Courses

The Cornwall Harp Centre is based at Trehawsa, the home of harpist Sarah Deere-Jones LRAM LGSM. Situated in north Cornwall about 5 miles south of Bude, it is an old Victorian house which is set in a secluded valley facing the sea with 11 acres of pasture and mature Oak forest, with poultry sheep and horses. The specially designed green oak framed music room is the setting for the weekend courses.

Regular residential harp weekend courses are held throughout the year for beginners, intermediate and advanced standard, there is limited Bed and Breakfast accomodation available at Trehawsa for up to three people, but other nearby B&B establishments provide the rest, a list is supplied on booking. Camping in the fields at Trehawsa is free in the summer and definately not recommended in the winter! Our victorian style shepherd's hut provides single accommodation in a unique form!

When looking for a harp course or teacher, please check the teachers are properly qualified! Sarah was trained at the Royal Academy of Music where she gained her LRAM and LGSM diplomas in harp performance and won the Julia Leney Prize. Her breadth of knowledge which includes more than 20 years of teaching, and her reputation as a performer which is international, explains the particular demand for her courses. Sadly anyone can set themselves up as an instrumental teacher, but serious physical damage can be the result of unqualified teaching, so ask a prospective teacher what their training and qualifications are - a good one will not mind giving you a run down on their training and experience!

Students are shown how to play with good finger technique to maintain a relaxed hand, which is very important on the harp. Advice can also be given on buying or renting an instrument, and it is possible to borrow one of Sarah's harps for the duration of a course for those who are harpless, so that you can get an idea if the instrument will suit you, before making a big financial commitment!! Usually it is possible to see and try many other makes and models of harp owned by the other students too, and there are also new harps available to buy or hire from the centre. Sarah's teaching style involves a lot of dry humour, in her opinion the learning process is much easier if the students are enjoying themselves!

By the end of every weekend course, complete beginners are capable of playing a simple tune, & are performing ensemble pieces together. They will have had a great deal of fun and often, made lasting friendships!

	Course dates 2013 Beginners/Intermediate harp courses are for raw beginners to Intermediates with specially arranged exercises to keep beginners and more advanced pupils playing together. A number of Harps are available here to borrow, for those without their own harps. April 5th - 7th, July 19th-21st, October 18th - 20th Fees- £200 includes lunches and dinners, Minimum numbers are required before courses can go ahead. Please note that we can NOT cater for any special diets apart from Vegetarian/Vegan. Courses start 7pm Fridays with dinner plus first session, and finish on Sundays at 4pm.
	The weekends are arranged as a series of group tutorial sessions with workshops on technique, arranging, accompanying, singing with the harp, care and maintenance and lots of ensemble playing. With plenty of time in between for informal questions/sessions and relaxation, there is usually an informal concert on the Saturday night where everyone gets the chance to play! Vegetarian homemade lunches and dinners are provided and included in the fee. Non musical family members are welcome to stay and watch, although will be charged for food if required. This is a well known holiday area with wonderful places such as Bodmin moor, the beautiful coast path, beaches at Bude and the historic villages of Tintagel and Boscastle are all nearby. The courses are suitable for adults or children alike, who want to improve or have "got stuck", some find it very difficult to have regular lessons or do not have a teacher at all. One of the most popular aspect of the courses is meeting other harpists and comparing notes! Students can continue their learning after the course with on-line lessons from the harp centre if no local teacher is available.The Cornwall Harp centre is best reached by car, about an hour west of Exeter (A30) which is in South West England, directions are supplied on booking. There is a bus from Exeter railway station, which links to London (Paddington). We have two regional airports nearby, Newquay and Exeter. Lifts can be arranged to your B&B by prior arrangement.
	Lunchtime at the Cornwall Harp Centre, delicious homemade, homegrown vegetarian food is served! Please note though that we cannot cope with special diets!
	When the fingers start hurting and a little fresh air is required, a tranquil walk around the woods at Trehawsa is good therapy!

Sarah teaching Jenny Hill in the late 1980's, Jenny went on to be a professional harpist herself!

If you are worried about how you will continue after the course you may want to think about on-line harp lessons from the Cornwall Harp centre. These one to one live lessons are simple to achieve if you have a computer with a camera and headset/microphone, the software which is downloadable free, and a decent broadband connection. Lessons can be fortnightly or monthly and they are backed up by e mail. This teaching method also saves hours of travelling time! Many of Sarah's on-line students have achieved exam passes via these lessons, so it is a perfectly serious form of study. Many students back up their on-line lessons with one or two courses a year, but on-line lessons have enabled many people to successfully progress with the harp when otherwise they would have struggled to do so.

For more information please see the 'on-line lessons' page on this website.

When looking for a harp teacher, you are entitled to ask them for their qualifications, and no properly qualified teacher will mind you asking! Unfortunately in some areas, musicians who have taught themselves the harp, are teaching harp to others, but they know nothing about harp technique and can cause untold damage. So before embarking on what is a long term learning process and one that costs quite a lot of money, please check that your teacher IS qualified specifically in harp!