Skip to main content

Anne Morse Hambrock Harp News

Search This Blog

Buddy Blues -YouTube Video Original

Get link
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Email
Other Apps

An original tune inspired by a bass line from the great Buddy Guy!

Get link
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Email
Other Apps

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular Posts

Teacher's Corner With Anne Morse Hambrock - Hand Position; Why Does It Matter?

I would like to begin my Teacher's Corner segments with hand position because, of all the challenges involved in playing harp, it is the one most likely to make or break your playing experience. The appropriate hand position will not only lead you to greater success musically, it will minimize tension and promote a longer playing career. This segment will not focus on specific hand positions (that will be in segment two) but will focus on why hand position matters and what it contributes to your playing. To properly address hand position we will need to break it into two parts: A) Tone and B) F acility . Let's start with tone . One of the nice things about the harp is that, once it is properly tuned, it naturally sounds good almost any way you play it. To clarify my meaning, it is not at all like the sound of a violin or clarinet in the hands of a beginner - no squeaking and squawking. That said, some sounds on the harp are more pleasing than others. The ton

Teacher's Corner With Anne Morse Hambrock - Teaching Blind Students To Play Harp

Recently a colleague asked for tips to help teach a blind harp student. When I first began teaching harp at Carthage College, there was a blind student who owned a lever harp but had only taken about 3 harp lessons before I met her. She had been doing the best she could on her own and was very frustrated. We got right down to it and, after four years of hard work together, she was able to give a senior recital split between harp and piano. She and I were very proud. But the journey was not easy. The first difficulty we found was the lack of good sheet music for the blind harpist. There were very few pieces to choose from. Not only that, the pieces we found did not seem to have been vetted at all. It felt as though a publisher made an arbitrary decision "This music is popular, let's also publish it in braille!". So we took another approach. Step one was to make sure she was sitting at the right height and to always sit in exactly the same position at the

Harp Study In College For Non Majors!

Recently a colleague asked me if I would ever consider accepting a harp student at the college level who did not want to major in harp. My answer was a resounding "Yes!!" I enjoy working with harp majors - it is always great to help harpists who are super serious about their instrument to further their career path. But I also feel that there are only so many job opportunities out there for those who choose to major in harp performance. During my teaching career of over 30 years I have coached hundreds of harpists who went on to major in things like law, medicine, business, pharmacy studies, language, etc. but still wanted to keep playing harp. Some of them went on to be part-time professional harpists, as an addition to their other careers, and some only played for fun, but they all wanted not only to keep playing, but to continue to grow. Both as harpists and as overall musicians. Now that I have grand concert pedal harps in place at both The University

Powered by Blogger