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About us
How did Jacquie get involved with the harp? Jacquie, a native of the Pacific Northwest resident in Australia for 35 years; became fascinated by the Celtic harp when first loaned an instrument by a colleague in the Melbourne Symphony in the late 1980s. The next step was to own one, but there was little choice of instruments in Australia in those days. She built an imported kit from the US. Gradually the harp became an obsession; the French horn (her first career) was phased out. In 1994 she embarked on a study tour of harp building on the USA West Coast, meeting with many craftsman. She also studied several large scale harp building factories both the Triplett Harps in California and Dusty Strings in Seattle, with research/resourcing trips to Robinson’s Harp Shop outside of San Diego. On her return, she and husband Warwick worked as a team to produce the 30 string Waratah model harp featured in the nationally run workshops Pull Your Own Harpstrings. Following years of development, Harps Australia released a unique re-design of the 30 string new Waratah in 2001, the 34/36 string Lyrebird Harps and the 23 string Rosella now available for workshops.
Warwick 's eclectic past includes 10 years at the ABC in Sydney as a sound engineer/editor, while operating several recording studios on the side. Then he “retired” and built/renovated houses for 20 years in Melbourne. His knowledge of acoustics, building, recording and electronics have all come together building harps at Harps Australia and co-producing the CD of Seasons Within with Lyrebird Productions.
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