A folk sound world

I love the mix of a folkie or trad sound world. It's like organic food - not as instant hit sweet as over-processed pop or as totally smooth as Classical; way more satisfying than both. Real instruments making real sounds.

There is a place for loads of timbre differences - roughness, raspy sounds, nasal, reedy. There's also a lot of sweetness, resonance, warmth.

I also like the feel you get from such personal interpretations of melodies, both the momentum of a good tune and the floating space, the touching gesture of a slow air. Yum yum.

Sessioning and harp technique

For various reasons I spent the weekend in sessions without a harp. This proved very interesting as I realised many of my tunes were in my fingers, not so much my head. How very frustrating. This, plus various conversations, makes the mechanism of playing folk music much clearer:

tune in your ear (supported by memory, imagination)
=> tune out your fingers (supported by your technique)

as opposed to the classical

dots on the page (supported by your ability to fluently translate code i.e. score and imagine how to phrase it nicely)
=> tune out of your fingers (supported by your technique)

The last part is the same, it's just the musical intake and subsequent memory load that is different. You either have to learn to sight read or learn to memorise and develop your inner ear.

While performances allow time for preparation, sessions are fast, furious and for a harp player can be a bit of a nightmare if you don't just want to accompany. This means that your technique has got be good enough to cope with 'on-the-fly' playing - something that harpists don't naturally do. Generally, we find our tunes, figure out the version including ornamentation we want, and then finger and learn it (lots of prep). I think is because we have to think so far ahead with each tune (we have to place, then pluck) and the double action for each note gets too complicated to do on the fly.

This is where I think striking strings (one movement to get a sound) is inherently more folky than plucking (releasing the string to get a sound). Given that folk is so much more of a acquisition of technique to then be used unconsciously, striking (where you do not have to plan ahead so much) suits it much better.

As an exercise I think I might look at practising tunes in terms of building blocks, the little melodic fragments that add up to a tune. Those little blocks will be really well practised, the placing a well as the playing well rehearsed. That way I can have a rough and ready fingering at my grasp and allow my unconscious mind to take over without screwing up hand shape or creating loads of tension.

However, if I really want to play a tune for performance, that extra work to sort and assess and finger will still take place. It is through that extra conscious work and then unconscious wearing in of a tune that we make them our own.

Classical vs Folk

Classical vs folk - two firmly established methods of playing music, each with a passionate following that their way is the right way.

I started by messing about on other people's pianos when I was 5, and fascinated, gradually started exploring sound and deciphering the strange code that is score. So started a love affair- I studied classical music until my A Levels, loving it but still feeling slightly at odds. I decided I wanted to be a full-time musician at 16 but couldn't see how I would do it as a classical musician.

Luckily I went to university to study early music, ditched the score and music came back to life. I also picked up a harp for the first time aged 18 and found my vocation. Since then I've not looked back and now work full-time as a musician and teacher.

I see Classical vs Folk as a result of two different methods - Classical by eye, by score, a very conscious learning; Folk by ear, by heart, often unconcious.

For me the biggest difference comes from the use of score or learning a tune by heart.

Score provides a map to coordinate hundreds of people at once. Grand structures, explorations in sound by one person only - the feted and revered composer. The musicians, the players are merely mouth pieces even though they may be glorious mouth pieces. Perhaps a handful of soloists are revered as great 'interpreters' along with the conductors who provide the link between score and players.

Folk on the other hand is by ear, by heart, jump for the rhythm, a simple melody and even simpler structures, the coordination of only a few at once but with such close, tight rhythm. Instead of big architecture you have personal and intimate gestures - each player following the subtle subtle changes of rhythm and timing, following the groove. Folk music is shape and dancing, and in fact the rhythm of the tunes comes from the dances themselves.

Perhaps the choice of by ear or by score is all down the the mind of player - how do you most easily take in musical patterns? Frequently I find my visual world too much - complicated and busy. Reading and writing are not always easy. However I have no problem remembering a melody and hearing it in detail. I find if I have to use a score I have to concentrate on that so hard and in such an abstract way, my connection, my sense of touch with the sound is compromised.

Many of the classical musicians I've met have a very strong affinity with score, clearly they have no problems with a visual flow of information, it does not impair their sense of shaping or their physical connection with their instrument.

Despite the great divide between classical and folk methods and my own personal preference, I think that each has much to learn from the other. Score is a crucial tool for conscious analysis and making details clear, and in order to give a good musical performance every musician must listen to the shapes they are creating. I believe that all good musicians end up at the same place - with music that they are shaping as they play it that falls easily beneath their fingers. It's just we get there in different ways.