December 09, 2024

Simplicity and Stillness: How to Create Calm in Your Harp Playing - PHH 186

35 minutes

One of the things I love about watching virtuoso artists perform is how easy they make it look. For instance, just this past summer I attended a reunion of many of us who attended the Salzedo Summer Harp Colony in Camden, Maine. One of the highlights of that weekend was a concert of music written by Carlos Salzedo, and the star performer on that concert was Judy Loman. She is in her eighties, and she walked onto the stage with as much comfort and ease as if she were in her own harp studio at home.

One of the pieces she played was Salzedo’s Variations on a Theme in the Old Style. This is a monster piece, very long and very difficult. She told the audience how she first heard and fell in love with the piece when she was taking lessons with Salzedo in Maine in the summer as a young child - I think she was ten. As she was walking to her lessons, she heard this piece wafting from the windows of houses where other older harpists were practicing it. She asked Mr. Salzedo if she could learn it, and he told her she could learn it when she was fourteen years old. I believe he actually let her learn it when she was twelve. She said she still loves it and has been playing it ever since.

So here she was on stage, over seventy years later, playing the Variations for us. This wasn’t just brilliant playing for an eighty-something year old. Hers was just incredible playing. And here’s my point - she made it look so easy. Most of us harpists break a sweat when we play this piece. When we finish, we are mopping our brows and feel like we’ve run a marathon. But not Judy. It looked - and sounded- as easy for her as playing a simple little ditty. Every motion was just what it needed to be and nothing more. I’m not talking just about arm motions or raising. Her arms and hands were calm when she played. Hers is an efficient technique, one that allows her to play with security and strength and without extra energy. That kind of efficiency, that kind of stillness, is what we should all strive for in our technique, and it’s never more important to think about than now when the holiday frenzy is in full swing.

Today, we’ll talk about how you can add stillness to your harp playing right now in your technique, in your playing and in yourself. I have some simple tips that will help you feel more relaxed not just in the holidays but after the holidays too.

Links to things I think you might be interested in that were mentioned in the podcast episode: