Michelle Velvin Weaves a Late-Winter’s Night Dream

The third gig of the Soundscape Series at The Bond Store was on Saturday night, 30 August. It featured harpist Michelle Velvin. Was it melodic, classical and ethereal, as advertised? Was it heavenly music for harp and voice? Here’s an essentially earthbound perspective on how it went.

It might be the closest I get to heaven. On the balcony of the venue, alongside blow-up cloudlike creatures and the creatively strung light bulbs that provide ambience for those gathered below, I’m focused on what seems a small female figure whose fingers are about to caress the strings of a giant harp. It’s her sole accompaniment on stage.

There’s something surreal and Shakespearean about the setting. Oberon and Titania, King and Queen of the Fairies from A Midsummer’s Night Dream, with their dutiful subjects Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth and Mustardseed, could be scattered amongst the assemblage – all a bit cold, perhaps, with their change of season. Acclimatised without difficulty would be dancing satyrs from The Winter’s Tale. And you imagine a plethora of muses could accommodate all four seasons.

It’s a mixture of the beautiful and bizarre. Inside the entrance, alongside the stage, is the bottom half of a full-sized nude mannequin, legs pointed upwards, with the top half presumable plummeted into the ground – a fallen angel! That’s not an omen I’m thinking – and my thoughts, I’m sure, are shared by the all-attentive audience.

We are positively expectant. The performance begins.

Immediately, we’re enchanted by the purity of sound and captivated by Michelle’s fingers working the strings - fondling, selecting, stroking, strumming, embracing, plucking, glissing. It’s tantalising. Other-worldly. The warmth of shared pleasure takes the chill from the late-winter weather.

Over the best part of two hours, we witness the interweaving of a variety of music, song and poetry. Michelle imaginatively draws us into the pleasures of nature with ‘On the Seashore’, her own composition for harp and voice. As the evening progresses, she follows this with ‘The Birds’, a composition we are informed is “for an album release”. Later there’s ‘Sammy’s Rain Song’, a tribute to her dog, and ‘Maple’, which is “often played with harmonica accompaniment or sung acapella”. The last of her compositions is ‘Chamomile Tea’. (We wonder if that might have gone well with the limoncello and slices of delicious pizza we had on arrival at the venue.)

Significant in the interlacing of pieces are compositions of Carolyn Mills, who had been a well-admired tutor of and role model for Michelle. We listen to ‘Moon Petals’, ‘After Rain’, and ‘Long-forgotten Things’. (The weather gods aren’t listening! There’s a thunderous downpour on the roof of the venue while ‘After Rain’ is played! It’s a fleeting distraction.) Also in the mix are Paul Lewis’s ‘Blues for Harpo’ (with movement of the harp’s pedal a feature of the performance), Béla Bartók’s ‘Mikrokosmos’, Adriano Sangineto‘s ‘Supernova’, and Walter Carroll’s ‘Forest Fantasies’. These iconic pieces that are rendered beautifully. The applause after each is heartfelt. And the same is true for two traditional pieces, ‘Will Ye Go Lassie’, arranged by Michelle, and ‘Bonny at Morn’, an arrangement by Carolyn Mills. The interspersing of poems by Genevieve Davidson, Katherine Mansfield, Emily Brontë, and Robyn Hyde all but completes the very-well-chosen, delightfully woven and memorable collection.

To finish is ‘Great Day’ by Nancy Gustavson. And what a finale! We are aghast. Here was power to add to the light and lilting subtlety typical of preceding pieces. Musically, ‘Great Day’ was a climactic glissando-rich explosion of joy for a memorable evening.

We need to know more about the feelings and motivations of Michelle – this rising angel.

Up close and personal, at the interval and after the show, we pop questions. (That’s a great thing about the Soundscape Series at The Bond Store. The performers are very willing and available to have a chat.) Michelle tells us she has different feelings and enjoyments depending on the contexts of her musical performance. “There are quite a few different groups I play with and they’re all totally different musical styles.”

How does she feel about playing solo? “There is a lot more freedom to experiment and choose repertoire and style. Some words to describe it would be euphoric, experimental and a challenge. I try to find ways to perform something new or programme a work that isn’t my usual choice. Then I can feel how the audience responds and how I respond in turn.”

She has a surprise for us about playing as a duo. There’s a special relationship with a harmonica player. “To play with Coral Trimmer for the Joyful and Defiant Collective is an absolute joy and delight! A favoured piece is ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ from the Wizard of Oz. It makes me feel alive and definitely lucky to have such a great friend and musical colleague.” And what a colleague and inspiration. We’re amazed to learn that Coral Trimmer is 95 years of age; Michelle is 32.

Her most recent chamber music group, she informs us, is the Aurum Trio with Barbara Hill and Robert Ibell. “This is a fantastic combination of harp, flute and cello. We had a tour around the South Island this year in April playing all sorts of amazing music.” Summing it up, she says that “every performance is a journey of musical fun”.

And playing with an orchestra? “To be in a mass of people surrounded by all sorts of colour and sound is something that can’t be replicated in any other way. It is without words and such a privilege to bring huge scores to life,” says Michelle.

We are intrigued about the challenges for this modern-day troubadour of moving a harp from gig to gig. We visualise her and her husband squeezed in the front of what might be termed a ‘people carrier’, with one of them cradling their dog – Sammy Sandwich – while, in the back, the space is taken up by the harp and associated bits and pieces such as protective sleeves and transportation aids. She confirms this is the reality. Fondly – not as an inconvenience – devoted husband Daniel terms the space, harp and paraphernalia at the back of the vehicle as ‘The Harp Nest’.

We find out more about the harp. “This is an Aoyama Orpheus 47. Which means it is a 47-string orchestral pedal harp. It weighs 37.5 kilograms.” Has she given it a name? “She is named Victoria.” What is involved in the tuning? “I tune it to A440 for solo music and chamber music. I use a chromatic tuner that picks up the vibration of the instrument to tell me how close it is to the note I want.” (A lute would have been easier for travelling troubadours of the past.) Do you have other harps? “I have two main harps: my pedal harp and my smaller lever harp made by Keith Harrison, which has 35 strings.”

Musical instruments played prior to taking up the harp? “I started with pre-instrumental music at a Saturday morning music school, also a recorder. Then keyboard/piano, guitar and saxophone.”

Passions other than music and poetry? “I am really enjoying gardening, doing agility with my dog, and home DIY at the moment.” (Angels aren’t so different after all.)

What genres of music are your favourites? “I like most genres, but at the moment I’m really enjoying harp covers of pop songs by Naomi SV, music by Liana Flores and Anya Nami.”

Funny moments in her career so far? “My favourite moment that comes to mind is meeting a young harpist who was playing a piece of mine and she happily said ‘It is so nice to meet a composer who’s not dead!’” Unusual venues? “Not a performance as such, but during the initial lockdown I would take a small harp with me to the field across the road where we lived at the time, and sit there facing the south coast shore improvising for about 30 minutes a day.”

Aspirations? “Longer term, I am really interested in developing my own songs and poetry and seeing where I can go with that, as well as continuing to write instrumental music and collaborate with other musicians through performance.” We nod enthusiastically. There are great times ahead.

It’s late. Time to close up – reluctantly. We exit past the fallen angel. (She should have kept her harp in tune.)

We reflect. Michelle Velvin has mesmerised us with a late-winter’s night dream. We’re on clouds – fairies, dancing satyrs, muses, musicians, singers, poets, Michelle, family and friends, gig after gig, with airs musical and ethereal – the admirers, the admired, and all. And look, that includes Alice from Wonderland (and maybe – maybe not – Alice who’s living next door, whoever the heck she is).

Where to from here for me? I’ve tried harder. I’ve listened and complied to the commands from above: “Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour, thou shalt not lust after thy neighbour’s wife … thou shalt sup the limoncello as nectar without slurping, thou shalt share the pizza as ambrosia together with the loaves and fishes, thou shalt seek the music of the harp.”

Count me in.