The Downstairs Spider

$5.45

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Elizabeth Volpé Bligh’s The Downstairs Spider is for solo lever or pedal harp. The piece depicts the true story of a spider encounter within the composer’s harp studio. (See more about the story behind the music below.) This piece is also available as part of Volpé Bligh’s collection Solos for Lever or Pedal Harp.

This piece is available as a PDF download for $5.00.

Pages to print: 3 pgs.

Duration: @ 2:30

The story behind the music

Volpé Bligh explains, “A spider emerges from its hiding place in a wall of the harp studio. It wanders around the room, distracting the harpist, who then tries to trap it in a tissue, drops it, shrieks, then gets it into the tissue, goes upstairs and puts it outside, where it scuttles off to safety, or to be eaten by a bird. We just don’t know.”

Notes from the composer

The technique of muffling with the second finger in bar 70 is accomplished by playing the first note, then immediately placing onto the one above it, using the front of the finger to muffle the previous note, and so on. In bar 72, muffle the last notes by placing the chord of bar 73 very quickly.

I wrote this piece for the summer when I taught at the Island Mountain Arts Festival in Wells, BC, and premiered it on the opening faculty recital.