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Here’s one that just came today. Be wary, as they are starting to catch the grammatical errors. The errors in this one are capitalization.
Hello ,I disagree with everyone here, it seems. Majoring in biology because of your family is the worst reason to do it, at least in American culture. It is time for you to begin your journey into what you are interested in most. If it is music, so be it. Music can provide a reliable living, through education, for one direction. Church music is another. You can go to any college with a music department, which most have, and preferably one with a good harp teacher who will give you a good foundation. You can also transfer to a music school after two years, or go for your graduate studies. If you want to play professionally someday, you need time to practice, three hours a day or more. Therefore, you need a light course load. I avoided classes with a lot of papers required. No, you probably can’t go to a conservatory right now, but in five years, yes you can. While making a living is important, education is important for its own sake, detached from practicality. That’s what the Liberal Arts are about. Sure, a lot of us came out not knowing business, but we were intelligent, employable people. An education taken solely for one type of job is narrow and unfulfilling. Of course, you have to have talent. I don’t like the idea of trying to be a harpist without an education in music. There are too many harpists with low standards and knowledge about music, not referring to anyone here. If I knew where you were I might be able to recommend a teacher. I will recommend Karen Thielen, who teaches at San Jose State and Santa Clara Universities in the San Jose area if you are anywhere near California. You can’t go into music and only be concerned about money, because then you will not be a good musician, in my view. You can keep harp as an avocation if you
I utterly reject that sentiment. It is diminishing to the harp.
I have composed some music for flute, oboe and harp. If Debussy was going to write a trio for the combination, he must have thought it a worthwhile group, and I have never known of such a combination. While flute and harp duos had a major heyday in the 1980s, there are very few duos touring or actively concertizing on a “high level” these days, or recording anything other than encores and tidbits. It’s a very large literature, and I think it is still ripe for development. It is a classic sound combination, one of the most ideal. I’m not sure a cello doesn’t sound better with it than a viola.
I think we need more harp and string quartet ensembles, or harp and string trios. And harp and wind quintet, even brass quintet. What we don’t need is a harp, marimba, trumpet and bass clarinet quartet. We also don’t have an all-male harp ensemble.
What is probably significant is what the return policy is. Can you return a harp merely because it is not quite what you were looking for? And what time period are you allowed to do this in?
I believe I have an unplayed lp of Gail Laughton’s Harps of the Ancient Temples. (I have one well played.)
What was so revelatory about Ruth Berman’s swing sets was how far she went with her arrangements, using cadenzas to modulate between songs, quoting pieces by Salzedo. If she were studying with him, I would bet that his hand was in them, and this is how he would have played pop music had he done so. They are far more imaginative than the many players who were basically making “muzak.”
What is your question about? Arrangements of folk tunes, classical themes, etc., are merely that, arrangements. Simplified versions of classical pieces are not classical music in the full sense. Sylvia Woods is a folk musician from way back, a folk harpist. I don’t know the extent of her classical background.
Yes, it was for a documentary film on Niagara Falls, so it is a four-movement suite, very powerful music, maybe more movements, but I don’t remember the exact title. I heard some Daugherty music played by the Philadelphia Orchestra, also had big harp parts.
When I save a shortcut or favorite for a site, it sometimes then blocks the site from opening for some reason.
Sorry, I must correct someone. Classical was never the pop music of its day, in our sense. There was folk music, ballads, romances and dance music all along. Familiar themes from classical music and the most famous classical pieces made it into home music-making as long as that was popular. The romance genre is the closest classical historically got to being popular, in my view. One of the most famous romances is “Plaisir d’Amour”, and if you think about the melody with a simple arpeggiated accompaniment suitable to piano, harp or guitar, you can see how it blended into pop ballads and Broadway.
Casper Reardon, and Ruth Berman Harris, to be sure. I have never heard anyone approach what they did. If their music had been available long ago, I think everyone would be playing differently. Miss Lawrence endorsed Verlye Mills in every sense.
Did I say topless??? Yes, strapless, and also tube-tops must never be worn for concerts. When? Maybe a wedding on a beach?
The Angel recording by Annie Challan of the Debussy Danses, Ravel Introduction and Allegro, Faure Impromptu, and the Pierne Morceau de Concert convinced me that if those works were in the harp literature, then it was worth learning to play the harp. When I first heard Chanson dans la Nuit I was totally taken with Salzedo. If I’d had the opportunity to really hear the literature for the harp, I don’t know what would have been different, but I might have started sooner. I wish I’d been able to hear the Conte Fantastique and solos of Caplet at first, more of Salzedo, and a lot less Godefroid and such.
While ebony harps look great, I have been frequently told that they don’t survive cosmetic blemishes well. If you do get one, you need a strategy to protect and repair the finish. If you want a simple, plain looking harp, why not get an ebony style 30 or 100?
Yes, but those are the most difficult and trying sections of the Danses! I think it is important as a composer not to copy the exceptional or extreme examples, but to work from a secure place. We can catch at a string just played, but it is hard to make it clean-sounding, and doing it over and over is exhausting. This Little Babe is evocative, but rather a nightmare to keep clean, and the buzzing interferes with projecting the right notes. On the other hand, bisbigliando and trills are timeworn safe devices with repetition. Having space between notes so the strings can continue ringing is a sure way to have the music and the harp sound evocative and fully colorful. So, therefore, in general, I would allow at least one beat between repeated notes at 72 or slower to the beat, until you are completely sure of playability.
