Are there interesting unique ways to accompany jigs and reels on a harp where the tune is played primarily by fiddles. Fiddles tend to drown out the harp when it tries to play the tune. But it sounds good as an accompaniment instrument.
You might try droning on the the root chord as you would hear a bass. Or arpeggios on an accompanying chord (light and fast), especially on the higher octaves. This is what I have heard done with great effect, though I haven't done it myself. Leave the melody line for the fiddle or play solo.
Get hold of the album 'Nervous Man' with great concertina playing accompanied in part on the harp. I would like to be able to emulate that sort of accompaniment on my guitar.
The concertina playing is great - Micheal O'Raghallaigh, and the harp playing by Michael Rooney is as good as it gets.
See recording section: http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display.php/168
Agree with odono 100% with regard to Michael Rooney. He also has a CD with Oisin Macdiarmada and Brian Fitzgerald. Both are great recordings making excellent use of the harp as accompanying instrument. Another one is Joe Burke's flute album, with a quite different style of accompaniment by Maire ni Chathasaigh.
Try listening to some of the bumblebees albulms with laousie Kelly on harp. She's amazing! She has such rythm when accompaning!
Normally when I'm playing in sessions and not playing the melody in tunes I tend to play octaves or 10ths with my left hand in the bass, and in the treble with my right hand I make up the rest of the chord, in varying nversions. Rythm wise I alternate playing all notes together, and splitting the octave/10th in the bass. Try and add some syncopation in sometimes too, and listen to the melody rythm and help emphasise beats in it...I suppose an example of this would be in like trip to hervys by mike mcgoldrick, in the last line of the last part you can emphasise the crotchets by playing whole chords.
If theres a guitrist or bouzoki player in the session I tend to try listen to them and work with them rythmically, and for any cool chord sequences they come up with.
hope that helps and that you understand what I mean!
not that I know much about this, but I tend to do fifths,or octaves (sometimes with a fifth). Or play a fifth low and hit the higher note an octave above on the next beat to give a bit more rhythmn in parts of it. Sometimes arpeggios. Depends on the flavour of the tune. And if there is a guitarist it is very important to listen to what they are doing so as not to play dissonant chords.It can be fun to follow their lead, or walk down in the bass range the second time through the A or B part of a tune. Does this make any sense? Again, I really don't know much about this but nobody has thrown anything at me yet and the reaction I get is largely favourable.
I have a lot of written-out teaching materials for accompaniment that I will be glad to send out via snail-mail. I could also post them on this site with abc just like how we post tunes, if that is ok with the moderator. I don't know where the best place to post it would be, though.
Basically, accompaniment is based on fingering patterns that create the rhythm. Moving around to different chords with these fingering and rhythm patterns creates progressions. There are a limited number of fingerings you have to know to play any chord in any inversion, and once you progressively build up a repertoire of these patterns, you can improvise!
A couple of tips:
1.) When sitting in a session improvising, worry more about not playing ugly things than about playing fantastically cool things. Knowing what notes to avoid in each key will help avoid a lot of embarrassment.
2.) Know what key they are in at all times, even if you have to ask constantly. A lot of session leaders call out the keys anyway, as a courtesy.
3.) Keep working on technique--imporovsing means you decide where you're going a split second before you have to be placed there. If you have difficulties with placing or basic technique, improvising adds another difficulty on top of that.
4.) Think of each tune individually and know the melody well. Work on and practice accompaniments to individual tunes as if they were solos. Ask a friend to record unaccompanied versions of tunes for you and practice along with the tape. Good accompanists know the tunes and let the tune dictate what the accompaniment should be. When you get to the session, you'll have growing number of things you're very comfortable accompanying, and you can continue to build up your improv skills on the rest. Eventually, you'll be able to improvise and follow the structure of a new tune almost immediately, through your knowledge of patterns and common progressions.
5.) Always listen the first time through on something unfamiliar, see if there are any tricks, and play when you have a decent idea what's going on. You can make mistakes, but NEVER be on automatic and oblivious to the melody!
6.) Communicate with other accompanists at a session. Taking turns is a good idea; when playing with another accompanist, it should be by mutual agreement and not because one of you is too stubborn to back down. When playing with another accompanist, listen carefully and take turns leading and following.
GOOD LUCK, and feel free to email or respond with any questions!
harp accompaniment
harp accompaniment
Are there interesting unique ways to accompany jigs and reels on a harp where the tune is played primarily by fiddles. Fiddles tend to drown out the harp when it tries to play the tune. But it sounds good as an accompaniment instrument.
# Posted on July 15th 2004 by harpalaska
Re: harp accompaniment
You might try droning on the the root chord as you would hear a bass. Or arpeggios on an accompanying chord (light and fast), especially on the higher octaves. This is what I have heard done with great effect, though I haven't done it myself. Leave the melody line for the fiddle or play solo.
# Posted on July 15th 2004 by windybaer
Re: harp accompaniment
Get hold of the album 'Nervous Man' with great concertina playing accompanied in part on the harp. I would like to be able to emulate that sort of accompaniment on my guitar.
The concertina playing is great - Micheal O'Raghallaigh, and the harp playing by Michael Rooney is as good as it gets.
See recording section:
http://www.thesession.org/recordings/display.php/168
# Posted on July 15th 2004 by Donough
Re: harp accompaniment
Agree with odono 100% with regard to Michael Rooney. He also has a CD with Oisin Macdiarmada and Brian Fitzgerald. Both are great recordings making excellent use of the harp as accompanying instrument. Another one is Joe Burke's flute album, with a quite different style of accompaniment by Maire ni Chathasaigh.
# Posted on July 15th 2004 by Kenny
Re: harp accompaniment
You could try improvising a counter-melody. Maybe that would upset the purists but it can sound nice!
# Posted on July 15th 2004 by Mark Harmer
Re: harp accompaniment
Try listening to some of the bumblebees albulms with laousie Kelly on harp. She's amazing! She has such rythm when accompaning!
Normally when I'm playing in sessions and not playing the melody in tunes I tend to play octaves or 10ths with my left hand in the bass, and in the treble with my right hand I make up the rest of the chord, in varying nversions. Rythm wise I alternate playing all notes together, and splitting the octave/10th in the bass. Try and add some syncopation in sometimes too, and listen to the melody rythm and help emphasise beats in it...I suppose an example of this would be in like trip to hervys by mike mcgoldrick, in the last line of the last part you can emphasise the crotchets by playing whole chords.
If theres a guitrist or bouzoki player in the session I tend to try listen to them and work with them rythmically, and for any cool chord sequences they come up with.
hope that helps and that you understand what I mean!
# Posted on July 15th 2004 by RacH
Re: harp accompaniment
not that I know much about this, but I tend to do fifths,or octaves (sometimes with a fifth). Or play a fifth low and hit the higher note an octave above on the next beat to give a bit more rhythmn in parts of it. Sometimes arpeggios. Depends on the flavour of the tune. And if there is a guitarist it is very important to listen to what they are doing so as not to play dissonant chords.It can be fun to follow their lead, or walk down in the bass range the second time through the A or B part of a tune. Does this make any sense? Again, I really don't know much about this but nobody has thrown anything at me yet and the reaction I get is largely favourable.
# Posted on July 18th 2004 by jessie
Re: harp accompaniment
Hey all,
I have a lot of written-out teaching materials for accompaniment that I will be glad to send out via snail-mail. I could also post them on this site with abc just like how we post tunes, if that is ok with the moderator. I don't know where the best place to post it would be, though.
Basically, accompaniment is based on fingering patterns that create the rhythm. Moving around to different chords with these fingering and rhythm patterns creates progressions. There are a limited number of fingerings you have to know to play any chord in any inversion, and once you progressively build up a repertoire of these patterns, you can improvise!
A couple of tips:
1.) When sitting in a session improvising, worry more about not playing ugly things than about playing fantastically cool things. Knowing what notes to avoid in each key will help avoid a lot of embarrassment.
2.) Know what key they are in at all times, even if you have to ask constantly. A lot of session leaders call out the keys anyway, as a courtesy.
3.) Keep working on technique--imporovsing means you decide where you're going a split second before you have to be placed there. If you have difficulties with placing or basic technique, improvising adds another difficulty on top of that.
4.) Think of each tune individually and know the melody well. Work on and practice accompaniments to individual tunes as if they were solos. Ask a friend to record unaccompanied versions of tunes for you and practice along with the tape. Good accompanists know the tunes and let the tune dictate what the accompaniment should be. When you get to the session, you'll have growing number of things you're very comfortable accompanying, and you can continue to build up your improv skills on the rest. Eventually, you'll be able to improvise and follow the structure of a new tune almost immediately, through your knowledge of patterns and common progressions.
5.) Always listen the first time through on something unfamiliar, see if there are any tricks, and play when you have a decent idea what's going on. You can make mistakes, but NEVER be on automatic and oblivious to the melody!
6.) Communicate with other accompanists at a session. Taking turns is a good idea; when playing with another accompanist, it should be by mutual agreement and not because one of you is too stubborn to back down. When playing with another accompanist, listen carefully and take turns leading and following.
GOOD LUCK, and feel free to email or respond with any questions!
# Posted on July 19th 2004 by ostrichfeathers
Re: harp accompaniment
those are fab tips!
# Posted on July 19th 2004 by RacH