By Tonica Hunter
“Of course, anything you don’t know how it will turn out is scary. Letting go of that fear is part of that process.”
Once upon a time, in a small Austrian village called Perchtoldsdorf, there was a little girl who dreamed of being a princess. One evening, while visiting the village hall, she saw the most heavenly person she had ever seen. In the hands of this magical person lay a golden instrument that bewitched the young girl and drew her closer and closer until she finally touched it herself. This particular instrument would guide the rest of her journey to become what she truly wanted to be and the closest thing to her princess-like visions: a harpist.
Fairy tales are just fairy tales, right? Well, the above story is true, and to date, Miriam Adefri’s musical career is a dream come true for most musicians.
In fact, she zooms in to the interview from the Cayman Islands, where she was contacted by an agency organizing creative residencies at an exclusive boutique hotel there. phew Even for Miriam, who still pinches herself in disbelief, it wasn’t entirely real, although given her talent and hard work, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that she already has such achievements to her name.
Born and raised in a small town near Vienna, Miriam has enthusiastically involved her career in the European music scene, performing at Austrian festivals as well as in Germany (Xjazz! Festival Berlin), Italy and the United Kingdom (London Jazz Festival) performed and also with the electronic musician Floating Points worked together, to name just one epic example. Like many other harpists, Miriam was taught classical music in her youth – known for her formal, rigorous training and her strongly Eurocentric repertoire, not least in European schools. In this area, perfection is fundamental and is reinforced through learning, rehearsing and repeating pieces used in performances and concerts – from smaller stages to large orchestral constellations. Of course, these early years and environments shaped much of Miriam’s first ideas in music and the harp.
In addition, Miriam was also very involved in sports – from acrobatics to horseback riding – and at a high level. As with her early experiences with the harp, she gained discipline while developing ideas of teamwork and training the adaptability of different parts of her body and mind. In this sense, flexibility and rigor should also characterize many of her later professional decisions in music. She says: “Everything I’ve tried has always been an all or nothing thing. I have always been competitive, but that drive has always been directed inwards, towards myself.”
“I just kept coming back to it”
However, the main motivation for Miriam’s work is neither competition, discipline nor conviction, but rather love. She calls the harp the love of her life and often speaks almost of a partnership. And as it should be, she also fell in love with the harp and separated from it again: “By the age of 11 it wasn’t cool to play the harp anymore, so I focused on sports“she laughs. “There were actually two periods, then and later in my career, when I tried to give up the harp, but it just wouldn’t let me go. I just kept coming back to it.” This synergy between the artist and her instrument is reflected so beautifully in their joint development. As she expands her skills and experience, she tells me, a harp also develops. She explains to me that the more the wood of the instrument is played, the more it develops, which improves the sound over time.
And this development was also crucial to her background in classical music: growth was a catalyst for her decision to move to the UK with her harp for a change of scenery and inspiration. Miriam enrolled there in 2020 for a master’s degree in performance at the University of Goldsmith a. In the midst of the pandemic and the arduous preparations for Brexit, she had to make the decision to remain in the UK. This circumstance meant that re-entering education was one of the only viable options for her to stay in the UK.
Miriam used this time to network and forge some of the most important connections that not only launched an international career but also her move away from classical music into other genres and art forms. And these interactions and inspirations – she was even once tutored in London by the jazz harpist Alina Bzhezhinska – sparked an interest in her that had already been awakened in Vienna.
After graduating from University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna (MUK) and subsequent engagements in various orchestras, Miriam founded an ensemble that dealt with improvisational styles. This formed a foundation on which she wished to build three years later in her studies and in her connections in the cosmopolitan, progressive and experimental city of London. “I wanted to go from being a musician who reproduces (classical) music to someone who produces music myself”she says. “I move between genres a lot now; although I’m still a very analogue harpist, I’m more concerned with having a creative output.” By continuing her education in jazz theory, emphasizing jazz-related exercises, and reading sheet music from reed instruments, Miriam has immersed herself in experimentation while also learning from other instruments. “Everything I do contains elements of improvisation.” This leap from her very local knowledge and understanding – in Austria the harp is very central to folk music – to a broader, albeit decolonial, approach meant for Miriam that she began to explore alternative sources of harp playing and theory. As she moved beyond these early associations, Miriam also discovered the limitations of her chosen instrument. Adapting harp playing to a variety of techniques and genres is no easy task, she explains: “Because the harp is tuned diatonic and has seven pedals to play semitones. That means she’s sometimes a bit slower when it comes to more complex harmonic changes.” Miriam does not see this as a disadvantage, but as an incentive: “I have to be more creative and find solutions that are often more exciting than the original task”.
Indeed, she seems to be using the harp and staying true to her roots while also pushing her boundaries. Contrary to its classical and Eurocentric association, the harp can be traced back to Iraq, Egypt and Iran before finding its way to Europe in the Middle Ages. Despite this, the jazz tradition in the harp is far less institutionalized than in other genres. So, by consciously practicing and playing with other instruments that are more familiar with jazz theory and performance, Miriam pushes the boundaries of the harp through learning and experimentation, each time breaking new ground for herself and her craft. No wonder her two role models did the same – two of her biggest influences are pioneers in this field: Alice Coltrane and Dorothy Ashby, both of whom completely reshaped the image of the instrument and invented a whole new way of playing. For Miriam, both are still fascinating personalities today. “At that time they were two of the very few female and also black instrumentalists. I worship them like goddesses and their musical legacy is priceless.”
Miriam’s East African heritage also plays a role in her music: “Ethiopian jazz and harp from the 60’s and 70’s certainly influenced my work”. In a moment of reflection, Miriam compares her current path to her classical past, where she says the mere thought of improvisation felt so distant and off-putting. “One is trimmed for perfection and is afraid of making mistakes (…). Letting go of that fear is part of this process, but it’s also the most satisfying; there is so much freedom.”
Communicating with musicians instead of just playing with them, she says, got her hooked, and she started exploring that: “Sometimes I listen to improvisations and I’m so overwhelmed by the process and what can happen in the moment. You could never think of something like that on your own. There is so much magic in this moment”. And since such moments she has had many more brilliant opportunities to perform with some greats from ongoing collaborations with Floating Points to Valentina Magaletti (“an important experimental drummer,” she tells me enthusiastically). It was only in March this year that she starred alongside Shabaka Hutchings Shakespeare Globe Theatre in London. Miriam also recently formed her own 4-piece band, whose first public performances were in the London jazz club 606 and at London Jazz Festival IN 2022 took place. This October Miriam will give concerts for school classes in Vienna music Society and in Vienna concert hall give. She is currently working on a solo album which she intends to release at the end of the year. Stay tuned!
Despite all this exploration and experimentation, and being so far from home, Miriam Adefris is still connected to the humble beginnings of her journey with her instrument – it’s still the harp she holds on to and all make her childhood dreams come true.
This is a story about a woman and her harp.
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Links:
Miriam Adefris (Instagram)