Ulla van Daelen is considered the ambassador for the harp: "Simply amazing - we have never experienced the harp like this!"
With her virtuoso and soulful harp playing she has enchanted her audience in a unique way for decades! Her compositions are inspired by jazz, pop, folk and of course classical music in its most lively form! On her new album "Mandala" Ulla van Daelen presents her wonderful diversity as a composer and interpreter for the first time at Stockfisch!
83 strings - 2 harps - one virtuoso. Ulla van Daelen impresses with her second solo album - released on Stockfisch Records.
The enigmatic title of Ulla van Daelen's new Hybrid-SACD is revealed as soon as you look at the cover. Two harps ‘come into play’ and expand the already broad spectrum of expressive possibilities of a concert harp with numerous additional colours:
Super-Audio-CD Hybrid: SACD Stereo + CD-Layer
SFR 357.4113.2 • total time 58:08
Van Daelen knows how to confidently juxtapose the smaller lever harp of Celtic origin (36 strings), and its rather ‘folkloristic’ sound, with the large concert harp (47 strings) and to bring them into direct dialogue in the CD's final track ‘Zweisamkeit’.
Most of the titles recorded are original compositions by Ulla van Daelen - or arrangements by her. The stylistic diversity of the titles presented is captivating: from the arabesque-influenced ‘Oriental Moments’, in which the harp also serves as a percussion instrument, to the minuet-like ‘Perückentanz’ and hits such as ‘Tulpen aus Amsterdam’ or the chanson ‘Für mich soll‘s rote Rosen regnen’. And even ‘Satchmo’ Louis Armstrong would have paid his respects to Ulla's version of ‘What a Wonderful World’.
Quotes from many genres are skillfully combined here to create what one might call the ‘van Daelen style’. Wonderful music, played with virtuosity on 83 harp strings.
Ulla van Daelen was already improvising on the piano at the age of five and won her first awards at the age of ten, when she participated in Germany’s most respected Youth competition “Jugend musiziert”. As early as the age of twelve, she discovered the harp to be her dream instrument, winning her first award for harp six years later. Engagements at numerous opera houses and concert tours in the United States and Japan followed.
Ulla van Daelen was then appointed to the position of solo harpist of the WDR Radio Orchestra. She is known to defy any attempt of categorization into a specific genre, and she began to develop new sounds and rhythms for the harp, drawing inspiration from frequent interdisciplinary collaborations with renowned jazz musicians and the WDR Big Band as well as with artists of the pop and world music genre.
She is one of the most popular examples for innovative harp music to date.
Super-Audio-CD Hybrid: SACD Stereo + CD-Layer
SFR 357.4100.2 • total time 57:05
"The harp has never been heard so varied - so rhythmic, so lively, so full of amazing motifs and ideas. Ulla van Daelen replaces an entire orchestra and makes you feel like you are in a concert hall, but sometimes also like in a rushing forest by a clear stream - simply put: wonderful." Elke Heidenreich
Ulla van Daelen began to develop new sounds and rhythms for the harp, drawing inspiration from frequent interdisciplinary collaborations with renowned jazz musicians as well as with artists of the pop and world music genre. She has since repeatedly been invited to be a guest soloist at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, she has accompanied the Young Tenors on their Christmas Tour and has recorded with famous artists such as Vince Mendoza, Charlie Mariano and Lalo Schifrin.
Ulla van Daelen
"83 Strings"
MUSIKER
