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I hope the 'harps aren't jealous
Jun. 4th, 2015 12:45 amSo about a week ago I was browsing around on Tumblr and stumbled across an image of a pair of women in "medieval chic" early '70s fashions (several of the blogs that post Monkees stuff on Tumblr also branch out into other aspects of the pop culture of the time period). The clothes were not particularly interesting to me - I'm a Pagan; they sell dresses like that at every festival - but one of them had a peculiar thing on her lap. Two-thirds of it appeared to be an autoharp minus the chord bars (which I suppose would make it a manual-transmission harp); the last third had a fretboard down the side and five strings.
I may have said "What the crap is that?!" out loud.
It turns out it's a concert zither (or the one in the image might be its slightly larger brother the alpine zither), and it probably is either the direct ancestor of the autoharp or one step removed from said ancestor. It also turns out there was one on eBay for roughly $100 counting shipping. I may have made an impulsive decision.
She arrived today. She's at least sixty years old and not in the best condition - I suspect she's been in someone's attic for forty years or so, and was discovered in an estate sale or something like it. But all the frets and tuning pegs are there and seem solid enough. And even more than the two regular* autoharps (who have claimed the names of Ojo-sama and Ohime-sama, and no, I don't know why two American folk instruments based off of a German instrument wanted Japanese names, but there you go), this is clearly a feminine instrument.
She needs new strings, which it turned out even with shipping were easier to order from Germany than to buy here in the states. Cheshirebast is going to come over tomorrow and see if she's going to need any serious repairs before we re-string her. Part of my motivation was to get something that he would be nearly as clueless as I am on, so we could explore it together; I don't know how well that's going to work, but we'll see. The new strings and a "How To Play" book that I'm having to order through Amazon from Australia cost more than the instrument herself has.
So, yeah. I impulse-purchased a nearly-obsolete instrument and now I'm going to try to learn how to play it. Go me.
*As opposed to the restrung, re-barred, and amplified one we changed to play power chords, which delights in the title The Punk Autoharp and so far has not claimed another name.
I may have said "What the crap is that?!" out loud.
It turns out it's a concert zither (or the one in the image might be its slightly larger brother the alpine zither), and it probably is either the direct ancestor of the autoharp or one step removed from said ancestor. It also turns out there was one on eBay for roughly $100 counting shipping. I may have made an impulsive decision.
She arrived today. She's at least sixty years old and not in the best condition - I suspect she's been in someone's attic for forty years or so, and was discovered in an estate sale or something like it. But all the frets and tuning pegs are there and seem solid enough. And even more than the two regular* autoharps (who have claimed the names of Ojo-sama and Ohime-sama, and no, I don't know why two American folk instruments based off of a German instrument wanted Japanese names, but there you go), this is clearly a feminine instrument.
She needs new strings, which it turned out even with shipping were easier to order from Germany than to buy here in the states. Cheshirebast is going to come over tomorrow and see if she's going to need any serious repairs before we re-string her. Part of my motivation was to get something that he would be nearly as clueless as I am on, so we could explore it together; I don't know how well that's going to work, but we'll see. The new strings and a "How To Play" book that I'm having to order through Amazon from Australia cost more than the instrument herself has.
So, yeah. I impulse-purchased a nearly-obsolete instrument and now I'm going to try to learn how to play it. Go me.
*As opposed to the restrung, re-barred, and amplified one we changed to play power chords, which delights in the title The Punk Autoharp and so far has not claimed another name.
