Quest for the Harpa

 Nyckelharpa built by Sören Åhker and tuning cable     I had the pleasure of playing some tunes with my friend Saana today, and I noticed how careful she was with tuning her nyckelharpa, using a clip and Korg tuner. I use my phone to tune, and any background noise often interferes with tuning. I asked her about the tuning clip and Korg tuner and she said the Korg tuner she has is no longer made and she was using Baroque tuning. She has studied at ESI (Eric Sahlström Institute) and she mentioned they would spend a long time tuning.       Yet here at SibA (Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, Finland), we use equal tempered tuning because oftentimes we play with instruments with fixed tuning (i.e. accordion or harmonium). While the baroque tuning may make the instrument sound better, I wonder, is it sacrificing the ability to play with other  musicians and an ensemble? What are your thoughts on tuning systems?

Nyckelharpa built by Eric Sahlström, 1981     I had the good fortune of visiting Stockholm, Sweden this past Sunday, February 20th, and visited the nordic instruments collection at the Performing Arts Museum. I happened across this nyckelharpa made by Eric Sahlström himself in 1981, and owned by  Åsa Jinder, the youngest person ever to be awarded the title of 'Rikspelman' or national folk musician in 1979 (16 years of age). Take at look at the beautiful woodwork engraving below. 

Kontrabasharpa, left; Finnish Esseharpa, right.  4 makes of nyckelharpas, and 2 older variants  (far left) Today I had the joy of attending one of the first nyckelharpa informational gatherings in Finland, with a lecture by my nyckelharpa colleague and friend Saana. She mentioned to me beforehand that many nyckelharpa players in Finland are spread out, and interest is growing but many people do not know where or how to get a nyckelharpa (not so different from the USA!) It was very cool to see so many makes of nyckelharpas in one room, including a kontrabasharpa and esseharpa (Finnish), and hear the differences in sound and handling. It was fun playing a harpa by Hasse Gille, a rare find! He also built the kontrabasharpa shown above.   

          Nyckelharpa played the traditional Swedish way, with the strap over the neck                                                                                      Photo: Aaron Winton NB!   Huom!  The title of this post is a playful reference to the famous Milton Babbit essay "Who Cares if you Listen?" It is not meant in any way to be disrespectful of Sweden's national instrument the nyckelharpa, but to explore the versatility of this beautiful instrument and deconstruct social bias.  Recently, I have been thinking about what it means to be a non-Swedish heritage nyckelharpa player and the history of the nyckelharpa and what the nyckelharpa has come to represent. I get the question a lot: ...

      Fast forward to September 11th, 2021 and I scooter along the canal through a foggy Turku, Finland. I can't fathom today is the day I get my new harpa, that day I've been dreaming of for over two years since I fell in love with the nyckleharpa at NFF 2019. Not only do I get to pick up my brand new instrument, I get to meet its builder, Bosse Nilsson!  Bo generously met me and a Fulbright friend in Turku, Finland as a halfway point between Helsinki, where I am researching Nordic Music and String Pedagogy at the Sibelius Academy for my Fulbright grant, and Bo's residence north of Stockholm, Sweden. He and a friend took a long ferry just to hand deliver my new instrument to me, and I am so thankful! He gave me a tutorial on how to take the key box apart to do repair work if a key sticks (this happens a lot in New York humidity especially!), and I was thrilled to do a demonstration and play the harpa for him. He lit up with joy when I warmed up on Spelmansglädje, an...

So where does one start when trying to buy a Swedish nyckelharpa from the US? Probably a quick Google search will take you to the American Nyckelharpa Association's page http://www.nyckelharpa.org/buy/buying-a-new-nyckelharpa/. And what a wealth of information there is there! Not only do you have to consider the location of the nyckelharpa builder and price, but the length of time it takes for the maker to build one. Yes, there's a wait list. It's very different from buying a fiddle where you walk into a shop and try one and pick one out to take home. For nyckelharpas, you commission a builder and hope you like what's built!  As someone who plays music for a living, I wasn't keen on purchasing a nyckelharpa without trying it. And I didn't want the cheapest possible one - I wanted one I would enjoy playing for many years. Neither did I want to wait 7 years, as is the case with some of the most recognized nyckelharpa builders in Sweden. Yes, I had my heart set on ...

A lot of people ask me, "how did you get into playing the nyckelharpa?" I usually tell them I already played a lot of Swedish fiddle tunes on the fiddle, and I wanted to learn to play them where I presumed they were originally written -- on the nyckelharpa. Little did I know when I asked to borrow a nyckelharpa for the week long Nordic Fiddles and Feet festival in 2019 I would be embarking on an epic journey to find the ideal nyckelharpa of my own from Sweden.  I fell in love with the rich, mellow, resonant sound of 16 strings and a curved wooden bow made by Sören Åhker I borrowed at NFF 2019. Bronwyn Bird, who taught at camp that year, said, "Hey, I used to have that exact model harpa!" And so did a lot of prominent players. So I e-mailed Sören several times about a commission and even had a friend contact him for me to no avail. There are very few nyckelharpa makers in the US who are experienced builders or even make traditional C-G-C-A tuned models, so I began th...