Sunday (into Monday) and OMG! A Harp? T.F.D- Then…

This is, once again, J.S. Bach Toccata & Fugue in D Minor. This time on a Harp, and with a Cyrillic Title, so I assume she is Russian. But 9.5 minutes without a single missed note in an iconic and not simple piece. Then, you can See The Music on the strings! I know about Math and Music being related… I love the piece. I know it entire. Yet to SEE it on the strings… you can see the way the bits are related. The octave offsets, the runs, the counter points. It just adds something.

The concentration it takes to play this, with the alternation of which hand is dominant, and all the time keeping cadence and strength just right. Just OMG.

I think I have a new found appreciation of The Harp… Perhaps my favorite song of all time… Fur Elise:

About E.M.Smith

A technical managerial sort interested in things from Stonehenge to computer science. My present "hot buttons' are the mythology of Climate Change and ancient metrology; but things change...
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4 Responses to Sunday (into Monday) and OMG! A Harp? T.F.D- Then…

  1. The True Nolan says:

    Two extraordinary videos, but the Bach between about 3:00 and 4:30 is just — lovely!

  2. Keith Macdonald says:

    The Webb sisters, with a smaller harp, but still quite quite beautiful.

    If it be your will that I speak no more
    And my voice be still as it was before
    I will speak no more, I shall abide until
    I am spoken for, if it be your will

    If it be your will that a voice be true
    From this broken hill, I will sing to you
    From this broken hill, all your praises they shall ring
    If it be your will to let me sing

  3. Keith Macdonald says:

    @EM
    Then, you can See The Music on the strings! I know about Math and Music being related

    Maybe it’s a mathematical and engineering background that does it. Musical notation on a printed sheet is static. But when we can see the moving parts, it comes alive!

    I had a similar “aha!” experience watching the very same music on a score animation. I felt I had a tiny uplifting glimpse into the mind of Bach, with beautiful mathematical patterns onfolding and revealing themselves.

  4. Keith Macdonald says:

    Or the Mercedes of the classical musical world?

    This piece, later (1972) adopted as a theme song for EU European integration. It worked better than the attempt with Panzers in 1943.

    It motors along steadily as a piece of German heavyweight musical engineering until about 09:o0, pauses for a while, then about 12:45 turns on the superchargers and blasts down the musical Autobahn at full power.

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