Harp Guitar 1831 - 1860

Curator: Here we have a harp guitar, believed to be crafted sometime between 1831 and 1860, and held in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It's a rather striking piece by Emilius N. Scherr. Editor: It looks... like a teardrop! The body of this instrument seems so inflated, and then it thins down so unexpectedly. I imagine holding this thing! It would be somewhat awkward, I bet. What kind of music does it make? Curator: A unique sound, I'm sure. Harp guitars generally offered both regular guitar strings and additional unfretted strings, allowing for a wider range of notes, a more complex tonal palette than a standard guitar could provide. It’s made of wood, giving it this… organic warmth. Editor: Absolutely. That wooden materiality is doing interesting things for the associations this has. The wood grain whispers stories of nature, tradition…but the shape almost wants to be futuristic. This coming together pulls in an emotional register of something longing, elegiac perhaps? Curator: It’s true; the elongation, the sleekness despite the age, could speak to a sense of aspiration, reaching beyond its time. Instruments are rarely *just* instruments. Editor: I’m fixated on that smaller sound hole at the base of the neck –it looks like a watchful eye! Maybe that's why I get such a powerful sense of longing from it. It's almost like the instrument itself yearns. That position on the neck creates something so powerful because we know that instruments only function via a performer. What it expresses comes from their actions! Curator: A lovely reading! Given the time period, you wonder about the contexts it played in; a parlor room, perhaps, serenading guests, or even filling a concert hall. A wooden vessel carrying emotions and music... that is certainly compelling. Editor: Seeing the visual harmony between those wooden figures in the guitar’s structure reminds us that our emotions are also echoes. They are passed to each other like this object through its players! This harp guitar gives us more to hold than its materiality lets on. Curator: A perfect observation. It truly invites us to think of ourselves in conversation with a material that speaks so evocatively.