A wonderful program of traditional harp playing on TG4

Trad Strings
1

Oidhreacht Dhonncha Uí Ámhsaigh (The Heritage of Dennis Hampson) features harpers from all over the Celtic world playing on the wire-strung harp, in commemoration of the 1792 Belfast Harp Festival. While music from various Celtic lands is played, the music of Dhonncha Ó hÁmhsaigh – the only harper at the Belfast Festival recorded as having played in the traditional manner, with the fingernails.

This was filmed in Ó hÁmhsaigh’s home town of Derry, at the beautiful new Cultúlann there. Most of the dialog is in Irish, but there are subtitles.

http://www.tg4.tv/main.aspx?level=ceol&content=398404481025

The music is wonderful! The only thing I didn’t care for was the way they kept cutting away from the performances to focus on people chatting backstage.

The first performer is a little girl who is a direct descendant of Ó hÁmhsaigh, playing on a student replica of his “Downhill Harp.”

Enjoy!

Redwolf

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Thank you for posting this link.
Beautiful.

There was another, similar program featuring the building of the replica of the Downhill Harp.
Do you know where to find it?

Greetings from
Ellen

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That was produced by the same people. I don’t think it’s available on-line anymore, but from what I’ve heard, the producers will sell DVDs if people request them.

Redwolf