From: Douglas Tate Date: Sat, 31 Aug 1996 13:27:44 +0100 Subject: Plastic body/wooden body
Pat Missin writes Conclusions, well I guess altering *anything* about the harp will make *some* difference, but I'm still convinced that the biggest difference you can make, is to connect your harp to a different mouth!
I agree entirely. Listen to some of the great players playing what can only be called 'not very nice commercial instruments' (Crap for short) to realise that the major differences in sound and quality are due to the player. This is why I don't sound like Larry Adler (but he'll learn given time)
HOWEVER.... inconclusive though Pat finds his results one detects in his writing that he favours the fact that there is a difference. Personally I find the biggest difference in body materials to be the stability of tone they offer. I do still think that it is probably the sheer density of the body material which is the influencing factor (combined with shape stability) but there is a queer trade off with very dense materials seemiong to affect the tone adversly!
I play at times, privately Silver Concerto, a silver plated Brass bodied, Plexiglas bodied (Amadeus) and now two different stainless steel instruments. I find the lighter Amadeus a big sounding but partly uncontrolled sound (I have three of them) The silver concerto (solid instrument grade silver, about 92% pure I think for strength) has a dead but very pure sound. The brass body has a fairly dead but very stable sound, the two SS models, one has a very lively very stable sound, the other has a more stable more contained sound but much more lively than silver or brass. Decisions decisions!
