Re: [Harp-L] practice harps

[Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

Playing a bad harp will make you damage a good one.

I'm being dramatic to make a point. When you play a leaky, unresponsive
harp, you may use more force and push the harp a lot harder to get what
you need out of it. You then form habits based on the poor response of
that harp.

When you apply those ingrained habits to a responsive harp, you're
likely to push it too hard. The force you needed just to get through to
 the reed on the leaky harp will now go directly to the reed, full
force, on the good harp. Result is that the reed will now get more
energy than it can handle and will blow out sooner. It also means your
artistic interpretation will suffer because everything will be hard
hammer blows.

If you don't want to wear out your best harps doing repetitive drills
and exercises, at least use harps that are in good to very good playing
condition. This prepares you better to get the most out of a good harp
and lets you form good playing habits.

I would do artistic practice on the best harps, the ones you'll use in
performance.

I remember a story by the orchestral conductor Antonia Brico. She went
to Italy to conduct an opera at a prestigious opera house (La Scala? I
don't remember). She worked hard in rehearsal with the orchestra to get
a disciplined, nuanced reading of the score. Then she showed up to do
the performance only to find a whole new group of faces looking at her
- the  players had all hired subs so they could play other gigs and now
had no idea what she wanted - she had to go along with their customary
interpretation in large part.

Using your best harps only for performances is a little like that - how
will you know what you can get out of them artistically if you never
use them until you get on stage? They will be strangers to you.

Winslow

--- drori hammer <drori_hammer@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hi, list!
>   Here`s a question I have not seen discussed here, but that I`ve
> been debating for a while: which harps to use for practicing on? For
> a long time I subscribed to the notion that I should save my best
> harps for gigs, cause it would be a bummer to blow a reed on my
> favorite harp while practicing, then not have it for the gig
> (although now I don`t ruin reeds as much as I did as a begginner -
> still , every harp "goes south" sooner or later) - I also figured
> that using a cheap, leaky old harp to practice on would be like a
> baseball player with a weight on his bat in the on-deck circle: when
> you get to the gig with a good harp, it`ll seem that much easier.
>   I started to doubt this wisdom when I started learning to overblow.
> What good is practicing on a harp which technically prevents you from
> using the technique you`re trying to learn?
>   How about all you guys who spend over $100 for a high-end
> customized harp (or even an out of the box Seydel 1847)? do you use
> that for practice, or save it for the gig?
>   I`m curious to hear your opinions
> 
> 
> Dov Hammer 
> www.dovhammer.com 
> www.myspace.com/dovhammer
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