O Come, O Come, Emmanuel [arr. Edwin McLean] // Amy Turk, Harp

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A few years ago, I was driving home listening to the radio and happened to hear a harpsichord rendition of O Come, O Come, Emmanuel which really left me spellbound. Inspired, I rushed home and tracked down the performance I had heard online so I could transcribe it straight away. At the time of transcribing there were a few technical things that I found really tricky to get just the way I wanted them, so the music ended up getting shelved, and then a few years went by. This year, it got to December and I thought, what am I going to do for a video this month? And suddenly I remembered how much I'd wanted to try playing this! Fortunately with a few more years of playing behind me, the bits I found hard the first time around seemed a little easier this time, which is always nice.

I really liked how this arrangement lends itself to the harp, with its arpeggiated chorus particularly, and lots of opportunities for different colours by varying my proximity to the soundboard (playing lower in the strings gives a more nasal quality which is reminiscent of the harpsichord).
You can't actually play varied dynamics on a harpsichord, so this was a great opportunity to make the piece my own by adding my own dynamics, in addition to experimenting with different tones.

Edwin McLean is a composer and arranger with many publications for piano and harpsichord available - you can find out more about him here: https://edwinmclean.com/

Wishing you all happy holidays, and wonderful things for the year ahead. See you in 2020!

Thanks to:

Ben Turk - Audio
John Hoskison - Camera Op, post-production
Location hire - Julia K, Firespark Studios