A Festival of Irish Music with Acacia Lyra

Posted on February 23, 2009 by Celticharper

March 10th 2009: A Festival of Irish Music with Acacia Lyra (harp and voice duo)

The Irish Society of the National Capital Region, Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Eireann, Ottawa Branch, and The Gaelic Hour CHIN 97.9fm presents A FESTIVAL OF IRISH MUSIC. This concert, which launches Irish Week in Ottawa, will feature ACACIA LYRA, harp and voice duo with Janine Dudding and Susan Sweeney Hermon. Also performing are the Cohmhaltas Ceoltóirí Eireann Traditional Musicians, the Sarah Shea Irish Dancers and the Ottawa Celtic Choir.

Library and Archives Canada Auditorium,
395 Wellington St., Ottawa.
7:30 pm, Doors open at 6.30 pm.
Tickets $17.50, www.ticketweb.ca
The Ottawa Folklore Centre, 613-730-288

Info courtesy of the OntarioHarps list.

The Wrong Trousers Rock Lestats

Posted on February 8, 2009 by Celticharper

I just can’t get enough of these kids. Although it’s hard to find YouTube videos of them with any kind of decent sound quality (believe it or not, this is one of the better ones). One of my favourite performances of theirs is a street performance of Video Killed the Radio Star that we posted earlier here. The official Wrong Trousers MySpace page can be found here.

Masters of the Celtic Harp

Posted on July 18, 2008 by Celticharper

Grainne Hambly and William Jackson. Presented by the Blue Ridge Irish Music School on Saturday March 31st, 2007. The music is lovely; although it’s too bad you can’t see Grainne’s hands when she’s playing. Warning: Occasional shaky cam action.

Vincenzo Zitello in concert: playing two harps at once

Posted on May 4, 2008 by Celticharper

Update February 2009: Found a version of this concert on YouTube, so I was able to embed it below. Enjoy!

Playing two harps at once is quite a feat; but doing it well is even more impressive. You can learn more about Vincenzo Zitello by visiting his website: http://www.vincenzozitello.it

Of Harps and Windmills

Posted on February 11, 2008 by Celticharper

Sarah Deere-Jones on Celtic and Aeolian Harp, with windmill accompaniment.

If the above video doesn’t play on your machine, go to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXTRCibYJXQ

Two unique uses of the harp

Posted on July 27, 2007 by Celticharper

Kids rock: Three high school kids (a group known as “The Wrong Trousers”) put on a great street performance of “Video Killed the Radio Star” (with harp, mandolin and stand-up bass).

Update Feb. ’09: Also found this version on YouTube; enjoy!

The sound quality isn’t ideal, but it’s a wonderfully unique use of the instruments, and the kids do a really good job (somewhat strained vocals at the end not withstanding).

On a slightly weirder note, there’s harptallica.com – harp duet versions of 10 Metallica songs, coming soon to a CD near you (be afraid… be very afraid).

February Tune: Drowsy Maggie

Posted on February 24, 2007 by Celticharper

Drowsy Maggie is an example of the type of quick reel that is often played in sessions. We usually do this in a set with several other E minor reels. The chords are fairly simple, mostly alternating between Em and D in the A part; and D, A and G in the B part.

The HarpBlog Tune of the Month is courtesy of Chubby Sparrow Music . For a printable version, right click on the picture and choose “save target as”, or pop over to the Chubby Sparrow Free Music page for more detailed printing instructions (note: if you just left click and try to print directly from the browser, it probably won’t print at the right size).

Harps in Historical Paintings: Domenico Zampieri

Posted on February 9, 2007 by Celticharper

The well-known picture of King David playing a triple harp, by Italian painter, architect and harp-builder Domenico Zampieri (1581-1641). You can click on the image to get a bigger picture. The colour in the larger image isn’t quite as good, but it does show more detail, including a bit more of the top of the painting, and you can see the strings on the harp more clearly.

A number of harp-makers have made replicas based on this painting. Since Zampieri was himself a harp-builder, one might assume that the harp is accurately represented. However, having King David play a triple harp of this sort is, according to Roslyn Blyn-Ladrew, “an anachronistic error by Zampieri of over 2000 years”. You can see Ms. Blyn-Ladrew’s full article here.