Hello! It's been a week of sorting things out and catching up! It's now only three weeks until the next Halsway Manor course and it's all systems go! So what is new this week? We have two nyckelharpa tunes. Vev-Lira Ettan. It's in the Halsway Session Pad! And we also have Cilla's Födelsedags Polskan aka Stadium.
On the fiddleharpa we have the popular Ut I Gröna Lunden - this is in an unusual key, it's perfect for the beginner fiddleharpa player and is mostly on the E string, dipping down to the D. On the Scottish smallpipes this week we have Where Does Our Guidman Ly On the flute we've reached Q and The Queen's Jig.
Hello! Back home again with a freshly serviced nyckelharpa. Hurrah and we're straight back into work and preparation. We're reaching the end of the quieter part of the year and it's going to get busy! We had thought this year would be quiet - but we think that this might not be the case! So what's new on the site this week?
We have the very popular tune in the Scandi scene in the UK - Juringius! Following on from the other playalong videos we have a tune that Jonny wrote the night before Halsway and got added to the tunes to be taught. He didn't name it, so it was called Nameless at the time and then over the week it got named Shameless. There's a minus-1 track in the lesson. Enjoy it!
On the flute we have Gladers Polska. I felt inspired to do Perry the Partridge on the Tagelharpa - no-one escapes Perry the Partridge! I also did Happy Birthday on the nuvotoot - everyone needs to play Happy Birthday on the nuvotoot! On the Scottish smallpipes we have The Mill Mill O.
Hello! Every so often one needs to have a service done on your nyckelharpa, so that's this week's task. Visiting Sören Åhker to give my nyckelharpa some much needed tender loving care!
As part of sorting out a session pad for Halsway I moved across Björnlåten from the old site and made ut into one huge lesson. It was part of World Nyckelharpa Day 2020, so there is a lot going on there!
I have updated the lesson for Emma to include Jonny's ensemble version that we played at Halsway (and embedded it below. It's totally lush!
We have Juringius in B minor on the flute this week. The Train Journey North on the Scottish Smallpipes is a really fun tune!! We also have Cockles and Mussels on the nuvotoot! Enjoy More next week! :)) Vicki
Hello! Halsway Manor week was awesome! Many, many tunes were played and I've been filming solidly since we got back! I was so happy to finally be able to use my Bal-a-Vis-X balls and do some rhythm training, such fun! There is a tiny YouTube Shorts clip below!
So what is new and featured on the site this week? There will be a steady stream of tunes I taught coming up in the next few weeks!
On nyckelharpa we have Polska efter August Bohlin - August was a really important nyckelharpa player that made the nyckelharpa what it is today! Jonny wrote a lovely little catch called Fångset - so this week I have the minus-1 version, the full version and the polska version! Just choose which you'd like to visit first! Fångset (polska version) Fångset (catch version)
We've reached P for the A-Z of flute tunes and Prince Regent. Next week there will be a slight pause on the A-Z for a couple of Swedish tunes. Watch this space! On the Scottish Smallpipes we have The Race for Home a nice little tune.
More soon! :)) Vicki
Posted inWhat's New?|Comments Off on Week 6: Behind the Camera
Hello! I'm at Halsway Manor this week teaching lots of lovely tunes to lots of lovely people.
What's new this week? Well, it was Burns Night last week and we played for a wonderful Burns Night Ceilidh in a pub, so I have brought over from my old blog Ae Fond Kiss to the original tune Rory Dall's Port. Simple and sweet. Enjoy!
For the Scottish Smallpipes it's The Piper's Wedding Jig On the flute we've reached O and Orleans Baffled On the Fiddleharpa - it was going to happen sometime. We have Sticky GnT. Everyone gets to play Sticky GnT sometime and this is the turn of the Fiddleharpa! We even have a tagelharpa tune this week - Nyårsaftonen. I'll be doing this tune some time on the nyckelharpa - but it won't be in this key!
I'm continuing with the shorts and amongst other things have been sneaking in what I'm going to teach at Halsway. Videos below! There are more shorts this week, so go to the shorts page to watch those! When I'm out on the road I do try to make sure the short is filmed on location! More next week! :)) Vicki
Hello! Halsway Manor has come round again and I find myself right in the middle of preparations putting together the music I want to teach, making badges and general getting ready! I've done quite a bit of filming, so there's plenty of videos over the next few weeks!
What's new on the site this week? On the nyckelharpa we have Tureholms 'Skreken' Schottis (I'll be doing this at Halsway next week!) We have The Partridge for the Scottish Smallpipes. We have reached N on the A-Z of dance tunes for flute and Neat Mr John. For Fiddleharpa we have Femtiöringen.
A lockdown project of mine was learning to play the tagelharpa. It's been recorded on a few projects since then, so I've added a new course for the Tagelharpa. I'll be adding a few bits and pieces, it's mostly there as a good resource. This week I added a help guide video to show people how I hold it.
I've also finally done my unboxing of the Remic V520. I had been hoping for an amazing replacement to my AKG "sticky bug" - you'll have to watch the video to see if it was! :)) Vicki
Hello! I've been gradually making better and better use of the new set up this week and working very hard on World Nyckelharpa Day. I made a little tongue in cheek advert using some of the videos I've had from previous years. Most importantly though I finally chose the tune that we're going to have as our global tune. It's Spikens Vals - it has to be the grooviest tune in the world! I created the arrangement, the lesson and the guide track. You can find them all on the World Nyckelharpa Day website - submissions are open!
So what else is new this week? I added Skäggigtschottisen on the Moraharpa. We have The Golden Birch for the Scottish Smallpipes. The A-Z of dance tunes on the flute is up to M and The Midnight Ramble. The shorts are going well, I've kept up with them fine this week! They're listed at the bottom of the page as well as on the Short Page itself. More next week! :)) Vicki
Hello! This week having moved my rooms around I've been filming away in the spare room and it definitely seems to be working!
This week I've been doing some work on the beginners course, so we a new video on the The Left Hand Position. I've also been adding videos to the Nyckelharpa Four a Day, Days 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14 and also fixing a few signposting things in the beginners course.
I've been carrying on with the shorts this week too! I decided to embed them below for you to watch and I've included links to the lessons where I have them.
Hello! I hope you all had a great Christmas and New Year. I had a great time in Sweden and have come back refreshed and ready to get back to work! Lots to be done. Lots of recording and filming and also the work now starts for World Nyckelharpa Day!
I have spent this week mostly trying to sort out my work space. As you know I use green screen to cover the fact that we have a very small house and it's hard to get nice camera angles. Since the start of the pandemic I've had a green screen set up in our lounge, but as of now I have managed to set up a green screen area in the spare room. This is awesome on many different levels. I have always recorded in the spare room, it's set up as a mini-studio, but I've not been happy with the filming in there. (You'll have seen it in some videos!) So now that I have managed to do the green screen up there it means that my videos won't have the sound of lorries and cars going past. I can leave it set up and respond to requests for videos faster. In short - I'm very happy!
I have decided to try to release a YouTube Shorts video everyday for 365 days - it's going to be tough and some of the shorts might be rough and ready! I'm going to film them and upload them there and then, no prep, just shoot and upload! I've done six days already - four tagelharpa tunes, one nyckelharpa and one moraharpa. The ones without links don't have lessons.... yet! Watch out for those as I get them filmed! 1st January - Nyårsaftonen on the tagelharpa 2nd January - A schottis on the tagelharpa 3rd January - O'Hara's Cup by O'Carolan 4th January - A tagelharpa tune 5th January - A polkette on the tagelharpa 6th January - Skäggigtpolskan on the moraharpa
At long last I can talk about a project that I did quite a lot of work for during the pandemic. I got to work on Netflix's The Witcher Blood Origin. The character Éile, an elven bard plays the nyckelharpa, so obviously they needed someone to teach the actress to play! I was unbelievably excited to get the job!
Because of the way I was asked to play (ie as much drone as possible) I decided to use a gammelharpa bow and a gammelharpa bow hold. (It's not possible to hold that bow in a modern way!) You can tell that from the video below. At the lesson with Sophia I realised who had made the instruments - Ian McMaster of Blackdown Harpas. Ian did an amazing job with all the requirements he was asked to do (I'm not going to give away any spoilers here!) but let's just say I was stunned at the job he did!
Sophia was a great student and I think from the photo below she looks awesome! I've had a lot of comments about the bow hold - but to be nerdy for a second: The strap is held correctly, the elbow is nicely over the tail piece, the thumb of the left hand is behind the keys, not the neck. The pinkie of the right hand is crooked behind the bow exactly where it should be and the thumb is tensioning the bow hair. Any other critique is overboard - so I will just say - good job Sophia! You rocked! I was onset making sure that everything was correct, so although you can't see me in the picture below, I was there, just behind the camera!
Unfortunately Netflix forgot to credit me. So there are two of us nyckelharpa players on the soundtrack - the rule of thumb is: if you see the nyckelharpa being played - it's me playing. If you don't see a nyckelharpa on the screen, then it's Erik Rydvall playing.
Recording in the studioIan McMaster - nyckelharpa builder!
In the instagram link on the left - go to the second image to hear Sophia play for real. She was awesome! The instagram link on the right is me de-tuning the nyckelharpa down to Bb!
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