Finding Your Voice: An Interview with Harpist and Episcopal Priest Debbie Brewin-Wilson
I met with Reverend Debbie Brewin-Wilson via Zoom at her Sparta, NJ parish to chat about her love of the harp, teaching, Scottish music, and spirituality. I honestly couldn’t tell you exactly when I met Debbie, but it was probably at The Somerset Folk Harp Festival when I was just beginning to learn the harp. She has always been encouraging and kind and has helped me along my journey.
One of Debbie’s passions is teaching beginner harpists and helping them find the joy that she finds in the instrument. She and Kathy DeAngelo started a yearly weekend event called, “The Harper’s Escape” as an event for lovers of the harp to get together to learn new songs and to experience the camaraderie of the harp community.
It began in 1992 and is now part of the larger Somerset Folk Harp Festival which takes place in Parsippany, NJ every July. This year, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the festival and Harper’s Escape will be conducted online. This will give more people from around the world an opportunity to attend the workshops and concerts and will hopefully inspire more people to learn the harp.
Debbie has a great interest in folk music and folk traditions, especially the music of Robert Burns. She has written arrangements of his work for harp in addition to other Scottish tunes that are taught at The Escape. These arrangements are available in the Harper’s Escape’s three books of tunes , which are a wonderful way to build up a repertoire of Irish and Scottish traditional music. “There’s so much wonderful music out there and that is in the folk traditions that’s going to be lost if people aren’t playing it.”
History of Celtic music in the church
“Ancient Celtic monks traveled with a small harp and they’d tie it on their belts and carry it along to accompany their singing.”
Debbie has a special connection to St. Colombia of Iona and we discussed how he is pictured with his harp and how she hopes to inspire people to bring themselves and their love of music into their own spirituality inspiring people to find that connection for themselves. A beautiful way Debbie helps facilitate that connection is through her book and CD, “Harp of My King”, which is a compilation of Celtic Tunes New & Old for Christian Worship.
Debbie has also been creating chants based on bible passages or devotional readings like the Taizé community music from, Saône-et-Loire, Burgundy, France. These chants are meant to be something to help people calm down and center themselves into a more prayerful place. She would like to eventually record this collection of chants.
Debbie’s Website www.harpagency.com/artist3.htm
Harper’s Escape www.somersetharpfest.com/escape.html#top
The Somerset Folk Harp Festival www.somersetharpfest.com/