Notes from the Harp
Issue #8 April 2008

Welcome to Notes from the Harp!

Happy Spring! In this issue, I'm sharing my favorite tips on how to love your harp practice, creating that energy and flow that keep you enchanted with your instrument. Little shifts in your approach to the harp can make a big difference. Try it and see!

We'll also look at two-hand coordination, improvising with harmonic minor scales, and little-known sources of free music for you to download.

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In This Issue:

Article
Top Ten Ways to Love Your Harp Practice

Technique Tip
Two-Hand Coordination

Improvisation Starter
Fun with Harmonic Minor Scales

Resources
Music Music Music

As harpists, we spend a lot of time focusing on technique, trying to get the perfect hands, the buzz free and rich tone, the precise anticipation of placing, the rhythm of not only playing the notes but flipping our levers (or pedals). Sometimes, it’s easy to forget that while all of these are helpful and essential to playing the harp, none of these things are what drew us to love this amazing instrument.

In previous issues of Notes From the Harp, I've given you other ideas to enhance your practice, as well as approaches to improve your attitude about practicing. This subject comes up again and again for adult students because we all have such high expectations for ourselves. A skill like learning to play the harp, however, takes time and gentle patience, and it's easy to feel discouraged when being a smart and capable adult doesn't translate into the instant results we may experience in other parts of our lives.

Teachers may remind us to focus on the music, or to have fun, or to get “in the flow” with our playing, but just how do we do that? Here is a list of wonderful tricks that help re-establish the open, exploring, passionate mind that we have at our best moments at the harp. Next time you find yourself needing to break away from your inner perfectionist, try one or more of these helpful approaches.

1. Before you play, bring your attention to your body, paying attention to all its sensations, your posture and breath. Purposefully relax and invite the music to flow through you.

2. Cultivate an open curiosity as you look forward to discovering new avenues into the music and your own ability to play it.

3. Play a piece of music that wakes up your passion, touches your soul and stirs your deepest feelings.

4. Make up a story or draw and picture that goes with the music, and then play the music with your story or picture in mind or in view.

5. Play a piece of music as “badly” as you can. Not only will you tickle your sense of humor, but you’ll make musical discoveries.

7. When your mind wanders away from your playing, focus your attention to listening to every note and every nuance of what you’re playing.

8. Learn to overcome the urge to stop at every mistake, instead noticing without judgment and bringing your focus back when it wanders.

9. Don't be rigid or static. Let your body and emotions move with the music. Sing as you play. Dance your music away from the harp.

10. Record your progress. Look back at what was hard last month or last year and really notice how far you’ve come.

Many students struggle with the task of coordinating their hands, especially as they move in different directions at different times and with different placing groups. If you find yourself in a stuck place with the piece you're learning, don't just keep "trying" to make your hands work together. Instead, try one of these magical techniques for laying down the pathways in your brain and body that will help you, not only with this piece but with those to come.

Assign one part of the music (either hand) to another part of your body. Sing it, tap it with your foot or on your lap, or say nonsense syllables (doo bee doo be do) that fit the music while you play the other part on the harp. You may feel silly, but you will make more progress this way than you can imagine.

Try tapping the rhythm of each part with your two hands, on your lap (no harp required).

Or, tap one part with one foot, and one with one hand. Cross your body; in other words, use your left hand or foot for the right hand part and vice versa.

While we're on the subject of crossing, try simply playing the right hand part with your left hand (alone) until you can do so relatively smoothly, and then learn to play the left hand part with your right hand. If you're really brave, you can try them together, but this isn't necessary.

Now, after all the crazy experiments, put your hands together as originally intended and see what happens!

If your harp is tuned in C (or you've put up your levers for C), engage your G# levers. In your left hand, play the following chords in succession (called a chord progression): Am, E, F, E. (The notes in those chords are ACE, EG#B, FAC, and again EG#B). Let's use 4/4 time and play the chord just on beat 1, changing chords every two measures.

Now, in the right hand, you may play any notes, but you'll notice that when your LH chord is F, the G# sounds rather dissonant, so you might want to avoid it on those measures. That same G# gives the harmonic minor it's distinctive sound, creating the E major chord instead of an E minor chord. Whether you understand that music theory or not, you can have fun experimenting with this scale. Glissing and fluttery patterns are very satisfying with this tuning.

By the way, if you have only F, C and B levers on your harp, disengage the B's to create Bbs, and then engage the C#s. Now your harmonic minor scale is Dm. Play Dm, A, Bb, and A chords to go with this scale, and avoid the C# when playing the Bb chord. (Chord notes are DFA, AC#E, BbFD, AC#E).

Have fun!

In addition to her well-known harp books, harpist Maryjean Zarick now offers some free pop harp arrangements as well as free video lessons for beginners. All you have to do to download these goodies is register at her site. Find her website here: Paradise Harp Music

If you love the tunes of the famous blind harper, Turlough O'Carolan, you can download all of them (melody only), listen to them as midi files, and use them to create your own arrangements. These tunes and many others are available at the Old Music Project

You might not be aware that many composers and arrangers who use Sibelius software post their music on the web for download. You have to install the Scorch viewer to see and print the music, but some of the music is free and there are lots of interesting gems here (as well as some very funny "harp" pieces written by folks who are clueless about the harp, but that's fun, too): Sibelius Music

All content by Susan Zevenbergen, Copyright 2008.

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