Thomas Walsh’s Inis Sear— my harp teacher seemed to be pronouncing it as /ih-nih SHEER/— is a traditional harp piece that my harp instructor had me prepare as one of my eight slow airs for a Mid-Atlantic Regional Fleadh. This is in the key of G major. The sheet music is arranged and fingered for a harp, but this can also be used as a lead sheet for a treble instrument by taking the top line.
Off the top of my head, I do not recall why I wrote out the two versions. As in, did I perform one and then the other? (Possible because, as my harp teacher told me, always do one repeat of the entire song for competitions and make the second time around different.) Or were they two possibilities that I wanted to have written down? It was probably the first.
Slow airs are apparently the sort of songs in which you can add fermatas wherever you want, assuming you can make it sound like your fermata placement makes sense. At least, that is what it sounded like my harp teacher was telling me. Anyway, this requires being light on the fingers, and being gentle with the music.
To download free sheet music for harp or a lead sheet for Inis Sear by Thomas Walsh as a .pdf, please click here:
