QUESTION FOR LEVER HARP PLAYERS

[Janis Cortese]

I have to say that the Douglas/Dilling sounds like a dream come true for a LOT of people. If they were more common, they’d be a strong contender for me. As it is, they feel too much like an old rotary-engine car where it might work well, but it might also be hard to have it maintained by a mechanic that understood how it worked.

[Biagio]

One could say the same about any pedal harp I think Janis. I’ve studied the Dilling/Douglas mechanism and it is quite similar to a pedal harp’s so a qualified technician from L&H or elsewhere should understand it readily. Still, it is a single action changing all at the same time which can be a drawback compared to levers OR pedals for some music. Aside from learning a cross strung, for ultimate flexibility on a non-pedal harp my vote would go to the fully levered double strung.

[susan-zevenbergen]

Jumping in, as a lever harp teacher…Most of my students (all lever harp) fall into two broad categories, those who have some music in their background and those who don’t. If they are already proficient at reading music, I love to use Kathy Moore’s Thumbs Up! Levers Up! It’s really an etude book, but one that those who are already musicians really enjoy.

More commonly, students fall in the second category and are starting from scratch with music. I used Pamela Bruner’s books for years, but have recently switched back to Sylvia Woods Teach Yourself book. That’s because it gets 4 fingers on right from the start and lets students play “real” tunes, no matter how simple. Neither is perfect, of course, so I regard them as jumping off places. I sometimes add in Friou, but usually not right at the beginning.

I also supplement like crazy in all the following areas:

Improvisation, right from day one (technique without reading, very crucial I find, plus they get to play way more notes than they could read)
Playing simple tunes by ear
Note and rhythm drills (written, electronic, etc).
Exercises pulled from the pieces they’re learning
Simple lead sheet pieces and elementary instruction about chords
Practice techniques, including one I learned from Alfredo Ortiz
Sometimes I have a singer, so we learn simple accompaniment patterns from chords early on (no melody required).

And of course, music theory, taught in chunks and some of my own materials. I’m going to start using Kathy Moore’s series Music Theory at the Harp, as I’ve found I can supplement it for lever players and I like the order and pacing. Many of my students won’t be ready for book one for awhile, though, as they are starting with the rudiments of music reading.

I love to follow the student’s lead. If s/he wants to play a favorite song, I’ll either find or create it in a playable form. For some students, I teach a lot more by ear and offer recordings. It’s so important to adult beginners to feel that they are making progress and getting to play music.

That doesn’t mean I’m not a stickler for technique (my teacher, Rachel Ellins, was trained in both classical traditions on pedal harp). We spend lots and lots of time on hand position for each thing they play. I just try to keep them learning on every front, and there is no one book that offers everything. This kind of creativity is what I find most fun as a harp teacher–working out how to help the person in front of me (even on Skype). I would have loved your teacher, Biagio.

Sorry to be long-winded. Just thought I’d give one lever harp teacher’s perspective.

[Aislinn Gagliardi]

Hi Carl,

I am a professional lever harpist in Chicago. To address some of the previous questions (I skimmed the answers so please forgive me if this has already been answered satisfactorily!):

I first learned lever harp from a mostly pedal/some lever teacher w/ Grandjany technique and using the Grossi exercise book. As a teacher I still make use of this book as well as L&H’s “Fun From the First 1 & 2” for lever harp students whether they learn by sheet music or by ear. Some of the short pieces in these L&H books have accidentals which make for a good starting point in helping the student get comfortable with changing levers during a piece. The majority of music I now focus on is traditional Irish although with my classical background I teach that as well if relevant. Either way, I’ll make sure that lever changes are happening from one piece to the next or within the piece if possible to help w/ lever comfort/ease when the student is ready for this.

Note that a fully levered harp will offer a variety of possibilities as far as what keys are readily available at any given time, depending on how you decide to tune it. That said, I first learned & continue to tune the harp to the key of C with all B, E & A levers up. This way, keys C-E major & keys C-Eb major (& all relative minors) are available w/o any additional tuning needed. This tuning gives a more balanced overall sound and reasonable amount of standard key options/accidentals w/o having to re-tune all the time; making standard “classical” & wedding rep easily accessible to the lever harpist. Enharmonics come in handy now & then as well 🙂

As far as lever harps go, agreed there is a wide variety and to some degree will depend on the maker. The “mid-size” lever harps usually range from 30 or 32 up to 36 strings, and then of course the lap harps w/ levers avg. anywhere from 19-28/30 (not often) strings. The majority of lever harps offer standard (pedal) string spacing, although I have found that most have a *slightly* lighter string tension. That said, the “lever harp” that L&H designed for pedal harpists is much taller, similar string tension/spacing to a pedal, and basically has levers instead of pedals (I wouldn’t consider it a good representation of your average lever harp).

The other exception to string tension on lever harps would be for what you earlier referred to as “folk harp.” Most of these far lighter tension & very responsive stringed lever harps are found by makers (such as Larry Eager) in the UK/Ireland to facilitate the fast dance music & other Celtic repertoire more commonly played there (far more than in the US overall by comparison). The only other makers outside of the UK/Ireland I have come across with a similar string consideration would be Camac harps and Larry Fisher based in Winnipeg.

My understanding is the type of wood for the soundboard will dictate overall tonality vs. the structural wood, which is why I opted for Koa for my newest harp, reducing the weight by 8 lbs! from my previous Walnut mid-size lever harp, and making it much easier to move around frequently for gigs. Ultimately if you have concerns about wood, as well as string spacing/tension/material/dimensions, I recommend talking directly to the maker/manufacturer whenever possible.

Hope this makes sense and hope this helps!

All the best, Aislinn Gagliardi

[Biagio]

A comment on wood choices….when a luthier sits down to develop a new design, he or she will first decide on several structural parameters: size, number of strings, tone, sustain, spacing, weight, expense – that sort of thing. Having decided those will set limits on what comes next.

Those are, first, string band and, second, sound board – the material and how it is tapered. What wood is used for the body has some relevance but not as much as the previous two. A heavier denser wood such as maple, especially for the neck, will not absorb as much energy as a lighter one such as walnut, thus enhancing sustain and relative brightness. But – and here is the important point – altering string composition and SB choices may serve to nullify that statement.

Some argue that a tone wood such as spruce or cedar without any hardwood veneer is the only way to go for the SB. High grade ply (typically 5 layers per 1/8 inch of birch, known as aircraft grade laminate) is dismissed as “OK only for lower end harps.” Others – and I am in this camp – point out that solid wood boards with a hardwood veneer (as most are made these days in the US) are also laminates, that a/c ply is considerably stronger and you can use a thinner more responsive board that will cost less.

I’d say that the proof is in the ears and pocket book. Two of my harps have the a/c laminate board; necks and pillars are made of maple piano pin block. In all modesty, honest, I’ve been told by some pretty famous players that they are “as good as anything out there.” Personally I think that the Triplett Eclipse and Salvi Egan sound better for what I had in mind, however, and if starting all over again I could have saved a lot of time just buying one of those!

Bottom line then: one should try a lot of harps and not just go on the descriptions, because they will often differ from one to the next even if they are the same design and the same wood.

[patricia-jaeger]

Carl, in your search for a lever harp, the type of harp which might suit someone who is used to pedals, is a Tyrolean Harp. It is common in Germany and Austria and is single action, with 7 pedals instead of any levers. Repertoire is not only all the lever harp music known in the USA but also a great amount of Bavarian and Austrian music published for it, for the most part very upbeat and cheerful. Some used harps of this kind might already be here in the U.S. Three US harp players had or still have this type of harp: Jill Whitman, Bellingham, WA (AHS), Laurie Rasmussen,(AHS) and Christina Tourin, now in Mount Laguna, California, with her company Emerald Harp Productions. Tyrolean harps all have the “banana-shaped” sound chamber. Perhaps someone in the Boston area has one.

[balfour-knight]

Perhaps Carl could start making Tyrolean harps? It sounds like they would be wonderful! I bet they are lighter weight than double-action pedal harps, too.

[Janis Cortese]

A single-action pedal is what my grandfather (and probably great-grandfather) played. It wasn’t from the Tyrol — although we don’t know who built it, really — but it was functionally identical to that sort of harp. I would truly love to own a tyrolean harp as a result, just a simple, plain wooden one without any of the little cherubs or angels or gold leaf all over everything.

[Author]

Posts