Traditional Irish Harp Tutor Level 2 + FREE The Tunes Book Vol 2
Now also available as a download version
These tutor books are the Harbison Harp Method for Traditional Irish Harp.
Today, Irish harp players have the choice of becoming traditional players that interpret, arrange and accompany, spontaneously and creatively as traditional harpers have done for over a millennium - or to play already arranged ('finished') pieces of traditional Irish harp music. From ancient times, our tradition has been ‘oral’ meaning ‘given by mouth’ - or ‘aural’ meaning ‘learned by ear’ (both descriptives are correct!) and it is an improvisatory art that is ultimately flexible, constantly changing, masterfully technical and expressive by the addition of ornamentation and variation.
This is distinctive from the ‘classical’ style of learning and performance - but, like jazz and other improvisatory styles, can also exist in the classical repertoire in ‘fixed’ arrangement. The Harbison Harp Method is designed to teach traditional players, and is the method that has trained many of Ireland's most celebrated traditional harp players currently.
In the Traditional Irish Harp Tutor, Level 2, you will learn:
- some historical harp pieces such as Give Me Your Hand and Si Beg Si Mor
- more well-known tunes to play with your friends
- first jigs and hornpipes
- more on Chord Plans and Play Patterns
- 3 easy steps to arrangement
- more improvisations to get you creative
- next steps in chord-based accompaniments – so you can join the session
- octave base playing
- what makes the music of Carolan particularly special…
- about the Belfast Harpers’ Assembly of 1792
- about the ‘Harmonic Scale’ which explains why we love the sound of music
- about ‘Major’ and ‘Minor’ modes and the chord plans that go with them
Tunes featured in this coursework are:
Give Me Your Hand, The Rock of Cashel, Shoe the Donkey, Lucy Farr’s Barndance, O Donnell’s March, Roddy McCorley (or ‘Sean South’), The Cliffs of Dooneen, Down by the Sally Gardens, Sonny Brogan’s Mazurka, The Ballydesmond Polka, The Murroe Polka, Lannigan’s Ball, The Road to Lisdoonvarna, Carolan's George Brabazon, Miss Murphy, Miss Goulding, Captain O Kane and Shebeg Shemore; The Mountains of Mourne, The Keel Row, Three Little Drummers, The Coolea Slide, The Butterfly, The Good Natured Man, The Rights of Man, Mo Ghile Mear, She Moved Through the Fair, Carolan’s Lament for Charles MacCabe
Technical exercises are from The Book of Chimes and The Book of Chordscapes.
