Sonate Pour la Harpe by Peder Schall
This is a beautiful and challenging sonate (Schall’s spelling) for pedal harp, composed approximately 200 years ago and published here for the very first time. This piece will be an exciting addition to intermediate-level pedal harp repertoire and would be a great recital or competition piece.
Peder Schall was a Danish composer who lived from 1762 to 1820. He played and composed for cello, piano, guitar, and harp, but none of his compositions were ever published. It is almost certain that the instrument played by Schall would have been a single-action pedal harp.
I found an archive of Schall’s hand-written manuscripts online. This sonate is only the first of several compositions by Schall that I will be transcribing and editing for modern pedal harp. While I have tried to remain as true to the original manuscript as possible, I have corrected some inconsistencies and added pedal markings. Fingerings have not been added as most are self-explanatory.
Here is a midi file so you can hear what the Sonate sounds like. There are two spots were triplets were not correctly translated for the midi file, but the rest of the interpretation is fine.
Click here to listen to midi file.
Schall Kompositioner No. 10 (Please note that this is a midi file that sounds like piano, but it should give you a general idea of what the piece sounds like.)
Here is a sample page for the Sonate so you can try it out.
Performance time for this piece would be approximately 15 minutes, without repeats. The publication is 22 total pages, 17 of which are the music itself. Performance notes; information about the composer, editor, and proofreaders; and the text of Schall’s original dedication page are included.
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{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Sounds like piano to me. Doesn’t even sound like harp-like piano.
Yes, it is a midi file that sounds like piano, but it will give you the general idea of what the piece sounds like. This is the only kind of midi file my software will generate.