Welcome to this month’s 5 Questions with…, where I interview a musician or someone in a related industry via email. This installment features French harpist Amélie Guiboux, who arranges & shares pop harp music online.
And yes, I’m hoping to publish this feature one per month, the 1st Friday of the month now! So if you have any suggestions or would like to be featured, let me know!
Now, let’s get onto the interview!
How did you start playing harp?
I don’t remember exactly how the idea of playing harp came into my mind, but I wanted to since I was 5. Because I was too young and too small to start at 5 years old I took piano lessons. I only remember long hours of me, sitting on the piano chair, refusing to play and saying to my teacher “I don’t care about piano, I want to play harp!” So when I was eight years old, I was finally able to start playing harp in a music school!
Do you arrange your music for YouTube? What’s that process like?
Yes, I made all my harp arrangements myself. This is definitely the most fun and more interesting part for me! I spend a lot of time in the day listening to every type of music from “hits of the moment” playlist, new soundtracks of movies I did not watch yet, artists I don’t know at all full new album, to songs recommended by my subscribers. So I have created my own private Spotify playlist called “Cover Ideas” in which I add every potential cover that I hear.
When I have decided which song I will cover next, I start listening to it a lot. I usually find guitar chords online which helps me to find the melody more easily. So I take a piece of sheet music and I start writing notes and letters (for the chords). When I have the whole structure of the song, I start practicing on my harp. It’s usually during this part that I get a new idea on how the song could sound more “harpistic”.
What made you decide to share your music online?
Sharing my music online was, at the very beginning, a way to share my harp progress with my family. I have deleted all videos from this time now! It was mostly excerpts of classical works I was playing at school, but I also wanted to show my family that I could also play “modern/pop” songs. So I made my first arrangement of a piano song from the movie The Last Song. This arrangement is still on YouTube, filmed with a very bad quality camera. I really enjoyed doing this so I thought of making more harp arrangements like this one. This is how my YouTube channel started!
What is your advice for other harpists (or musicians in general) looking to grow their online presence?
In 2016 I decided to upload a new cover every week and I have not stopped since then. Regularity (same day, same time every week) is a good way to retain your audience. Every Saturday at 10am (French zone time) my subscribers know that they will find a new harp cover on my channel.
I also try as much as I can to be available when the cover is online so I can directly answer the comments. I also published photos of my rehearsals during the arrangement process, behind the scenes and sneak peek videos on my social medias so my subscribers can know and see more about the videos and my work as a musician on Youtube.
I also answer as much as possible to comments, messages and emails I receive. But covering pop songs is also a great way to grow my audience. People are often very surprised of what you can do with a harp, which is known as a classical instrument.
Do you have a favorite song to play?
I don’t know if I have a favorite song to play, but all my covers from The Greatest Showman movie were a great pleasure to create and perform. And it looks like people very much like them too!
And there you have 5 Questions with… Amélie Guiboux! Be sure to go say hi to her on Instagram, Twitter, & Facebook. And subscribe to her YouTube channel too for a lot of pop harp music!
Let me know in the comments, do you prefer to play more pop harp music or classical? (Or another type or instrument!)
Merci beaucoup, Amélie!
Fischarper interviews may be edited for accuracy (spelling, punctuation, etc.), sentence flow, space, etc. Interviewee views are not necessarily endorsed or shared by Barbara Fischer or Fischarper, LLC.
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-Barbara
Amélie’s bio:
After 10 years of only performing classical music, making my own harp arrangements on YouTube began a new way to perform on this instrument. It also allowed me to reach a new audience which sometimes does not know the instrument at all and which is kind of surprised to hear the song they heard in a movie or on radio played on this curious and majestic instrument. YouTube is a great way to build a community around something you love (covering Taylor Swift songs on harp for example haha!) and I don’t know how I can get tired of doing this!
Barbara Fischer runs Fischarper, LLC and loves her job as a harpist and private music educator. She enjoys blogging about various aspects of the music field on fischarper.com/blog. For more music resources, check out the Fischarper store. Find out where you can find Barbara on the interwebs here. And you can sign up to receive Fischarper updates by joining the email list.