Meet My Harps!
From left to right: Thormahlen Swan lever harp in maple wood, Cunningham Arpa Doppia Italianate triple harp in cherry wood, and Salvi Arianna pedal harp in olive and rosewood.
In front: Thurau Bosch late Medieval bray harp.
As you can see, harps vary quite a bit in size and scope. Each type of harp has its own distinctive sound and chromatic abilities.
My Thormahlen Swan was built in 2007 by Dave Thormahlen of Corvallis, Oregon. It is made of figured maple wood with bubinga accents and a spruce soundboard. It uses lever-gauge gut, and it is fully levered with Camac sharping levers. It produces a warm midrange and bright upper end which is equally conducive to Celtic music as it is transcriptions of “classical” repertoire. This is the harp I use for session playing and for most outdoor events.
The Italianate triple harp was made by Robert Cunningham of Atlanta, Georgia in 2007. Though technically a Baroque instrument, I find I use this harp a delight to play dance music and transcriptions of lute songs from the late Renaissance. I also find the extra rows of strings very useful for playing more interesting arrangements of all sorts of “early” music and folk music. I am currently offering this harp for sale. Please visit the harps for sale page for more information.
My Salvi Arianna pedal harp was made in 2009 in Piasco, Cuneo, in the Piedmont region of northwestern Italy. It pays tribute to the time-honored tradition of Italian marquetry with its inlays of olive, maple, ebony, and rosewood. This the harp I have played the longest and is what I use for orchestral work and indoor solo or duet engagements. It has a deep, warm, and resonant sound. I am currently offering this harp for sale. Please visit the harps for sale page for more information.
Finally, the Bosch harp was made in Germany by luthier Rainer Thurau. It was modeled after the late Medieval harp in Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights and features bray pins on each string. In addition making the the strings buzz and “bray like a donkey”, the bray pins create percussive effects, increase the volume/projection produced by the harp, and allow the strings to resonate for much longer than an unaffected string. Despite being quite small compared to the other harps, it is perfectly suited for Medieval and early Renaissance music.
Here is a better view of the bray pins on the Bosch harp. The body chamber is carved from a single piece of maple wood.