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I have fairly easily injured fingers and certainly could not suddenly add an hour onto my usual time once or twice a week unless I am very careful. I play a lot more than two hours a day but only if I am playing daily. If I miss a week or two I have to work up again gradually. I could not play for more ethan about 20 mins as a young child. And I cover my fingers – I have a variety of tapes/bandaids/duoderm if they start to hurt and back right off fortes and glisses. I would never play on a full-on blister unless it was covered – I have ended up with holes in my finger doing that that took forever to heal. You just have to accept a slightly off tone and find a covering that suits you and stays on. There are a variety of things people dip their fingers into supposedly for toughening – ranging from some French homeopathic thing that didn’t work for me to methylated spirits! I wonder if she has quite moist fingers. Mine are worse in humid heat or if I have been swimming.
Which ones exactly do you hate? Salzedo’s originals are not whimsical, soothing or angelic. Scintillation, Ballade, Whirlwind? Elena Kats Chernin’s Chamber of Horrors. Hindemith. Crown of Ariadne. Britten Suite. Peggy Glanville Hicks sonata. Paul Patterson’s insect things. Many/most Baroque works. Spanish transcriptions. If you watch a recital by a great “classical” soloist like Sasha Boldachev (very good one on you tube) it might include “soothing” pieces like the Chopin Etude no 1 op25 but they are also haunting and passionate and it will have “epic” things too including his own arrangements of Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Petrushka!
Check out this version of Whirlwind too where you can see Alice’s hands…https://vimeo.com/32937680. the piece starts at 1.07 after the diary entry reading. I am studying advanced classical performance (harp) with Suzanne Handel at the Elder Conservatorium in Adelaide – about to start my second year. Just been to summer harp camp with Alice Giles for the 9th time – first a few days of how to teach the harp then masterclasses. My mother is fine thanks and working full-time but luckily she came to harp camp as our caterer as its impossible to find anyone good to do cooking locally there.
Lucia is my favourite. I will probably perform it for the first time in April. I have learnt several big Parish Alvars pieces but this certainly has some tricky bits as well as being long. There is a recording by Emmanuel Ceysson and a lovely you tube by Valerie Milot but I still cant work out quite how to do a long repeated right thumb section yet with tune taken by other right fingers. Valerie appears to do something different in that section! The grey donkeys has been more straightforward note wise but getting the donkey atmosphere needs some thought. I forgot that I am also slowly getting through Salzedo’s Whirlwind which will take a while to get up to speed and is rather a finger shredder with pages of glisses. But what a finale!
Thats what I call organised – getting ready for next Christmas. I have Les Annesses Grises by Tournier for the practice challenge, Liszt/Renie’s Le Rossignol, Bach Cello Suite No 2 transcribed by Victoria Drake which I love the Prelude of, a long project which is the Fantasie on Lucia di Lammamoor by Parish Alvars, the Debussy Sonate, Piazzola Cafe 1930 and Oblivion for flute and harp and also polishing the fast bits of Granada by Lara/Salzedo which are hard?impossible to get properly Spanish sounding at the marked tempo. (Plus Chopin’s Ballade no 3, Reflets dans l’eau Debussy and Beethoven Sonata Op 31 No 3 La Chasse on the piano stand).
Hi Elizabeth, hope you are well. I often think of you – especially when playing Tournier – you may not remember you suggested I might like to learn Berceuse Russe years ago in Italy. You were right and I like Images, Au Matin and the 2nd Sonatine now as well. Keep thinking about learning Feerie as well but so far not got around to it.
Yes, I saw the results too but the writing from the correspondent in Israel appears to have fallen by the wayside and been removed! You would think someone there would be keen to write about it for them.
All harps move around a lot unless all you do is play at home! That is indeed why you insure them. You will be very lucky indeed if you keep a well played and travelled harp perfect for very long – pick a finish that doesn’t show every tiny ding and fork out and use a decent 3 piece cover set. Stand guard against your orchestra colleagues knocking over their stands and pushing their chairs into it and don’t let other people move it for you unless they are your family and equally careful! You relax more after the first tiny blemish though. No one except the owner notices them. I have played some of both these makes and think both are quite variable so there is no way I would choose without playing. I have played one Chicago which I thought had good sound for the price (others were not nearly so nice)! Perhaps the Daphnes have less intervariability but still they do not all sound or feel the same.
I would really like to play this too if anyone has it – I could not find it on Svetlana’s website either! Thanks Philippa
I personally would be dubious about non-natural colour at a wedding or funeral where you don’t want to stand out even though I am a teenager. I doubt I would be employed in a conservative city like mine for the formal events although you could have a wig as well perhaps. Have you got a website to put your different looks onto then the clients could choose what they want. It is different for a soloist like Evelyn Glennie who is meant to stand out. Solo pianists are now often in stunning backless dresses slit up to the thigh and beyond and would be fine with hair of any colour if they play well enough I would have thought (think Yuja!). Unusual styling never stopped Nigel Kennedy either. And Catrin Finch plays classical harp
recitals in black leather and other edgy looks with modern hair but her own colour. But soloists are not competing with brides or coffins. Never outdo the bride, the bride’s mother or the coffin was what my teacher told me.They would very rare where you are second hand although I know he he has shipped some, expensive to export and look a bit space age (you can choose the colour from anything they spray cars with) but my 36 string Olwen by Andrew Thom is light, can be strung with different tensions although mine is concert and I have Camac levers. It has a big rich sound. There is a video of someone playing some of his if you put his name into youtube although mine sounds better than those at the top end.
I am a novice teacher too. All my own experienced teachers have said that they have a high attrition rate at the start compared with other instruments. You give/get basically the same lessons over and over again for a long time. The good news is that the harp at least sounds beautiful even when you only are playing Hot Cross Buns very slowly. You can add in a gliss and harmonics for some variety but basically learning to tune, getting positioned correctly at the harp, how to raise to the strings consistently, finding a comfortable and physiological hand shape and mastering closure and simple movements takes up lots of lessons. In addition if they do not read music then you have to think about how to address that unless you go by ear for a while. I incorporate some note reading and rhythm theory from the start. I quite like Old Tunes for New Harpists Mildred Dilling and A Bouquet for Young Harpists although I learnt with Suzuki Book 1 (goes very fast for many people) but I also make up things and use other books. I accompany students with a secondo part during a lesson (you can make these up as you go along) so they hear their tune embellished and let them experience playing with someone else. I always get them to take video clips of me playing what ever they are doing and encourage them to video themselves to see how they are progressing. I agree that they have to really want to do it though and many underestimate the work it takes. And they have to want to come and see you so you have to find something they like – I think one of mine comes more to visit my cat and get a cat sticker for practising at least 5 times a week! And she always wants to know if there are any Chocolate Afghans in the pantry (a homemadeNew Zealand really good cookie/biscuit). I also bribe them with a promise they can play in the ensemble at my first teacher’s Xmas concert if they can manage a few carols well (one hand only) which is a big garden party with Xmas lights and lots of harp and non-harp items. That seems to keep some going.
We have a Voyager Manhasset at home which works fine although its not very attractive. Its usually easier to transport it as is not taken down though. My everyday home stand was a present from my grandmother the Xmas after I got my pedal harp – a MisterStandMan Victorian Lyre with a double shelf with my initial in it. He did a perfect wood colour match for my harp and it takes loads of books at once. I love it but it was expensive.
http://www.misterstandman.com/Vicinitial.htmI will add to that. Some advice for 2nd harps who might want to be asked back – be very early, make the 1st harp nice cups of tea and never ever practise their cadenzas if they are in earshot! Thats from the UK. I think it’s probably coffee in rest of Europe and Australia….no idea about the US.
I still am very much a student of the harp. But one of the things that I find useful that has not been mentioned was Alice Giles’s advice about “letting go” after the finger or thumb has swung into the hand. It is really hard to let go and you often think you have but actually have not – its much harder than to play. But you can hear the difference. Along with advice that everyone’s hand shape/finger placement will look different – but that every placement and movement should follow the natural anatomy/physiology of that particular hand/finger. I often use Heidi Lehwalder’s image for big chords of “swoop in, play and then go up the vase” and use the hand exercise she showed me that Salzedo used to do when away from his harp – bringing all his fingers into the palm starting with the little, 5,4,3,2,1 in quick succession.
Hi Elizabeth, I love that site too. I hadn’t seen that latest article. I went to Alice’s teach the teacher how to teach beginners course this year which was really fun and had lots of experienced teachers as well as brand new ones on it. I learnt heaps about teaching but I dont think anyone mentioned that advice. Have you ever had a student do the bulletproof musician online course on improving performance and if so how did they go? I was wondering about doing it as part of my research project for school next year but its hard to work out how to judge how well or not it works or which bits of it work best!
My tip would be to watch yourself on video and see how your hand and fingers look and how you close your fingers. Each hand will be a little different according to size and finger length but you will see if you look comfortable and like a version of what you are trying to do. Helps if you get a video of doing it properly at a lesson so you have something to aim for. Once you know what sound you are aiming for it gets easier too but again, you need a teacher to help with that.
