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Hello!
Halsway was amazing! It was also a lot of preparation, so last week and this week's updates have again been merged into one. But we're home again tonight. (I'm on the M4 as I write this update!)

So what have I been up to in the last two weeks? The Whitby Playford Ball Playalong page is now up and ready for you to play along with. We had Symmetry Dance this week, but I've not had time to edit the video yet. So hopefully that will be ready to play along with by next update!

We had the most amazing concert at Halsway Manor. It was filmed and is being made available to the people who were there to watch again. But if you're one of my subscribers I'm giving you access too. It was incredible to play with such amazing players!

I'm going to feature some lessons this week.
On the nyckelharpa a tune that is really popular is Juringius. That isn't the real name, but it's what everyone calls it! I'd like to also feature a tune by English nyckelharpa player Ed Pritchard, this always gets played at Halsway and indeed was this weekend by Ed himself. So here is The Noodle Slicer!

In flute news - my lovely TJ wooden flute had to go in for some new flute teething problems and as a result can't be played all evening at the Jane Austen Festival as we are now reset to "playing in" mode. But I will do my 15 minutes of playing in tonight so it will feature in the play-along video. This sort of thing can happen with a new wooden flute - but it has made me appreciate how awesome it is compared to my old flute! So I am going to feature Näcken's Midsommar Polska which is on my simple system 8-key flute. As we're playing for the Jane Austen Ball I'm going to feature Chelmsford Assembly. Although Bath Assembly would have been better if I'd done that one!

In Scottish Smallpipe news - I'm going to feature Hambo Polska efter Theodor Freyland in honour of being at Halsway playing lots of Swedish tunes and Incognito Ian as a jolly little jig!

More next week where I'll have the Symmetry video from the 10th finished and will have filmed the tunes I taught at Halsway.
Have a good week
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
We're back for a few days and are now in the lead up to the Halsway Manor weekend. It's really exciting! I'm still prepping and the it looks like the concert could be incredible! So watch this space! I was inspired to do another AI book review. This review is now attached to both books on Amazon. If you spot any other AI books I'll upload it to the, too. Let's get these taken down!

My biggest news is that we have booked another weekend at the Eric Sahlström Institute. This will take place on the 7th - 9th February 2025. I can announce that we have Josefina Paulson as the Swedish tutor. So get yourself signed up for updates straight away! Right now the signups are just an expression of interest. But this will change pretty soon! This is such stop press news that it's not had a general release yet and the website is still being updated!

So what's new this week?
The Jingling Keys for Fiddleharpa.
I added a video for The Race for Home and updated the music to include the slurs and some grace notes. It's technically a nyckelharpa lesson, but good for any instrument.
We have The Piobaireachd of Donald Dubh on the Scottish smallpipes.

This time next week I'll be at Halsway Manor so I will do my weekly update early (rather than late like this one!) with lots of nyckelharpa players. So next few weeks will have a lot of Halsway updates coming through! Have a good week!
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
It's Whitby Folk Week! We've been up here for a week now and we've had a lot of fun! We had a harpameet up at the Whitby Whalebones. I ran a Swedish tune workshop we did many concerts and the Playford Ball. We still have the Children's Ceilidh left to go before we finally hit the A1 again and head off to Framligham Castle for three days. There are so many different things that I'd like to feature this week that aren't quite finished! I posted the 2nd Edition additions for #PlayfordinShorts (there were only 8 additions!). I wrote many Change Tunes for the Playford Ball and we ran a competition to identify the dance they go with. These were the tunes I mentioned in the last update and at that point were still on the whole unplayed - they all worked brilliantly! So I will be filming lessons for these in the coming weeks. I will also do a Playalong video for the three dances that I filmed in full and if I can get enough footage from anyone I will add this too! If you'd like to see the tunes the videos are all on a blog entry on our Duo Website.

So what is new on the site this week?
The Whitby Playford Ball Play-along page is a work in progress in the Play-along video section.
I ran a Swedish tune workshop at Whitby and that has a resources page. You can take a look and see what I did! Suitable for any instrument that can play in D or G major!
On the Fiddleharpa we have Colin's Cattle - it's really pretty!
On the Moraharpa we have Gruvan - it's really cool!
On the Flute we have Whisky Before Dinner by Jonathan Jensen

I've again run out of time for updating - so next week there will be Nyckelharpa and Scottish Smallpipes.
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
We've been up and down the A1 so many times and it's not over! This week has been full on with preparations for Whitby Folk Week and the Nyckelharpa Weekend at Halsway Manor. (At the time of writing there is still a room available!) I decided that I needed to write 'change tunes' for all the music at the Playford Ball at Whitby. These were written last night and today we get to work them through with the piano and see if they actually work. Watch out for these in the autumn! I've also selected the Catches for this years Catch Club.

Because I am late with this update there is a dance tonight! 7pm in Symmetry. Come along or watch the watch again video later!

What's new?
We had a Symmetry Zoom dance last weekend and the Play-along video is up and ready!
When a dance tune gets two outings in the Play-along video list I like to make sure there is a lesson for it so here is The Drummer!
On the flute we have Casady Jig by Gary Roodman.
Playford in Shorts is back in Session! I've added the tune that got missed from the first edition and am in the middle of releasing the second edition additions! There were only eight tunes added to the second edition. When I come to do the third edition I think that will be a much bigger task!

More next week, but next week is likely to be smaller update as we're not here much and the following week finds us in Whitby and I think internet will be limited, so Whitby week might be a week off the weekly update!
Happy Summer!
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
The weather has been amazing and lovely and hot. We had a great time being medieval in the north and now have a very brief time at home before heading back up again! We have a Zoom Dance on Sunday - so hope to see you there. Fingers crossed we'll have a video for everyone to play along with.

It was brought to my attention that there are a couple of books for sale on Amazon that appear to be Nyckelharpa books for beginners. I knew that these were likely to be written by AI and I was curious, so I bought one. What I saw was worse than I could have imagined. It was terrifying. So I did a review. One review was not enough, so I did three. One as if I was a beginner, one as me and four shorts.

What's new?
On the Scottish Smallpipes we have Cailinn Mo Ruinsa.
On the Moraharpa we have a re-working of Day 1 & 2 of the Moraharpa Four-a-Day.
We're heading up to Whitby in a couple of weeks which made me think I should share the Whitby@Home 2020 Swedish Session from 2020! I'll be doing another Swedish tune workshop at Whitby. So watch this space!
More next week!
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
This week we went to Sweden. Just a little social trip with no work involved. It was lovely to be away for a few days! But there is new stuff for the website!

There is no Symmetry Dance play-along video this week, so instead I'm featuring the Lockdown Halsway Bar Session 3 - British Tunes. Enjoy!

On the nyckelharpa we have Enfield Common by Henry Purcell. It's in Playford's Dancing Master!
On Fiddleharpa we have Flickorna Svensson. A great little tune that almost everyone plays!!
On the Flute we have Schottis från Lima. Very popular and very G minor!

I've now run out of A1 to work on. This weekend it's lots of medieval work, so more next week! (Still the old flute in the pictures - but come along to the Symmetry dances and you'll see the new flute!)
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
It's lovely and warm this week and I'm writing this from the gazebo in the garden! Long may it stay! We had a nice little run of gigs last week culminating in the Zoom dance at Symmetry on Tuesday. I've been busy editing videos - seems I filmed rather a lot the other week and they're taking some time to get through!

So what is new this week?
We have the Symmetry Zoom Dance video ready for watching and playing along with. You'll see the new flute in full swing and me not quite able to find the bottom C on the bottom B foot joint. Interesting to see (if you're a flautist) is that I spent the best part of 35 years on one instrument and now I'm having to get used to the way a new one responds, which includes not making any squeaks on jumps over an octave! More practise required!
On the nyckelharpa we have Barbarini's Tambourine, which is a tune we often play for dance!
On the flute we have Vendelpolskan for simple system flute. (I still don't have any videos of the new flute - that probably won't happen until after September!)
On the moraharpa we have the sweet little tune Mysan.
On the Scottish smallpipes we have the last tune in Chapter 4 - The Damson Tree.

Next week's update should be from the AI! Have a good week!
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
It's been a nice week mostly at home with a Symmetry dance this week. So I managed to get the camera out and do quite a lot of filming. This all now needs editing, so it'll come through in the coming weeks. Don't forget you can always request things!

So what's new this week?
We had a Symmetry Dance this week and the video is now editing and uploaded for everyone to play-along with. The next dance is this Tuesday, so see you there! Remember it's in Zoom and it's free to come along to!
On the Flute we have Haste to the Wedding a lovely little jig on the simple system flute.
On the Fiddleharpa we have Björnlåten
On Moraharpa we have an update to the tuning it in DDA: Moraharpa Tuning updated
For pipes this week we have säckpipa and Polska efter Lennart Skoglund.
I have one more catch left that I have filmed, but I will put this up next week - spread out the catch goodness.
For nyckelharpa we have one for the D tuned people, Polska från Mulseryd in the key of D. Enjoy the schwing of pretending to be a silverbas!

More next week!
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
It's July! How did that happen! This week I've been focussing on the moraharpa, so there's going to be some new moraharpa stuff filtering through now! As usual I'm writing this update in the van. So what's new? I've bought a new tuner for the nyckelharpa that is amazing - video to follow as soon as I get time to "unbox it". I've also bought a new flute mic - this hasn't been tested at all yet. So I'll report back on that as soon as possible!

In Catch Club this week we have another easy Catch - Cal's Song. It's quite a long one, but very simple!
Perry the Partridge on the moraharpa. It's in D, so if you want to join in on any instrument you can. A canon version is included in the lesson. No-one escapes Perry the Partridge!
Josefin's Dopvals on the wooden flute (no keywork needed). It's a popular and very pretty tune!
On the nyckelharpa we have Byss-Calle 45. I loved playing this for World Nyckelharpa Day and here is the lesson to back it up! (I qualified for my 20 BC badge - but have in actual fact done 27. It's time to do some more!)

We have a Symmetry Dance on Tuesday 9th July and the music is up and ready for anyone wanting to come along and play. As usual we will make a video after the event.
A lot of the Symmetry dances are quite tricky and fast paced. So as there is no video to share this week I'm going to feature the Lockdown Halsway Bar Session Zero Part 2. It's nice and easy and at a sedate pace. So enjoy!
:))
Vicki

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Hello!
It's been a scorching hot week here and we've been not far from home doing medieval work at a local castle. But before that I took a very exciting trip into London to All Flutes Plus to try a new flute. I can now say that I am a proud owner of a wonderful new wooden flute. It's so wonderful that this is now my full time flute and my trusty old Pearl is being retired into being a spare. I'll review the flute as soon as I get a chance, so for now you'll still see videos of the old flute. But it won't be long before the new one comes online in YouTube!
So what's new this week?
The latest Symmetry video from the 18th June is up and ready to watch or play again. The next dance is Tuesday 9th July.
Catch Club on Sunday is another Henry Purcell tune - He That Drinks Is Immortal.
I decided to start going through the shorts hunting out the ones I did for Moraharpa and include the music for them, so here is Colin's Cattle on the Moraharpa. These tunes seem to work really well, so there will be a few of those coming through!
On nyckelharpa we have Polonoise efter Johan Hagelberg.
On the flute we have Michael and Linda by Dave Weisler.
More next week!
:))
Vicki