Featured artist - lauren hayes
We had the opportunity to interview professional performing harpist Lauren Hayes. You can view her responses below! Thank you, Lauren, for providing us the opportunity to learn more about this art form!
Why do you create the art that you do?
"I strive to maintain the integrity of my profession and the harp world while breaking the traditional mold of what the harp is capable of and integrating technology into my work. I also am committed to diversifying my performances and the canon of music available by commissioning and performing works by BIPOC composers and works advocating for social justice. Through teaching, I aim to broaden my students’ musical vision and am an advocate for the harp-to make the harp more approachable. I also dearly love performing traditional orchestral and opera works and keeping the tradition of Western Classical art music alive. I look to make this experience more approachable to younger audiences by taking classical music and performing it in non-traditional venues.” “I feel that the harp is not a very approachable instrument. It is kind of seen as...I don’t know, a lot of people are afraid to approach us, because the harp is not a ‘normal’ instrument, there’s only one of us usually in an orchestra, and I really really want to make it more accessible.... It’s often seen as an instrument for the upper class. When I was teaching in Atlanta, it was fantastic because a lot of kids who wouldn’t have had the opportunity in general to experience the harp were able to experience that.”
Could you tell us more about your incorporation of technology?
“I started working with technology when I was in middle school. I received a WCATY grant (Wisconsin Center of Academically Talented Youth) to do a composition project with Jeff Herriott from the University (of Whitewater). I ended up recording/sampling my harp sounds and we used Peak and Audacity to edit the sounds. I worked with him on how to change sounds and manipulate them. We ended up creating a kind of catalog of extraneous harp sounds that were all things that I created but electronically manipulated, and then I wrote a piece that went along with that, and basically, essentially, played with myself. So I had a recorded track and then a live part that I wrote out. It was called Impressions of Glacier. Glacier National Park was one of my absolute favorite places to travel to. I was really into geology at the time so I did three different movements about different aspects of nature. [I was] playing around with the recorded harp technology in addition to a live performance. I continued that. I wrote another piece while I was in college using that, and then I really got more into it when I was doing my master’s in London. I worked with a composer named Dominic Murcott and he wrote a piece called Domestica and it was for video electronics and harp. He took video of “domestic” sounds, like a tea kettle clinking, water running, dishes being loaded in the dishwasher. He recorded all these different sounds and used snippets of them to create a rhythmic track that then the harp played along with. I really like incorporating the technology into harp, and playing with videos and audio. I also have an electric harp that I play with a lot, and I have a looper pedal and a couple of effects pedals, so creating backdrops of sounds that I play on top of.”
Who inspires you?
"I draw inspiration from so many different sources-from my surroundings, traveling, city lights at night, people I interact with/in my life, and musicians I listen to.”
“A big reason I like to live in the city is because I really thrive off the buzz of a city. City lights at night are one of the things that inspire me the most. I love seeing the city alive at night. When I lived in London, the electricity at night there was absolutely amazing, and the city was literally awake 24/7.”
“My parents have been a constant source of inspiration throughout my life, exemplifying service to community and devotion to their love of music. I draw a lot of inspiration from other musicians, who are non-artists, in particular Ben Folds. He bridges the gap between music education, rock and roll, and the traditional concert hall and is an incredibly well rounded artist and musician and advocate for all aspects of the performing arts.”
“I’ve found, especially over the last year during the pandemic, I’ve found a lot of peace through some solitude and getting away from the busyness of life a bit more. During the pandemic, I took a solo trip with my dog out to North Carolina and went hiking in the Blue Ridge Mountains for a couple days, and it was fantastic. It was great just to get away, and I felt really rejuvenated after that.”
It sounds like you have travelled a lot!
“I absolutely love traveling. I’ve travelled a lot of Europe thanks to harp. I’ve gone to Brazil, I played some harp concerts down in Brazil my senior year of college, and I’ve travelled quite a bit of the US.”
What is your background?
“I grew up in Whitewater and graduated from Fort Atkinson High School.” “I switched to Fort Atkinson in middle school because they had an orchestra program.”
“My parents started taking me to see Joffrey Ballet’s The Nutcracker every year starting when I was two. When I was three, I told them while we were at The Nutcracker that I was going to be a harpist and I wanted to play the harp. Kind of like a kid saying ‘I want a pony,’ they were like, “That’s cute. That’s great. Why don’t we try piano?” So I had been begging to start piano for a long time, but they waited till I was five, because they wanted to make sure- they were overly cautious not to push me into music since they are both musicians, so they were pretty hesitant for me to start any sort of proper lessons so young, but I literally begged and begged and begged.” “They contacted the local harp teacher, JoAnn Hobbs, who said I needed to have 3 years of piano experience before she would consider starting me on harp. So, I began piano when I was 5 and promptly returned to the question when I turned 8!” “It was fun; I got to come down to the Lyon and Healy factory, which I live near now, so I got to come down here and pick out my own harp. I started on a small little lever harp, and after two years went to my full-size harp.”
“I first began piano when I was 5, then harp when I was 8, and bassoon when I was 10. Throughout school, I credit a lot of my interest in creating music to my mom who was my elementary school music teacher. She taught composition, non-traditional notation, and encouraged exploratory musical experiences daily. In high school, I was in band (bassoon), orchestra, concert choir, show choir, jazz band (piano), and handbell choir! I credit a lot of my practice skills and discipline to marching band experience- both watching my Dad’s band rehearse at the university my whole life and my high school band director Tom Cook. Through marching band, I learned the importance of repetition, consistency, and perseverance. I then attended the University of Arizona where I received a BM in Harp Performance, studying with Carrol McLaughlin and an equivalent degree in Bassoon Performance.” “I actually started out as a Music Education major, and switched to Harp Performance my sophomore year.”
“I then moved to London to pursue my Masters at the Royal Academy of Music, studying with Skaila Kanga and Karen Vaughan. While in London, I also took my courses for the LRAM teaching certificate. After completing my Masters, I accepted a position teaching for the Urban Youth Harp Ensemble in Atlanta, GA. While in Atlanta, I became more involved with contemporary music, becoming the harpist for ensemble Chamber Cartel. We performed new works at breweries, warehouses, and art museums. In 2017, I moved to Chicago to pursue a Performance Diploma in Orchestral Studies at Roosevelt University with Lynn Williams. While in Chicago, I began performing as an extra musician with the Lyric Opera of Chicago and became the harpist for the Chicago Composers Orchestra. I completed my performance diploma in 2019 and have since continued performing with the Lyric Opera, the Chicago Philharmonic, the Joffrey Ballet, the Illinois Symphony, and will be performing in my first Chicago Symphony Orchestra contemporary music concert in November of 2021. I also have a large teaching studio of piano and harp students and coach harp students in the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra. I frequently volunteer with the organization Sharing Notes in Chicago, bringing live music into hospitals and hospice spaces.
I can see why the harp is often associated with upper-class. It sounds like you need a lot of access to different instruments and lessons to learn the harp.
“I will say it is a very expensive instrument. Lots of sacrifices were made.”
How do you create your work?
“A vast majority of my work is recreative in nature-I spend a lot of time practicing, endeavoring to realize the composer’s intent.” “I try to think, “What does the composer want to convey? Why did they write this piece? What’s my role in this piece? Is it strictly an accompaniment role? Is it little flourishes? Or does the harp have an underlying meaning?” For instance, in a lot of Wagner operas, Wagner uses a lot of light motifs, and the harp always comes in at specific times with a certain character. The harp has very specific roles and is sparsely used, but when it’s used it’s very important.”
You mentioned using technology earlier. How much do you use that now?"
“I don’t use technology professionally. That’s more of the hobby side of my career. Professionally I mostly play classical music, but I also play with a group called the Chicago Composers Orchestra, and that’s probably the most innovative group that I play with. We use all contemporary living composers. Most live in Chicago, but some we fly in from other places. Most of the composers are either Black, Latinx, Indigenous. We really try to highlight works by underrepresented groups and really try to highlight Chicago composers, primarily. It’s a fantastic group. We do about four concerts per year, and they are all live streamed so people can watch no matter where you are, you can watch them for free if you can’t afford to attend, so they are doing a fantastic job reaching audiences that wouldn’t necessarily be reached. And a lot of them are in conjunction; we did one with a rock band a couple of years ago. It was really really cool. So we try to incorporate different arts, different artists. The concert we just did two weekends ago was in conjunction with a new music festival called The Ear Taxi Festival. For our part we teamed up with four different artists, and then those four artists teamed up with four different composers and made four different works based off of a single artwork. They presented the artwork while the concert was going on for everyone to see. The concerts always take place in interesting places. Like this last one, I thought it was really cool because it’s very very very contemporary work with these artists and it took place in a cathedral in River North, which is like the bar area of the city, so they put it in very nontraditional venues which is great.”
Do you ever do solo work?
“I do solo work, though that’s not my main focus. Just this last weekend I soloed up in Whitewater with the University Chamberlains, and played WC’s dances, which is one of the main harp concertos we have in our repertoire. Solos are usually more with ensembles or chamber work.”
“During the pandemic I started doing what I call “harpy hours” 35 weeks in a row, where I’ll do between 11 and 15 new songs per week, which is a lot! I built up my gig book, and it was pretty much all pop music.”
What are you trying to say with your work?
“I’m trying to convey the composer’s voice, be that a Donizetti Opera or a new work performed by the Chicago Composers Orchestra. I strive to evoke the meaning of the work I’m presenting.”
What is your favorite work and why?
“My favorite compositions to play are French works from the early 20th century, as well as contemporary music by living composers.” “The French composers I really love are the ones who were inspired by the impressionistic artists, so Fauré, Ravel. I think I like them because they use the rich harmonies of the French era of the time but also there’s little bits of jazz thrown in there, so there’s always these, we call them crunchy chords, these little pops of gorgeous French lyric melodic beauty, and all of a sudden you have like three jazz chords, and it throws it just a little bit. It makes your ear go “Ooh, what was that?” I love Bach. When I was in London I worked with The London Festival of Baroque Music for several years as their intern, and I love baroque music, it’s fantastic, but nothing about it catches my ear. It’s very nice and I love when it’s performed cleanly, but with the impressionistic music, there’s just so much give and take. It’s very romantic I guess. Mahler’s first symphony is my absolute favorite; there’s a great harp part in there. The development of the symphony is one of the few that I just feel like really comes to fruition through the whole work.”
Is there more you would like to share that wasn’t covered by the previous questions?
“The harp doesn’t have a lot of boundaries. The harp can really play anything. I play a lot of rap and hip hop now that I really like and the harp is used in so many more unconventional places than a lot of people would initially think it is. Beyonce and Jay Z have both toured with harps. A couple of them are friends of mine, and they’re like ‘It’s so awesome, it’s so cool.’ When I tell new friends or people ‘I’m a harpist,’ they think, ‘Oh, you just play Mozart,’ and it’s so much more than that now. I still truly do enjoy the classical work, and I don’t see the classical stuff going away, but I also don’t think it can exist stagnantly; it has to evolve. The main way I see it evolving is getting it into new places like playing in bars, playing in places that are not so staunchy, where you don’t have to put your phone away and sit and listen for three hours and not move a muscle.”
Do you have any upcoming events or news you would like to share?
I am currently finishing up a run of Donizetti’s “The Elixir of Love” at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, and will be performing for the Joffrey Ballet’s first show this season: “Home: A Celebration” with 10 shows between October 13-26. In November, I’ll be joining the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on their MusicNow series, performing at Symphony Center on November 1st. For all upcoming events, please visit my website at https://laurenhayesharp.squarespace.com/events
Thanks for reading!