I have a healthy respect for harpists. A portion of this respect comes from the beautiful sound they produce, and the fine motor skills required.
But mostly I’m impressed by their commitment.
Committing to harp mastery means committing to having a harp in your house and lugging it around with you. And a full-sized harp is enormous; six feet tall by three feet wide and pushing a hundred pounds.
Yes, okay, pianos are bulkier than that. But pianos are everywhere. Walk down your street and there might be a piano in 20% of the houses you pass. Maybe more. If you visit someone’s house for the first time and they’ve got a piano, you might think to yourself, “oh, neat, a piano,” – if you notice it at all. Can you imagine your reaction if you walked into someone’s house and saw a harp in the living room? It would be the only thing you’d remember about the house a month later.
All this is to say that if someone is booking a pianist for their wedding reception or anniversary party or grandma’s 100th, they’re booking a pianist, because the venue will undoubtedly have half a dozen pianos just sitting around. If someone is booking a harpist, they’re also expecting the musician to transport a human-sized Guinness logo.
Harpists, therefore, are rare and special birds. Here we are at week 843, and as best I can tell, British harpist Rachel Kitchlew is just our third featured harpist, after Dorothy Ashby and Mikaela Davis.
Kitchlew unsurprisingly cites Dorothy Ashby as an influence, but to me her sound – at least on her 2025 album Flirty Ghost – is closer to the laid-back jazz of Svaneborg Kardyb or the vintage experimental funk of Cymande.
If your summer checklist includes a hammock, a drink, and a good book, I’d like to add Flirty Ghost as a potential soundtrack. A solid record from start to finish, “Heady” for me is the track that pairs best with any summer activity that requires horizontality.
What makes this a beautiful song:
1. It begins with a cascade of glissandos, like the intro to a dream sequence.
2. The main groove sees the harp spending a lot of time on the seventh degree of the scale; possibly the headiest note of the scale.
3. During the final minute, the mood shifts to a slightly uneasy vibe, with the lap steel guitar wailing ghost-like in the background.
Recommended listening activity:
Sitting at the spot in your house where a harp might fit. (And then, possibly, feeling grateful for the sacrifices made by harpists around the world.)