Photo - Keith Bryant
Internet Harper
There was a time when I collected instruments like crazy - they were so fascinating, especially those which explored so many different ways of stretching strings across a box and then twanging them to make a nice noise - zithers, dulcimers, langeleiks, Scheitholts, épinettes: you name it, I had it. Then of course, people wanted to hear them played, so that was fun - though tuning about 500 strings before a concert is something you can grow tired of in time.
But then I had nothing to play just for myself. So I got a harp. And played just for myself for a few years. Then of course, people wanted to hear it played, and that was fun too - only 34 strings to tune now.
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Photo - Keith Bryant |
I don't know of any more-satisfying way of being together with a few close friends than to sit round the fireside in my forest farm in the north of Sweden, though it doesn't happen often nowadays.
Over the years there have been many different sorts of music-making there: from courses for those who previously believed they couldn't sing, to rehearsals for concerts: from journeys of discovery of renaissance thinking and doing, to journeys of self-discovery.
The place where the farm is is called Lilla Löfsjön, 'Little Leaf Sea', and the Internet Harper web-site features recordings made by four friends under the name of "Musica Poëtica Löfsjö": Karin, Janet, Kjell and David.
I don't only play and sing at home, of course: nor is it only harp. These days harpsichord, organ and synthesiser crop up quite often too, and there are radio and disc recordings which prove that I've previously played clarinet, recorder, dulcimer and piano ...
In January 2002 I had the opportunity of both contributing repertoire and playing on a CD with half-a-dozen other professionals; and a year or two back I got to represent on TV a 19thC. harpist from this area who became musician to several royal houses in Europe.
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