Strung together: Ringgold’s Harp Ensemble a happy accident
Karen Mansfield
Kay Balderose, a retired associate pastor, is a member of the Ringgold Harp Ensemble. Balderose attended a recent practice, where she played a 36-string Celtic harp. Modern orchestra harps have 47 strings and seven pedals.
Karen Mansfield
Gianna Sprecace, a senior at Ringgold High School, practices the Celtic harp at a recent rehearsal of the Ringgold Harp Ensemble.
Karen Mansfield
The Ringgold Harp Ensemble is one of the few harp programs offered at public schools across the country. It was started nearly 20 years ago by middle school music director Melanie Sandrock.
Karen Mansfield
Ringgold High School freshman Sarah McIntosh has been playing the harp for nearly four years. She is a member of the Ringgold Harp Ensemble.
Karen Mansfield
Ringgold High School senior Reagan Allen, who is the drum major for the Ringgold High School band, has been playing the harp since she was in sixth grade. She plans to major in harp performance in college.
Karen Mansfield
A recent rehearsal of the Ringgold Harp Ensemble. The members, led by middle school music director Melanie Sandrock, include students, former students and adults who share a passion for the instrument.
Karen Mansfield
Ringgold High School graduate Angel Wateska participated in the middle school’s Celtic harp course, and is still a member of the Ringgold Harp Ensemble.
By Karen Mansfield
Throughout elementary school, Ringgold High School senior Reagan Allen loved music and playing the piano.
But when her mother encouraged her to take an elective Celtic harp class offered at the middle school in sixth grade, Allen initially resisted.
“I wasn’t familiar with the harp, and I wasn’t really interested in playing instruments other than the piano,” said Allen. “I honestly just took the class because my mom wanted me to.”
For Allen, the music class that introduced her to the ancient, ethereal instrument was life-changing.
Allen recently was accepted at Liberty University, where she will major in harp performance and plans to become a professional harpist.
“I’d be on a completely different path in life if they didn’t have harp here,” said Allen. “I can’t imagine doing anything other than music, and playing the harp. I love the sound. It’s beautiful.”
Allen is a member of the Ringgold Harp Ensemble, founded by Ringgold Middle School music director Melanie Sandrock.
Ringgold’s harp program is among only a handful offered at public schools throughout the country.
“Most schools don’t have harp because they’re so expensive, and you don’t often have a harp player,” said Sandrock.
The ensemble is comprised of about a dozen students, former students, and adults who share a love for the instrument.
Kay Balderose, a retired associate pastor of Church of the Covenant, Washington, who jokingly calls herself “the other kind of senior,” first began playing the harp 20 years ago after a friend invited her to play the instrument during a stressful time in her life.
“Just holding the instrument in your arms and feeling the music as a part of your body was really healing in a difficult time in my life, so I really fell in love with the harp,” said Balderose. “So finally when I retired, I was able to own one.”
Over the years, the ensemble, which currently includes about a dozen members, has traveled to play at several venues across the region.
The group has been featured at community events, state school board conferences, and at PPG Place’s Wintergarden with the Pittsburgh Chapter of the American Harp Society, where students in grades 7 through 12 have played alongside Carnegie Mellon and Duquesne university students. The ensemble has also played alongside Gretchen Van Hoesen, principal harpist of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra.
The ensemble performs annually at the Ligonier Highland games and attends the Ohio Scottish Arts School each summer.
Members of the ensemble have played at weddings, and freshman Sarah McIntosh performed at a funeral.
The Celtic harp course elective is available to students grades 6 through 8.
The school district has embraced the harp ensemble and adopted the Dress Gordon tartan – a plaid combination of blue, yellow and green worn by the group during performances – as its official tartan.
The program started by accident.
About 17 years ago, a Ringgold Middle School student, Kelly Jones, asked Sandrock to teach her how to play the harp.
“So, once a week after school, I taught her to play, and then some of her friends said, ‘Can you teach us, too?’ I said sure,” recalled Sandrock. “Before you knew it, there were about eight kids staying after school to learn to play the harp.”
That summer, former middle school principal Dr. Jeff Matty – a former student of Sandrock’s – asked if she would like to teach harp as an elective class.
Fifteen students signed up for the first class. Over the ensemble’s history, hundreds of students have had the chance to pluck the strings of a harp, a 36-string instrument that dates back to ancient Mesopotamia; harps range in price from around $3,000 for a Celtic (folk) harp to upwards of $100,000 for an orchestra harp.
The middle school houses nine Celtic harps, most crafted by master luthier Jeff Lewis of Michigan. Some students have their own Celtic or orchestra harps.
The instrument, Sandrock said, takes “a lot of work to get really good at. It’s easy to start, but not easy to master.”
Sandrock said she isn’t aiming to create professional harpists. Instead, the harp program – both rigorous and fun – exposes students to a unique experience and the fundamentals of music, and it provides a chance to learn a lifelong skill.
Angel Wateska, 20, graduated from Ringgold High School in 2020, but she still plays with the ensemble.
“I think the thing I love about the instrument the most is its versatility,” said Wateska, who owns both a Celtic and orchestra harp.
“You can pretty much do all genres of music, it’s dependent on what you want to play. So, I think its versatility is a huge thing that draws me to the instrument. That, and the positivity. Here in ensemble, everyone is always so positive and so warm, there’s no pressure, it’s just fun.”
On a recent Wednesday, six ensemble members were cloistered inside the music room in the elementary school for practice, including Gianna Sprecace, a senior who returned to the group after a four-year hiatus during which she participated in a variety of other activities.
The members ran through a warm-up song, Fires at Midnight, a folk ballad by Scottish harper Wendy Stewart.
McIntosh, who has been playing the harp for nearly four years, became fascinated with the instrument when her older sister began to take lessons.
“I like that I can make everything I play my own, change it up a little bit,” said McIntosh. “It ‘s a lot of fun. It’s very relaxing, and I’ve met a lot of people playing. I really enjoy it.”