Over the years, Janet Harbison has made an impact on the global harp community through her leadership and participation in various orchestral groups worldwide. Her extensive experience spans continents, where she has directed ensembles and collaborated with musicians in diverse cultural settings.
These groups, infused with her passion for traditional and orchestral harp music, showcase her dedication to both performance and the development of harp as an art form. Janet’s influence can be seen across numerous orchestras - explore some of her accolaids below.
Janet Harbison’s Irish Harp Orchestra was a thrilling stage and concert production that entertained audiences worldwide! Evolved from the multi-award winning and world-travelled Belfast Harp Orchestra, and based from the Irish Harp Centre in Limerick, the orchestra was until the pandemic of 2020, a professional touring production that toured annually in Europe in December.
The Irish Harp Orchestra was a company of 23 members: of harpers, singers, pipers and other instrumentalists with a team of 8 champion Irish dancers – in an exciting, unique Irish stage show.
Clarsheree was Janet’s 5-member group assembled in 1993 to record an album of Carolan music and to go on tour to Gothenburg (Sweden) where they featured at the Gothenburg Irish Festival with Riverdance choir Anúna.
Clarsheree members comprised:
While the recording focused on the music of Turlough O’Carolan (1670-1738), the group’s performance programme also featured original music by the group members, principally by Janet and piper Patrick Davey with the first appearances of his tunes ‘Flying to the Fleadh’ and ‘The Rectory Reel’ (named after the Old Rectory in Glencolmcille where Janet invited Patrick to teach at our summerschools). Janet’s arrangements of these tunes set the style for the future, more contemporary direction of Janet’s other groups including the Harp Orchestras.
The group Clarsheree went on for a number of years to perform at many corporate occasions for national and international occasions.
‘Clarsheree’ is an anglicisation of the Irish word ‘Cláirseoirí’ meaning ‘harpers’.
Following on from the success of ‘Riverdance’, there were a number of Irish dance shows touring through Europe and UK. One of the most successful of these was ‘Spirit of the Dance’ in which Janet placed another of her touring groups ‘The Irish National Harp Ensemble’ – made up of 7 members.
Barry Kerr (Armagh) on uilleann pipes, flute and whistle, Michael Rooney (Monaghan) on harp and flute and Maeve McGuinness (Derry), Una McGuinness (Derry), Dearbhail Finnegan (Meath), Grainne Hambly (Mayo) and Suzanne McAlindon (Antrim) on harps.
Produced and directed by Janet, the group extensively toured through the great theatre venues of Great Britain for 6 months from September 1996.
A commercial video was made of the tour but is no longer in print.
The Irish Youth Harp Orchestra was the training version of the Irish Harp Orchestra and was a unique concert group that in the short time since its launch in 2006 performed nationally and internationally – in the UK, France, Belgium and Cypress. Since establishing the Irish Harp Centre in Castleconnell County Limerick in 2002, orchestra director and trainer Dr Janet Harbison has been shaping up the orchestra’s accomplished musicians (age 10 upwards) to follow in the footsteps of her Grammy Award winning Belfast Harp Orchestra (1992-2002).
The Irish Youth Harp Orchestra featured at:
Another group assembled by Janet for international festivals 2014-16. The 7-member group comprised:
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