On Saturday I was at Hospitalfield house, near Arbroath. This amazing 19th century country house is now conserved and run as an arts centre. A recent project was to restore the Erard Grecian double-action pedal harp that has been at the house since about 1830.
Saturday’s event was an inaugural concert for the newly-restored harp, and I was asked to give the pre-concert talk on the harp and its place in Scottish music.
Yet again I am surprised how this fits in to a lot of my recent research interests and how a very different picture is emerging in my mind, about how the old native harp traditions worked.
I didn’t get a chance to touch the harp on Saturday, but I hope to get out to Hospitalfield again soon to spend some more time with it.