Tix-Comix

This comic about Tix’s best friend Susan (a professional harpist) is probably a little bit esoteric. The harp is essentially a diatonic instrument. Pedals allow you to sharp or flat all the B’s for example. If you want to play something simple in E-flat, you simply set the pedals up to flat the B, the E, and the A strings and it’s pretty slick. In more difficult music you have to kick the pedals on the fly. In jazz you might want some wacko chord such as an F7 with a sharp 9, which essentially requires you to play an A and an A-flat in the same chord. That’s why most harpists, even really good ones, kind of shy away from jazz. Playing jazz on the harp requires clever planning ahead, and after all that it’s still some pretty fancy kicking. When Susan plays jazz it sometimes looks like her feet are making whipped cream.

The grande dame of jazz harp was Dorothy Ashby, who died way way too young in 1986. You’ve probably never heard of her, and unfortunately all her recordings seem to be out of print. If you ask me, she should be right up there with the likes of Bill Evans, Oscar Peterson, etc. but being a woman and a harpist, well, she had to overcome a lot of preconceived ideas both about her gender and her instrument. Here is a you tube of Dorothy Ashby abusing a harp and it’s one of the coolest things I have ever heard, especially since I have some appreciation for how insanely hard this is.