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I have worked regularly in a Catholic church in which there were various degrees of sophistication, both musical and liturgical, among the assigned clergy. I wound up doing all manner of things from show tunes, LOTS of secular stuff, and some woeful garbage that somebody found at a Bridal Planning Event.
The nicest ones I ever did were the ones in which the happy couple said “You’re the pros- do what you think will be nice”. For those we always knocked ourselves out.
I still haven’t gotten over that ’40’s Salzedo that was on the L&H website a couple months ago. Doesn’t anyone know who bought it?
I love the idea and I’m a crabby pedagogy nut. I do something similar when re-learning a C clef that I haven’t used for a while, except without the color cue. It really is amazing how knowing a few notes and using them to orient the rest of the notes around them can make the task so much easier.
Thanks for sharing!
Older, are you working on this problem too?
Patricia, I really appreciate your response as well. I suspect part of my problem is being less than attentive at home when I have my mind on something else. When I’m at my teacher’s studio, I know that I have to keep my arm in the right position and at the right height. Seeing and studying your very clear explanation, I realized why the problem is worse at home than during my lessons.
I feel so fortunate to have a wonderful teacher as well as the input of this board. I’ve been able to teach myself to play several instruments in the past, some to an advanced level, but the subtlties of the harp make it a very difficult instrument to learn without the input of others.
I love the “big” Grossi book. The particular exercise in question is fun to play, sounds good, and teaches an essential skill.
Terrific for listening training, Erin! Just the kind of thing that works perfectly for training toddlers to be critical listeners, and that’s something that is harder than ever as the noise in their world exponentially increases.
Tiptoes for lightly plucked notes, marching feet for chords, big gestures for loud notes, tiny little gestures for soft notes. Just please be sure to use the terms short and long for the duration of notes, loud and soft for volume, and fast and slow for tempo.
I LOVE DOING KODALY WITH CHILDREN!!!!!!!!!!
My husband tells me that this car is the same body type as the Pontiac Vibe, a terrific smaller car that I rented for a while when my Subaru was temporarily out of commission.
I do understand the sight problems, but it certainly is a nice car. Don’t kn ow anything about the re-do.
Interesting, we did mostly Kodaly and just a little Orff. I can’t find a “bordun” but I think it might be spelled a little differently, and is a drone. I dream of being able to finish Kodaly certification.
Jennifer, if you’ve done any reading about the Kodaly Method, my very favorite teaching technique for children, you’ll find that tons of the Kodaly tools work wonderfully well with harp. I think some music therapy programs use a lot of Kodaly and Orff, and some I guess don’t. If you can find some articles online, I’m sure you’ll be able to adapt some goodies from them.
I hope all of us novices are bearing in mind with our advice that the question was about a chromatic harp, ie., one that is not relying on levers or pedals to produce a chromatic scale.
I have zero experience with a cross harp, but I do have
Hi Karen- As a trained musician, absolute novice on the harp, I find my teacher to be an excellent judge of what she needs to do and I need to do. She and I have come to a comfortable point of understanding my frustrations at wishing to be able to play everything perfectly the first time I see it, and her frustrations about my droopy thumbs and forearms. Sounds like you’re setting a course for yourself that works for you and your teacher.
The relationship of the height of my harp to the height of my chair was a huge problem for me. When the Thormahlens added “tall feet” to the Serenade, my problem was immediately solved. You really can’t decide about the proportions in terms of your height. I’m “short” (5’4″) but still need a taller harp.
This does take a little experimentation, but I think it’s definitely the first thing to consider.
I bought a humidifier from QVC (don’t ask) a couple weeks ago, but I haven’t tried it yet. The verdict is still out on “white dust”. Will post after I try it.
