Letters to England

Last night a nice man brought his wife out to hear me. They are English, but he has been working in Israel. He said he was writing letters to her while listening to me play and he told her about the lovely music he was listening to. Now that she is visiting he wanted to bring her to hear me.

Daiguo

My new Chinese friend's name is Daiguo. His English name is Douglas Lee He went to Tel Aviv for a few days, but he will be back and we will play more together. Here's where you can find him on the web. You can hear some of his music. He also has discs for sale.

http://love.betternonsequitur.com

www.myspace.com/specialaffection

And Another Harpist

A young man came up to me last night. He said he had herd me a few years ago and was inspired to get a harp after hearing me play. He had dreamed of playing a harp before, but thought it was only a dream and could not really happen. But then he heard me play and then he inquired of a piano teacher and found a harp. A lot of people , when they think of the harp. vision the big orchestral harp. The concert harp is really NOT practical for most people. A cheap one starts at over 10 thousand dollars. But the best harp money can buy maybe around 50 thousand. Have you heard what the top violins go for ? I recently heard of one Stradivari that as bought for 4 MILLION dollars. And that is only if you can find one for sale. So a folk harp, while not cheap, is affordable to anyone who really wants one.

Anyone For Chinese?

Last night D( I must get his name right) was on Ben Yehuda. I met him on Friday in the shuk. He was playing on a Chinese Instrument together with the man who plays every week on a Middle-eastern instrument. I have spoken with him before but I forget his name or the name of his instrument. I think I will try to get that and write about him here.

Anyway, back to my new friend. I wil call him D for now until I get his name right. I met him last Friday in the shuk. They had just finished playing, and I heard the last minute of it. Well, when I saw the Instrument D was playing, I had to find out about it. It was a stringed instrument like the guitar, but pear shaped and very exotic looking. The name of it, I found out, is pipa. I told him about my playing on Ben Yehuda and invited him to come. He was there last night when I went out. He didn't have the pipa with him but had a bowed instrument and a reed instrument like the oboe, but very different. I will write about these later.

We played together and it was awesome. He played sometimes on one instrument and sometimes on the other. He also sang and had a very deep voice. He could sound like a digerydoo. I also let him play my harp. Within minutes he was producing very beautiful music.

D actually grew up in America, but lives in China now. He has studied the violin. I think it was his first instrument. He will be here for 6 weeks and will be playing with me more. We agreed to do a disc together before he leaves. He also has a double disc of his own.

Sunita in concert -- Harp and Fiddle

TZALOOL in concert, Sunita Staneslow, Celitc harp, Gal Shahar, fiddle

Irish music with a splash of Jewish

Thursday, 18th September, Jerusalem, Mercaz HaTarbuot, 27 Hillel St.
8pm, tickets 02-621-1777

Friday, 19th September, Kibbutz Harduf, Beit Miryam 8:30pm, tickets at the door

Saturday, 20th September, Tel Aviv, Felicia Blumenthal, 26 Bialik, 8:30, tickets 03-620-1185 or info@fbmc.co.il

www.fiddleandharp.com


Preview them on YouTube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bje6xNhJILo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7QB3GyNKCQ

טל.

Mike was in from Tel Aviv tonight.

A New Harpist is Born

Last night a very exciting thing happened. A young lady, her name is Herut, came up and said she was getting a harp. I had let her play my harp a few months ago and she caught the fever. She was very excited and said she had ordered a harp and would be getting it in a few weeks. She said it was just because she had played my harp that she was buying a harp. I feel very happy and honored that I was the cause of someone falling in love with the harp, enough so that they actually buy one.