Did you know that there is now a harp emoji?! If ever there was a must-have addition to your phone, this has got to be it!
It wouldn’t be surprising if you hadn’t heard – this just happened recently. The Harp emoji was approved as part of the latest update by the standards organization. It was published in Unicode16.0 and Emoji 16.0 in September 2024 and was introduced on iPhones last week.
This might be the most exciting tech news of 2025!
It will be challenging to use the harp emoji to mean anything except harp-y stuff (no weird fruit or veg connotations here) so you should feel free to use it everywhere you would normally emoji-ate.
I’m not a phone tech genius, but if you’d like to add this brilliant emoji to your device, you can wait for your phone update – rollouts will be going on throughout the year. But if you just can’t wait, I found directions (no assuring they are the best, just info I found) here for Android or here for iOS.
Usually I talk about things I actually know. This isn’t really in my knowledge space, and I encourage you to read up on it if you’re interested. Here are some of the references I used:
I’m going to wait until it gets pushed to my phone but if you’re an early adopter, I’d love to hear about how you go with adding the harp emoji to your phone. Let me know in the comments!
I get it. YouTube is an attractive nuisance. After all, where else can you go to learn all you ever needed to know right now about how to change a tire, make a martini…or play the harp?
I’m not denigrating or disparaging people who are trying to earn a buck/rise to prominence/achieve world domination (by teaching harp?) – it’s a living.
But…
There are limits to what you can learn by watching someone else do something four dimensional in a 2D space. Especially if you get caught up and watch video after video after video… Made worse if the time you spend watching other people play uses up all the time you have for the harp. Then you are not coming out ahead. Because no matter how much you can learn by watching, the real learning is in the doing – you know, the actually touching your harp, p-r-a-c-t-i-c-i-n-g!
I’m not talking here about content for which you have paid, online courses by legitimate professionals, or online lessons. I’m also not talking about short stints of poking around all the offerings – good, bad, and ugly – to get a feel for the wider world. No, I’m talking about all the schlock that’s out there – the stuff by any yahoo with a harp, a phone, and connectivity. Those people embody “you do you”. You, on the other hand? Is watching their videos really the best way to spend the precious little time you have for harp each day?
No. Turn that off and practice the things you are working on. On your real harp, in your real life, at your current real level. You don’t need to play at some weird angle, or hold the harp like it’s falling, or any of the other crazy stuff you see. Because like all the other unfluencers online (in every genre), you’re only seeing the stuff that made the edit – the false glam, the fake ease, and the counterfeit first-take. You know what you don’t see? The hundreds of lessons and the hours of practice behind every second of the video. They have already done the work so that it looks flawless, easy, and common. Online, everything is easy and you can be just like them. And you don’t even need to practice.
Right….
But this the real world. Yes, of course a little inspiration can go a long way. You should definitely have harp heroes that you aspire to be just like – in your own way. And just like every other worthwhile endeavor, then you should turn YouTube off. The answer is not on YouTube, just in you.
I often hear people relate that they can’t play a tune yet, because it’s not ready – it’s not perfect.
Pfffttttttt
There is no perfect. There is just today. There’s as good as you can make it just now. Be the star you are.
I get it. It’s ouchie to perform. It can make anyone anxious to get out there. Especially when some of the repertoire doesn’t feel near ready, much less perfect. And that’s a shame, because I can’t think of any music that was generated to not be shared!
But then there’s that endless loop inside heads that sort of goes:
How can we get past that – because really, music is meant to be shared! Here are five things to keep in mind:
One. Don’t be anxious (I know, easy for me to say). A lot of the time we are afraid and/or anxious – the tune isn’t perfect and I’m going to look stupid, people are going to know I’m faking it, I can’t withstand the humiliation of not being flawless, etc.
I hate to break it to you, but it’s not about you. People genuinely enjoy music. Even more, people love to hear live music. And they can get ecstatic being in an audience which is small enough that they can actually meet and have a conversation with the artist. You truly are offering a boon to someone, and you should acknowledge that!
Two. Playing perfectly is a failure. If you actually play perfectly, it likely means that you missed the mark for the audience. Every audience is different, even if it’s the cat and curtains or the same people on a different day, so you need to play differently for each of them. People who are listening to you play want heart, to make a connection, to feel. None of that is included in perfect. Perfect is mechanical, static, and dead. Ick.
Three. Rise to play again. So you missed a note or two (or a hundred), got off the tempo, got flustered, or otherwise felt like you didn’t do well. Maybe I haven’t swayed you off being perfect yet, so, here’s another harsh reality – you’re going to play those tunes jillions of times and there’s never going to be perfect. And that’s ok. Ref 2 above. Instead, think about how you got where you were (when something fell apart) and…
Four. Focus. Learn from the foibles of your wobbly performance and use that to focus your practice. Learn from your mistakes and go forward to make new, bolder, more daring, more creative mistakes! Learning goes both ways too. Sometimes your fingering deserts you and you can’t extricate yourself from a bad situation gracefully – then spend time evaluating your fingering and making repetition your friend. Sometimes you miss the chord you were aiming for and you get some glorious, jazzy sound – remember that stuff and mine it for more cool ideas!
Five. You are amazing, right now, right here – just accept that as true (because it is). Concentrate on comparing you to yourself. Every time I get off stage I am struck by two things – how many mistakes I made (I’m not going to lie – I am human) and how much better/easier/less terrifying it was than the time before and definitely since I started! This metric helps pull me through those times when I’m pretty sure I played with rented fingers all the while allowing me to be kinda pleased with my progress (no matter how slow it has been!).
At this point, you might be thinking that I write about this a lot. Well, I’m going to keep writing about this as long as you keep telling me about how you’re not perfect – and until it sinks in that you are good enough and that you should just shut up and play!*
When does the need to be perfect get in your way? Have you ever had that need cause you to seize up (I have!)? Never had that happen? Great – how did you get there? Let me know in the comments!
*Please don’t be offended, I say this to myself any time I start to feel me pulling back. We don’t play for glory or perfect-ing but because we love it, so we should all sit back, enjoy the ride, and shut up and play!
Harp can be a somewhat lonely instrument. We play solo so often. If we play in recitals we are likely to be alone on the stage. It’s not that we can’t play with others, it’s just that we do spend a lot of time on our own.
But playing in an ensemble is something special! I cannot encourage you enough to find a way to play with somebody – other harpers, other instruments, combinations of two, three, 100 – whoever you can find to play with.
Playing with others gives you the opportunity to remember that when we’re making music, it’s not about you. And playing with others in ensemble can yield incredible benefits to you as a musician. I hear you saying (skeptically), “like what?”
There are the obvious benefits like being part of a team and being camouflaged. But there are even bigger payoffs. Here are some ideas for your consideration.
Being on a team shifts your attention from what you are doing to what you are doing together. No one has the lead the whole time. The melody moves between the players and parts. Sometimes you have the harmony, or the melody variation, or a highlight bit. The pressure to perform is shared. You can breathe!
You learn the importance of following the conductor. This can be obvious with a person standing in front of you, reading a score, and herding the cats with a baton. Or it can be subtle with someone selected to set the tempo, or count you in, or do some pseudoconducting (waving an arm to direct until their part starts and they have to play too). No matter the level of conducting, you must pay attention and listen to the direction you’re receiving. You’re not solo and you need to follow the conductor as a part of the ensemble team.
All of this is built on you having strong skills – good technique and good musicianship. You will be listening for your own tone, rhythm, dynamics as agreed, and you will be filling in tweaks to create the shared music.
But perhaps most importantly, you have to know your place. You must listen to the whole, not just your part. You listen for your entrances and make compromises to ensure the music is musical. You have to hear how your part fits into the whole. And you have to hear how the other parts are in and around your part. You will only get that if you listen intently and with purpose. You need to match yourself to the rhythm of the group and incorporate the inflections of the ensemble.
You must constantly just listen, stay with the crowd, do your part, and contribute to the whole. Just Listen – that’s how you do it.
Have you played in a group (of any size)? What did I miss? If you’re new to ensembles (or after reading this want to do even better) how will you improve your listening? Let me know in the comments!
You know how it feels. You learn a fast tune – a reel or a jig. You can hear it in your head – faster, faster, faster! Sadly, your fingers are not q-u-i-t-e ready for that! But we’re focused and so we push. We push the tempo so we can play as fast as everyone else. We want to play faster than everyone else!
So, we set ourselves the task of speed. And we repeat (a lot, as we talked about here). We push as hard as we can.
AND IT ALL FALLS APART. Why (whine)?
This happens because we are focused on the wrong thing. No tune is good if it isn’t accurate and well played. That’s true of airs but one could argue that it’s even more true in the fast tunes. In a slow air you have time to fix things in real time. But in a reel there’s no buffer – there’s only hanging on and hoping for the best! And that’s stressful.
Stress is not good for fast tunes. It seizes your hands, your arms, you brain! You need to r-e-l-a-x!
No really. Try playing some tune you think you know as fast as you possibly can. When you’re in the middle of the tune, stop playing and check-in with yourself. Is your hand relaxed? Arms? Shoulders? Butt? Legs? (no, really, check your legs too!)
As long as you are holding a lot of tension and stress, you will not be able to play your fastest. Sorry, but it’s true. You have GOT TO RELAX!
And to get relaxed, you have to play at a tempo that doesn’t stress you out! If that’s at Lento/40, so be it! There’s no shame in a well played tune at an approachable tempo. Only when that feels easy and all the notes are correct (no, really – all the notes, rhythms, harmonies, etc.) will you be ready. Then you can speed up a little (like to 44!).
Use the “feels easy” and accuracy as metrics for when you might try going a little faster. This is where you can push yourself a little – each time it feels easy and is accurate (and be very strict on this – accurate is accurate, not sorta accurate, not mostly accurate – actually accurate!), then go a little faster. If you like more precision, use your metronome for each speed and make it part of your accuracy metric. When you hit your limit (and you will – we all do), slow down a little bit and get accurate again, then run at it again. This is a process that will take a little time but will help you develop a tune you thought was cool enough to learn into a tune you love to play!
Give it a try – take on a new fast tune and work it up this way. Let me know how it goes (in the comments!). Don’t have a fast tune – you can always ask me!
Before I embarked on this whacky phase of life as a harp player, I spent most of my time thinking about how people think about their work and how to improve that. Now my poor students have to endure my explanations about what we’re doing and how they might think about it. It’s important to know and understand not just what you’re doing but why.
So what I’m going to share today total makes me crazy. It works but I have no idea why. It just does. It’s a “tip” that might help you learn tunes easier and faster. And who doesn’t want that?
What’s this magic thing?
When you’re trying to learn a tune, there’s a lot to do. And even when you have the tune relatively well learned, you often find yourself stumbling. And if there’s a trouble spot, you will begin to build in a “speed bump” – a place in the tune that frankly scares you – and so you slow down and try to get through it.
If you don’t get that sorted out – and quickly – the tune will always have a speed bump and/or you won’t want to play it because there’s a scary spot. To get past those scary spots, you need a way to learn your way over it! So this week, I’ll share a way to get those smoothed out.
Find a shape at the beginning of a phrase. Place all your fingers as you will be going to do when you’re playing. Squeeze – hard. Definitely distort the strings – yes, squeeze that much. Don’t be wimpy! Then close your fingers – don’t play, just close (all the fingers at once). Place the next shape. Think about the shapes as you place and squeeze and then move to the next. Work in phrases. Think about what you’re doing in each shape. Focus on one hand and then the other (unless the shape of the tune makes that untenable). As the shapes become more familiar, shift your focus to the movement between the shapes. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat more than you think you should. Then repeat again.
Once the placing and moving begins to feel easier (than it had been) then you can shift your attention to playing the shapes. This isn’t the speed round – keep your focus on the shapes and linking them together. You can play and work toward making it musical once you can actually get from shape to shape cleanly and on time. If, as you start playing, you find there are still rough spots or ugly transitions, go back to the place and squeeze and come at it again. Don’t be afraid of repetition (and while you’re repeating – pay attention to what still needs work).
I don’t know why this works – and believe me I have generated multiple hypotheses – but it does. If, after reading this, it’s not clear, send me questions and we’ll see if we can make it clear for you.
When you’re working on a new tune, give this approach a try and let me know how you go – you know I love to hear from you!
Happy St. Patrick’s Day – how’s that O’Carolan tune coming?
We all know that we need to practice, but one thing we often forget to teach is what to practice. While it’s easy to rattle on about practicing, actually teaching how to practice is more challenging.
People typically ask how long to practice, but this is the wrong question. Instead, start by asking how much time you have scheduled into your daily routine for practicing. Why? Because you definitely will never practice more than you have time for and you’re never going to “fit it in” unless you do so explicitly. This may be the number one challenge for adults – you don’t have a lot of “free time” and practicing isn’t free time anyway – it’s very committed time! You won’t luck into a free slot of indeterminate time in your day. You will have an identified amount of time into which you’ll have to fit it – and that is how long you should practice.
So, if the question isn’t how long to practice, then what is the right question? It is better to focus on what you will spend your time doing – what to practice? Here are some ideas to consider to establish what to practice:
What are you learning? When you first start a tune, everything needs work! Rather than having a scattershot approach, start by identifying the layers of stuff to be learned. This requires a level of concentration – because we typically want to do all the things all at once. Instead, name what is to be learned. How does the melody sound? what’s the fingering? how’s the rhythm go? where is the harmony? what is the order of phrases? all the things! Focus on what you can hold in your brain – when it starts to fall apart, focus on a smaller chunk. And while you’re at it, don’t compare yourself to others – I know that I can learn a lot more in one go (fingers, melody, rhythm) than I could when I started learning (when I learned one note at a time!).
“Before you leave the house, look in the mirror and remove one accessory”
– Coco Chanel
To paraphrase – before you start practicing, prune what you’re going to try to learn in one practice session!
What needs work? What is the weakest link? That’s what you want to focus on. Having trouble with the fingering? Just work on that. Can’t remember the melody? Just work on that. Screwing up the rhythm? Just work on that. Don’t try to work on everything all at once!
What are you doing? Remember that practicing is not a one-shot thing. You are going to practice day after day, week after week, month after month, etc. You’re going to practice the rest of your natural harp life. Remember that your practice will have arcs like a series of novels or a particularly convoluted tv series. Keep those arcs in mind – the short arcs (technical exercises), the mid arcs (etudes and “work pieces”) and the long arcs (your power repertoire). Just like novels or tv shows, all the arcs need to be integrated and make sense individually and together! Keep the end in mind.
What are you watching? It’s not enough to just practice or even to just practice the right thing. You also need to be demanding of yourself. Monitor your practice so that you can see what’s coming along and find what needs more work, different work, or both. Don’t accept poor work from yourself, you’ll only be shorting yourself. Each time you play/repeat, evaluate the outcome and determine what needs to happen next. This doesn’t mean be ugly to yourself – you need to be supportive but firm. Not sure if you’re judging yourself correctly? If what you just played would also cause you to check your teacher’s reaction out of the corner of your eye in a lesson, then it wasn’t good, and you need to keep at it.
All this seems like a lot, but likely you’re already doing most of it. It is important to remember that practicing is part of learning (certainly not the only part!). You still can look forward to loads of mistakes, frustration, errors, questions and laughter, excitement, and the thrill of getting it!
If, after you read this, you think, “that’s all well and good, but it’s one thing to know this and another to practice this way” try this. Tell your third-person self how to do it – write a lesson plan for that person. Be detailed and specific – what needs to be done, what you expect the outcome to be, and what to do next. Don’t forget to leave a motivational boost to remind yourself that you’re showing progress, and even if you’re not finished yet, you’re proud of your growth!).
Which parts of this did you need to hear? Do you feel like you are able to tell yourself what to practice? Will this help you make better progress in your practice? Let me know in the comments!
It is, I’m sure you already know, practically that most important of holidays, not to be missed or overlooked and certainly never able to be over-celebrated.
Yes, it’s nearly St. Patrick’s Day. The one day everyone believes themselves to be Irish, or at least Irish-adjacent. As a harp player, it’s best not to be caught flatfooted and you need to have a tune or two ready to go. So, I thought I’d share one with you.
The best known composer in Irish history is Turlough O’Carolan. It would behoove each of us know to at least one tune by the man. He was, if nothing else, prolific with over 220 compositions to his name. And regardless of how you feel about the man, his story, his music, or St. Patrick’s Day, it’s never a bad idea to be able to whip out something by TC. He was active during the Baroque era, so you can definitely do double duty with these tunes when you’re scouring your brain for something to play for various specialty programs. Another reason to play Carolan tunes is that they are harp tunes, written by a harp player so at least they make sense and fit into your hands!
So, I wanted to share one of those with you today. This piece is Number 171 in the collection and is often referred to as Carolan’s Welcome. It’s recognized by audiences but it’s not one of the top tunes (like Ellenor Plunkett or Fanny Power) – so it resonates with your listeners but is not overplayed. This arrangement is fairly gentle so you can have it ready to play by St. Patrick’s Day and it’s also a bit spare so you can (when you’re comfortable) add your own ideas and nuances to make the arrangement your own!
So, here’s the tune. Give it a whirl* and let me know how you go (especially if you have a place to share it!). Let me know in the comments.
BTW – do you have any idea how hard it is to find a graphic for St. Patrick’s Day that is not insulting or ridiculous? Between the unending beer mugs, creepy leprechauns, and countless shamrocks – ugh. Hence the coin <sigh>.
PS if you’ve gotten this far and are not sure where the link is, click on the link and download the music!
You might have noticed that at the turn of the new year, I assiduously avoided talking about setting goals (except to encourage you to plan on coming to Ireland and Scotland with me in October!). But that doesn’t mean that we can’t still have some idea of where we’d like to get to as we keep learning and growing throughout the year (and beyond). A vision board might be just the tool you need to keep focused!
A vision board is really just a collage made of graphics, photos, words, and any other visual elements that help you keep in mind where you’re going. No matter how you put it together, making yourself a board gives you an opportunity to think about your playing and progress in a very different way. Because how often do you think of a visual to represent your music? It is relatively easy to speak of it, but what visual would symbolize where you’d like to go?
How might you go about making a vision board for your harping? I thought you’d never ask! First you have to choose a couple of parameters – you can make your board virtual (online) or physical (on paper). Then the hard work begins! You need to ask and answer a few questions –
> Where are you coming from?
> Where are you going to?
> What would show your thinking?
Once you’ve asked and answered these questions (and any others you dream up), then you can get started in a series of steps.
1. Collect pictures and other ephemera that will display those thoughts.
2. Organize these items to reflect your thinking.
3. Using those organized items, generate a collage that shows your thoughts (as well as dreams and desires).
4. Look at it – every day – and remind yourself what you’re working toward.
5. Change your collage as needed – so that it continues to stand for your thinking. Nothing about making the board is “permanent”. You’re not stagnant and your vision shouldn’t be either!
You can make a vision board as simple or as complicated as you like – after all, it’s yours. What matters is that you know what you mean when you look at it.
You may find that coming up with ways to show your thinking helps you get clearer on what you want to do. Or you might find that trying to find the right photo helps you refine your thinking as you try to capture your thoughts visually*. Keep in mind that it will be dynamic and that you have to leave yourself room to grow and change.
Will you give a vision board a try? What do you think will be the most challenging part of putting it together? Would you be willing to share yours? Let me know by leaving a comment!
* I’ve really focused on visual representation, but don’t feel like you must use only one sense – if you want to include audio, do it! Want to put your vision in smell-o-rama, use it! It’s your vision and your reminder!
There is not a teacher that I know that hasn’t heard some variation of, “it was so much better at home”! I know, right? Sadly, I know this not only as a teacher but also because I’ve said it myself! Because we have practiced so much and we’re expecting so much of ourselves when we get to our lesson.
Therefore, we could be excused for being bemused when we sit in our lesson and … bomb! It’s like we brought rented fingers. Like we didn’t bother to practice. Like we play some other instrument. Like we’re no good. What happened?
What happens is that you have practiced playing the tune, but you haven’t really practiced performing it. Nor have you (probably) practiced playing in a different environment. I know that none of my students has a carpet as challenging as the one in my studio. They don’t have the same lighting. They don’t have the same harp (some have a different model, others have a different brand). And they sure didn’t practice all week with me looming next to them, watching what they do.
The reality is that your lesson is not a stage performance, but it is a type of performance. You are playing for an audience. And you know that your audience is judging.* The question is what will you learn when you do these performances? Here are a few things you might do to learn more to take away from your next lesson performance:
Optimize your setting. Make sure you have enough light, enough room, are comfortable, and can relax before playing. You can still do this, even if you’re at a lesson. It will give you space for your performance. And it might give your teacher some insight into how their studio looks to a student.
Have a run through. This is a good idea to help you settle down. If you’re nervous, just play a “throw away” – play through the tune just to settle in, get used to the harp, and shake off the commute and the day and get your head fully into your playing. You might ask your teacher to busy themselves doing something that isn’t listening to you – just to get in the groove. Once in that groove – then perform the tune.
Lean in to where you are. If you’re still learning a tune, don’t pretend (or expect) to play it flawlessly. Think about what’s not working and start there. Rather than plopping on the bench and belting out a bunch of notes, start a discussion about what you have had trouble with, what’s tripped you up repeatedly, what you’re dreading as you come up on it, and what’s going pretty easily. All this will help you and your teacher focus on what needs work. Don’t make your teacher figure it out – you’ve had all week to find out where the problems are, so use that information to move you forward! After working on the kinks, then you can play the tune!
Just these three things will make each of your lessons more effective and will shift your thinking about performing in your lesson. You will be able to prepare better, learn more, and get farther each time. And that will get you ready to learn even more!
Do you feel like your lessons are performances? How does that help (or hinder) you? If you haven’t thought of it that what, what else do you think you might do for your lessons? Let me know here in the comments!
*All teachers judge – but good teachers judge your playing – not you!
