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Over the past few years I have been converted to %100 software based recording as opposed to dedicated device recording.
If you have a smart phone of any kind you can almost certainly find a recording app. A tablet of any kind is even better. And best option of all is a decent laptop. If you have a laptop running windows you can download Audacity for free. And MacBooks come with one of the best programs for doing simple recordings for free, GarageBand.
So if you have any of these pieces of equipment then you already have the hardware, and possibly the software (or you can easily find the software cheap or free).
Once software based recording was complicated and buggy. These days it is often the easier, and even cheaper, solution as the basic tech that is needed many people already own. The average laptop these days is sufficient without the need of an expensive, super powered, dedicated machine. Even a phone can do it.
I think it depends on what you want to play. If you want to play classical or more popish music I would go with the Ogden.
If you are primarily interested in Celtic music then I would go with teh Ravenna.
But as you said, they are all great harps.
What do harps have in common with elderly parents?
They are both unforgiving and difficult to get in and out of the car.
Keep them in their individual plastic, zip lock bags they typically come in. Store them in a dark place. Preferably one that is reasonably climate controlled (not too hot, not too humid, etc…).
That’s about the best you can do. They will last a fairly long time, and if you use them to restring your harp every year or two and then replace them you should never have a problem. Stored like this they should easily last two years in storage and two years on the harp if you are a non-professional who practices an hour or two a day.
If you are a pro who performs frequently and practices
If you like Sylvia Woods’ arrangements then try her other pop arrangements. She has books of Beatles songs, John Denver, and her book of 60’s music are all very fun to play and I find that people really enjoy them.
Amps are a tough topic. It is very subjective. Also there are often needs that require features that can take precedence over sound. For instance many people are more concerned with portability and having something battery powered, but personally, while some of those are acceptable sounding, I have yet to find one that really sounds as good as many amps that lack those particular features.
My amps of choice for harp are the Fender Acoustasonic series. They are specifically designed for use with acoustic instruments, can handle the full range of the harp with little difficulty, have good on board eq, two channes input so you can separate out the bass from treble and eq them separately, and best of all it has a feedback control that helps eliminate that screeching.
Oh, and they can be cranked up very loud.
One area where harpists need to catch up with the guitarists and bassists of the world, in my opinion, is in attention to amps. Most guitarists have come to learn that if you are playing amplified then your amp is half your sound, as important as your instrument. That’s why guitarists often have multiple amps for different music, just as they often have different guitars for different kinds of music. There isn’t a one size fits all solution, and a lot has to do with what the individual musician wants in terms of tone.
Ultimately you need to go try a bunch out and hear for yourself the comparison between different amps. A much bigger pain to do when you play the harp as opposed to guitar, but ultimately worth the effort.
A lot of Salzedo’s music is a bit challenging for those not used to it.
Not all music is meant to be pretty, entertaining, background noise. Some people appreciate that and some don’t.
I wonder how a Dilling harp would be classified. It looks like an Irish folk harp, but the mechanism is like a single action pedal harp, only using toggles instead of pedals.
Confounding innovative harp builders messing up the convenient harp classification dichotomy!
Well, I’m probably not the one to answer since when I started I had no intention of playing pedal harp, but I ended up playing pedal harp.
But…
I know plenty of harpists who have no desire to play pedal harp. There are plenty of harpists who even played pedal harp and moved exclusively or almost exclusively to lever harp.
Pedal harp strings and tension is a matter of taste and not necessarily a tool simply to move people on to pedal harp. Having both lever harps with “folk” stringing and “pedal harp” stringing I simply prefer the tension and feel of strings when strung like a pedal harp. I have big hands so the narrow spacing and thin strings are more of a problem for me, although I can manage.
As I have mentioned elsewhere, I don’t like the idea that the lever harp is some kind of stepping stone to the pedal harp. Not that it can’t be. Since it takes a while before someone becomes proficient enough for pedals to become a real necessity for most people who do want to play pedal harp eventually, the lever harp is a good, less expensive option to get your feet wet and learn the basics while you save up for that very expensive pedal harp.
But that is just one end that lever harps serve. They are instruments in themselves. All instruments have their strengths and their limitations. The strengths and limitations of a lever harp vs. a pedal harp can often make it the better options.
And the number of pedal harpists out there who also play lever harp as well I think indicates that there is more to it than the idea of “moving up to” a pedal harp from levers. If that were so there would be no need for most harpists to keep a lever
It all depends on the music you play. If I played nothing past the medieval period, or perhaps if I were an angel, then sure, levers would not be an issue. But then the gods created chromatic music.
Since the majority of the music I play on lever harp would be pretty much impossible to play without levers, I find them rather indispensable. And a beginner who doesn’t know for a fact that they only want to play diatonic music from now till eternity would do well to consider levers.
It’s a good harp. That they take more finger strength to play I don’t agree with. In terms of the strings the Blue is no different than the other Camac concert harps, and they are very similar to most other pedal harps. There is no real standard, and there is some variation from make to make, but for the most part the string tension of the major harp builders are similar enough that it shouldn’t be an issue.
If you need a harp that can play chromatic music, but you don’t require the full range of a concert grand, and you need to amplify fairly regularly, then the Camac little big blue is a great choice.
As for the electronics, they are pretty stable. I have a Camac baby blue and after many years it still hasn’t given me much to complain about. When the occasional issue does pop up it is usually very minor and so far I have had nothing happen that I couldn’t fix myself in just a few minutes.
As always, you should go try out the harp you intend to buy yourself first to see how it works for you. But as a general rule Camac makes good harps and are a good choice.
