Moladh, a harp story

I am extremely thankful for Moladh, my harp. Moladh (“mall’-loo-uh”) means “praise” in Gaelic. She is my voice and I love to sit down and play songs or unstructured thoughts. Moladh is a lever harp in the style of a Celtic or folk harp.

I have had my harp since January 2009. She is made by Dusty Strings and her model is Ravenna 34. Ravenna is the model name and 34 refers to how many strings she has. A “full sized” Celtic harp is 36, so Moladh is just shy of that. Those two strings has hardly made a difference in the range of things to play though. I have only come across one song yet that needs those two extra strings (the are on the high-end of the notes).

I was able to get started right away with lessons, but the closest harp teacher is in Sacramento which is about two hours away. She is a great teacher but I couldn’t keep driving four hours round trip (not to mention the gas) every other week forever. So after four months I had to quit. Maybe someday I’ll have enough money to go back. My teacher was wonderful. She really helped me; by pushing me when I really needed it. She also taught me more than the harp, she also taught me (and explained it in a way that finally made sense) about music theory.

I mostly play for myself, and occasionally for others. Today was a day that I shared my love with this beautiful instrument with other people. I did a talk at my work’s staff meeting today, correlating tuning a harp and our relationship with God. (I’ll put that down in a future post for all of you to read.) Everyone seemed to like both the talk and the two songs I did afterward.