[musictlk] Auto harp

[Ashley Griggs]

Hi there, I purchased an autoharp two years ago and it's one of my favorite things to play now. I have a 21 bar Oscar Schmidt. That's the most commonly found brand and also, in my opinion and that of many others, the one that really sounds the best. You can play melodies on them, but that is most easily done using fingerpicks where you place one on your index and middle fingers and use of thumb  pick. I've just started getting into using fingerpicks and playing melodies. A flat pic is mainly used for playing chords, though you can change up the voicing of the cord a bit depending on where on the autoharp you play. Tuning Canby and irritating sure, but the good thing about The autoharp having 36 strings is that when a couple fall flat it's not noticeable. I usually wait until the whole thing has fallen flat to tune it just because of how time-consuming it is. I hope this is helpful.
Ashley  

Sent from my iPhone

> On Jul 5, 2017, at 5:51 PM, Tara Briggs <thflute at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hey everyone! I recently got my kids signed up for a music together class. Experience has been absolutely fantastic! My family I like to get together and play music. My uncle is an accomplished keyboard player and my dad is an accomplished guitar player. I like to sing with them and I play flute. At the class, the instructor was playing and auto harp. I got to look at it today and I started playing in a little bit. I don't have perfect pitch. I have decent relative pitch. I can pick somewhat complicated melodies out by ear. But when it starts to get into a lot of friends and skills I've got to get somebody to spell the notes out for me. Anyway, I'm thinking about purchasing an auto harp so that I can play along with my family. Do any of you have experience with this instrument? What are your thoughts and do you have any recommendations for a particular brand. Is it easy to learn? Like I said, my primary instrument is the flute. I'm simply wanting to have an instrument that I can use to learn the  so that I can accompany myself and my kids while we sing the songs that my family likes to sing.
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
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