Notes from the 2021 Spanish Peaks Harp Retreat
Just when you think it can’t get any better… it goes way out of the ballpark!
2021 was our first virtual retreat and it was a unique one. Aine Minogue went deep into the research, checked with experts in the field and presented a scholarly history of the lowland Scots who had to leave Scotland, their settlements in Ulster and, the Ulster Scots journey to America and final settlement in Appalachia. She introduced the music they left behind, the tunes they brought with them, and the variations of some of those tunes in Appalachia.
During the retreat, harpers were able to play along with, among others, Lead Belly, Loretta Lynn and Kurt Cobain. The information kept coming and so did the tunes.
Jaimee Joroff presented a session on “Tuning and Modes and Changing Keys” or
"Cool it Mozart, we're keeping this simple." She also created a Harp Trivia game at night, and tricked her intermediate group by using a few hand positions (without any music) and naming keys into suddenly realizing they were playing a Chieftain’s tune.
Aine and Jaimee gave the history and the back stories of tunes they presented.
Thursday was our harp and pipe day. This was led by Julie Norem-Hawley and, in the morning by piper Robert Mitchell . Julie led the afternoon session herself with the help of two of her Taos musical friends which added more instruments to the mix. She led all the harpers through the piping tunes.
Saturday evening Aine gave a presentation on keening and then we all saw a wonderful musical play by the Bardic Sisters. Kathy Wimmer and Gwen Easterday played their harps and described the last day of O’Carolan.
Sunday morning was a return to Scotland and the Carolinas. Bonnie Prince Charlie, Flora MacDonald, Robert Louis Stevenson, and even Outlander were all tied together.
The five day retreat ended with a meditation session led by Aine followed by Susan Spangler spontaneously playing a perfect ending for the meditation and the retreat.
We thank all the harpers who attended. Thanks to Zoom we were able to have attendees from Massachusetts, Florida, Tennessee, Texas, Colorado, New Mexico, California and Wyoming.