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Rudeness in the market place has become almost an expectation. For me, and it has happened very rarely, the drunk, laughing groomsmen were a particular annoyance. In one other instance, an organist missed a cue so one song was not performed during a wedding service.
The groom left the photographer in mid shot to ask me to refund part of the soloist’s fee to make up for the missing song. I siad I had no way to compute what I “owed” him, but that since I had sung for half an hour before the ceremony for free, he’d have to count that as part of my job. He wasn’t happy but he backed down.
Hate to imagine the scene when his wife bought herself an extra pack of gum.
It’s absolutely true, you have to let it roll off your back and not even consider giving it a second thought. If Evangeline could get through what the groom did to her, anyone can get through anything.
Thank you both! That’s the commercial. My husband laughed at me for calling the car a Toyota- it’s actually a Hundai (?), and the back of it is too small for a harp, the only criteria at present for cars in this house.
I just glimpsed the harp and it looked as though it was shaped a little differently than what I expected from a Troubador, also looked rather tall, very handsome.
Glad I wasn’t imagining that I saw it!
Saul- Through using both Pirastro and Savarez strings on various violins/violas I have noted that Pirastro is one of the very few companies producing anything that actually does improve on its products when it says so. Haven’t they recommended anything to replace the strings you’re looking for?
Also, Savarez strings are sometimes very hard to get here in the US. I was told once that they have some restrictions on what they release to certain countries and what they only sell in limited areas. I think there is a middle man between the company and retailers. This may happen all the time but I only wound up having problems with it trying to acquire a certain size string.
I know this post is full of generalizations, but if they apply to something you are looking for, the generalizations become important to you. Does that make sense?
Great! My younger feline child came to us as a 1 1/2 week old foundling, and about a year later, began to ohave frightful temper fits, persisting to this day. She has neither benefitted nor suffered from my playing, but I shall persevere!
I agree with Carl, especially in starting Kodaly/Orff (my bias is toward Kodaly, because it’s more fun than you can imagine, but also solid sound instruction). Kodaly teaches reading and listening training as being as natural as learning the reading of words and sentences. If you have a great general methods course in your college curriculum, ask the prof if h/s knows of some place where you can access Kodaly instruction- not “modified” Kodaly, or Kodaly “based”, get that little guy the REAL THING!
I do think though, that he must have some little harp to pluck. I can remember as a very small child how glorious it was to feel the touch of an instrument, and it sounds as though he might be the same way.
How lucky he is to have you as his brother and mentor!
There’s a new ultra-light on the Blevins website that looks very nice. Also, the Harpsicle Supersicle is ultra-light, and they’ve promised to post a sound clip “soon”. I love the sound of the Harpsicle, and the Supersicle is larger, so hopefully the sound is similar/larger.
There’s already a sound clip up for the Avee (the Blevins’ new harp). Decisions, decisions!
Kelly, I’ve been ogling the Blevins Amadeus for some time. It’s beautiful, and if the sound clip is any indication, sounds as pretty as it looks. May it bring you many happy times!
Sherry L.
Sorry, senior moment, returning to the reality of your question- didn’t Billie Holliday perform the song without accompaniment?
Hi Cei Cei! How good to see you. Hope all is well.
I had a little breakthrough over the weekend that I thought some of the ultra-beginners, like me, might enjoy.
I was playing through my Sylvia Wood Christmas Carols book, very slowly as I try to do, and evidently forgot to turn over a page, and all of a sudden I realized that I had played the “HARD” version of Jingle Bells, slowly but almost perfectly!
I was so proud of myself! I think it’s important sometimes to look back. Sometimes I feel as though I’m not making any progress at all, but those are the times when I need to go back and play something that was really hard 6 months ago.
It’s been tough to maintain a playable tempo when I’m practicing because I’m so used to the tempo I’ve been listening to for so many years.
I do have hopes that by next Christmas the Sylvia Wood book and I will be really good friends!
I have to disagree with John also. For better or for worse, it is certainly easier to provide a decent inexpensive violin for a student than it is to provide a decent quality harp, and it has been my personal experience in a reasonably middle class part of the tri-state NY area that very few students have exposure to the harp in their high school musical experiences.
Naturally, this is compounded by the fact that districts spend loads of money on marching band, but that is a discussion for another time.
I am familiar with one nearby school district that bought a lever harp for a student enrolled there. My personal choice in the particular situation would have been a small pedal harp, but there are so few students who were interested that at least there was a harp for students to see and hear.
I couldn’t agree more with CW’s comment about the flutes! Even a flute-harp package, offered as such, allows the student to march with h/h friends AND do something a bit more out of the mainstream at the same time.
I’ve never known any woodwind players who had a problem with relative strength or dexterity of the left/right hand. Some of the lower woodwinds require a pretty good deal of heft and torque and the left hand might be considered a little tougher because it’s a longer stretch than the right from the body.
I know there are woodwind players here who have added harp. Maybe they could weigh in. Maybe there’s also an additional difficulty in using the left hand simultaneously with the right instead of sequentially. Interesting to think about.
