Customer Reviews

A Celebration for Harp

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I bought this CD (with slight trepidation) because I was sure I would enjoy most of the music. The trepidation was only because, having discovered the inimitable Andrew Lawrence-King, I wasn't sure how the sound of the modern harp would stack up against his amazing instruments and the even more amazing range of sounds he gets from them. But I needn't have worried. Nancy Allen makes a beautiful, if mostly conventional, sound on her modern harp and her virtosity takes away one's breath. Her articulation is possibly the cleanest of any player of the modern harp I've heard and her sense of rhythmn is faultless. I'm no fan at all of modern music but I even enjoyed the two pieces by Prokofiev on this CD. I can't recommend it highly enough.

Well, I wrote the above review three years ago and this CD remains one of my favourites. I do wish Ms Allen would record more. The two movements from Bach's sixth French suite remain my favourite performances of these pieces. If Ms Allen was able to transcribe all six suites I'd certainly buy the resulting CDs.

Nancy Allen is the best harpist in the world and this CD reflects that.

My CD library looks like it might sit well on the shelf of a music appreciation course of a juniour college in the seventies, with sections representing pop, blues, rock, and classical. Some country, some ragas and talas. Notably there is no Hawaiian msic Probably not unlike a lot of collections.

I have listened to this CD at least a hundred times, and it remains a favorite. Nancy's performance is both technical and soulful.

As I tell my friends, this is truly the music of heaven.

This is a great compilation and lets Ms. Allen display her knowledge of period styles. She can project mood and passion in these pieces. My only regret is that the bass response drops off a bit; and this can be a recurring problem with compact disks.

I recently came to appreciate harp music while watching and listening to the New York Philharmonic on New Years Eve, on PBS. Ms. Allen's playing stood out on several pieces, in a way I never noticed from a harp before. Although this DVD was recorded a while ago, it is new to me. It still amazes me that anyone can make a harp sound this way. This DVD has opened a musical world to me that I never would have believed existed.