Planning and prepping for the coming year (2024, and also 2025...) has started. When I stated this ensemble, I had no idea how much forward planning would be required to make everything run smoothly. Of course, there isn't a huge need to run everything that far into the future... but if you are planning to apply for grant funding and to reduce chaos and all of that in the future then it is actually good to have a long term roadmap that starts to get filled out.

So, there is a rough skeleton for 2024... that involves the people that I want to ask to play and the rough ensemble compositions (in terms of instrumentation) for the 6 planned concerts in the main series. In some ways, we are funning crazily fast... in our second year, to have that many projects planned in the main series (plus others, probably at least 4-6, as additional projects either in collaboration or under the banner of other organisations). Most groups of a similar ensemble size (chamber...) that are older generally are running at 3 or 4 concerts maximum per year.

One of the proposed guest artists is a Baroque harpist... we could include the shipping of her instrument in he budgeting... but she knew of a Baroque harp that had existed in the inventory of the university when she was studying here a while ago. However, the music school of this university was drastically cut twice in the last couple of decades... and with those staff and funding cuts came a huge hole in operational knowledge... amongst which was the inventory list and upkeep of the various instruments that the university owned. And there is a huge collection of historical keyboards and other instruments that we currently have access to as the resident Early Music nerd staff!

Sadly, not everything is in good playing order... which is a pity, as these old instruments (many of which are from the 18th and 19th centuries, need to be maintained to preserve their value (if you are an accounting bean-counter) or to fulfil their purpose and performing instruments (if you are a musician...)

The Baroque Harp is one of the many instruments that was purchased for a decently large sum of money about a decade or two ago... and has since sat in a dusty corner somewhere in the building, unplayed and unknown. The harpist knew it existed when she studied here... but past that, she had no idea if it still existed in the university collection. Thus the instrument hunted all of that... several emails and a physical search of the building, and I found the harp!

Sadly, it had quite a few broken strings... not a big deal, these are replaceable (given the funds to restock the string supply...), and it is sort of expected given the lack of use and maintenance over the previous many years of disuse and neglect. However, I can't speak for the regulation of the pedals and all the stuff that a proper player of the instrument would know about. I had a quick Whatsapp chat with the harp player... the harp sounded okay, but the regulation of the pedals would be for the tuning.

.... hmmm, quite a few strings missing! Replacements would be quite expensive... this isn't the four strings of a violin! Plus, I had no idea of what gauges would be required, as the spare strings stock, tuning key, and maintenance manual were all missing as well!

It is a beautiful looking instrument though... a baroque harp is a slightly smaller beast compared to a modern baroque harp. Actually, a much smaller beast! Surprisingly light, I hadn't really expected that... I've never really tried moving a harp before, and when I moved it I nearly toppled it over as it was much much lighter than expected!

A bit more sleuthing and I found the tuning key, manual and some spare strings in the possession of a previous student of the university! Phew, that will save on the costs of purchasing all this stuff... which the university had said that they would cover about half the cost of, with our ensemble footing the other half in exchange for the ability to use it in concerts.

I hope these aren't all dried out though... gut strings have a habit of degrading over time, even if they are kept in their packaging!

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