Discover the world of the harp-guitar at the Festival of Chichester

SussexWorld

The sound is big, the sound is dreamy. It leads naturally into the worlds of myth and folklore. So says Jon Pickard who will demonstrate the unlimited possibilities of the harp-guitar for this year’s Festival of Chichester

Transcript

00:00 Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers and also

00:06 Chairman of the Festival of Chichester, and in that capacity it's lovely to say that we

00:10 are welcoming to this year's festival John Picard, who's going to offer Music and Myth,

00:16 Harp, Guitar and Ancient Tales at the Chichester Arts Centre on Sunday, June 23rd, 2024, with

00:24 two performances, tickets available through the Festival of Chichester box office. John,

00:31 that's a seriously impressive instrument there, isn't it? It looks fiendishly difficult, but

00:37 you say it's the sounds that drew you, it's a big and dreamy sound. What do you mean by

00:42 that and is it possible to demonstrate that? Yeah, for sure, yeah. I mean, when I first

00:47 came across harp guitars, I was playing mostly a classical guitar and then you get the ordinary

00:52 six string neck and you're limited by your lowest note and your highest note and how

00:56 far you can stretch. And then I saw harp guitars and the whole point really is that you have

01:00 extra range in the bass for these big long strings. I don't know if it's going to come

01:05 across well, but yeah, extra long bass strings. So the lowest note actually, that low E, is

01:10 the same lowest note as a bass guitar or a double bass. Yeah. So, you know, big difference

01:15 for a guitarist. And you've got 23 strings then? Yeah, and I've got these short super

01:19 treble strings here as well. I don't know if you can see them or not. You can barely

01:23 see them. Yeah, they go up. Wow, it's an incredible harp, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, it's got five

01:29 and a bit octaves, I think it is, which for a guitarist is nice. And they all resonate,

01:33 they all ring. As soon as you start playing something on the guitar neck, I mean tune,

01:40 as soon as you go down here, you get this, the whole instrument comes alive with sound

01:50 and resonance. And then you've got to kind of try and ride the beast without going too

01:55 far wrong. And it looks fiendishly difficult, but you were kind of saying it's not. On one

02:00 hand, it is fiendishly difficult. On the other hand, it's easier. It depends what you do

02:03 with it, really. Like I say, on the guitar, you're limited to what notes you can hold.

02:08 If I wanted this, this G sharp down here, on a guitar, I'd have to hold it there. And

02:15 then I can only reach what I can reach. But on this, I can play that and I can be free

02:19 up here to go anywhere I like. So it's very liberating and freeing in a lot of ways, musically.

02:29 And you were saying that resonance, that sound naturally pulls you towards mythology and

02:34 folklore. It does. As soon as I start playing, I'm away with the fairies. It has this big

02:42 kind of spacious sound. But the audiences tell me that as well. You know, you start

02:45 playing and you see this kind of, the audience's faces kind of glaze over a little bit and

02:49 they get taken, transported into this kind of slightly dreamy state because it's a bit

02:53 unusual. Nobody's ever really seen it or heard it. So it draws you in and it takes you to

02:59 these places. It's so remarkable, doesn't it? And for the Chichester concert, will you

03:04 give a kind of context to the instrument, to explain the instrument? Or do you present

03:08 here's the music? Yeah, no, I'll give a little talk at the start. And if there's any questions,

03:13 it's very up close and personal. So if there are any questions people like to just ask.

03:17 And even after the show, there's always a few people who like to come in a quick go

03:19 on after the show as well. To give a little brief talk through, but then I'll focus straight

03:23 onto the story. And you were saying you remain absolutely the classical guitarist, but this

03:27 is your preferred instrument. Yeah, I think once you've delved into this and then had

03:32 a bit of time with one of these, it's kind of hard to go back to the six string. I do

03:36 still play six string and I play it professionally a lot with the gigs and parties.

03:40 And how rare an instrument is it? You're saying there's a big creative mistake.

03:45 How rare is a piece of string? I mean, they have been around for like 400 years. And if

03:49 you look around online, you Google harp guitars, you'll find a big community there. Globally,

03:55 I've just a couple of weeks ago played at a European harp guitar festival in France,

03:59 which is wonderful. Last year, I played a harp festival in the States. So there's pockets

04:04 here and there, there's little groups and gatherings here and there. And we all know

04:07 each other online now as well. So we kind of watch each other and do it. But again,

04:12 there's hardly any two alike. They're all kind of different and original. And each player,

04:17 they kind of draw in quirky guitarists, quirky musicians who want to be a little bit different

04:20 and are seeking that kind of unique original voice. So we all tend to be a bit different

04:25 to each other as well, which is part of the attraction. There's no real standard harp

04:29 guitar.

04:30 Brilliant. Well, how lovely that you are extending that community to Chichester for the Festival

04:34 of Chichester. John Goodgarden, Musican with Harp Guitar and Ancient Tales, Chichester

04:40 Arts Centre, Sunday, June the 23rd. Lovely to speak to you and lovely to interview you.

04:45 Thanks for having me.

04:46 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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