Harp Ensemble Concert I attended the Harp Ensemble Concert on March 2nd, 2016 at 7:30 pm in the Organ Recital Hall of the University Center for the Arts. There was a total of eight harpists, Rachel Franklin, Yuri Machihara, Katie Miksch, Sara Schmidt, Kristen Linroth, Cora Maramma, Kristine Popielarczyk, and Clair Sims. Each of the arrangements that were performed during the show were new arrangements for harps, meaning they have never been played by an ensemble of all harpists before.
The first song, Por Una Cabeza, written by Charles Gardel and arranged by the director for the night’s performance, Rachel Starr Ellins, started out slowly and simply. My initial impression was that it sounded like a lullaby being played by a windup music box
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Chromatic harps differ from modern harps in that they are set up more like a piano. Chromatic harps have two sets of strings, one set is like the white keys of a piano, and the other functions similarly to the black keys on a piano. This piece was played by a trio of harpists, with Sara Shmidt taking the soloist role and Katie Miksch and Rachel Starr Ellis taking the accompanying role. Katie kept producing an almost irritating, buzzing sound from here instrument that was rather unpleasant but after a while of doing that, the soloist began playing an ascending melody, with Katie and Rachel playing harmony in the background, and it sounded great. Around 4 minutes into the trio’s performance, all three women started strumming their harps to create a chord-like sound. This was very different than the plucking one note at a time style of playing that was employed for the rest of the song. Danses Sacred and Profane ended with very low, slow, dark, and spooky-sounding notes that left an eerie feeling lingering in the concert