Karen Marshalsay Scottish Harp Player & Composer

JANEWARY CHALLENGE! Days 1-10 of this second online daily harp teaching video project features a set of traditional tunes from Skye arranged by Karen. Originally put out in 2017 the materials are all still there to access including sheet music and videos.

NEWVEMBER CHALLENGE! Over on Harps North West you can follow along and learn a piece of Karen's tune, Tracey's Wriggly Jig, each day for November - with videos by Mary Dunsford and sheet music available too! Join in - the more the merrier - keeps the November winds and general dreichness at bay! This free online learning project took place daily in November 2015 but you can still join in and follow along now as the all the materials are still freely available!

Here are a few of my own tunes and arrangements of traditional tunes for clarsach. They can be downloaded free as pdfs, or printed out from here. Information on my published music books can be found at Marsharp Music. Individual wire-strung arrangements can now be purchased here.

SOME OF MY OWN TUNES

Andrew's Smiles A reel written for my nephew when he was 6 months, and we smiled a lot at each other in the mornings.

The 25th String A slow air written for my harp maker, Jack Yule, when he left Scotland to go and build a house in Colorado. A harp arrangement of this tune is in The Clarsach Collection Vol 2.

STRATHSPEYS ARRANGED FOR GUT-STRUNG HARPS

Nellie's Strathspey - a great pipe strathspey which I taught at the Glasgow Branch of the Clarsach Society. There's two versions - one for elementary players and one for more advanced players. Both include some techniques from my Key Techniques for Harp book. You can hear a slow recording of the elementary version here, and of the more advanced version here - just to give you an idea of the tune!

Lady Carmichael's Strathspey An easy version of this strathspey I taught at a Glasgow Branch workshop. A sample arrangement from my book The Clarsach Collection Volume 1 Elementary.

MacKinnon's Brook A more challenging strathspey, taught to the intermediate group of the Glasgow Branch. A sample arrangement from my book The Clarsach Collection Volume 2 Intermediate.

ARRANGED FOR WIRE-STRUNG HARPS

O caite am bheil u rhuin (O where are you my love) A tune from the Elizabeth Ross manuscript which I taught at the 2013 Edinburgh International Harp Festival and gave to the Wire Branch as a freebie to hand out - you can download it here.

Olaf's Reel Written for my beginners' class at the Edinburgh International Harp Festival in 2006, this reel uses both hands for the tune. The tune appears in my wire harp tutor, First Steps, An Introduction to Playing the Wire-Strung Clarsach.

Tha Fonn Gun Bhi Trom This tune is from the Patrick MacDonald Collection, arranged as a reel. I taught this on my Skye course in 2007 when it was a mixed group of wire and gut-strung players.

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