What is a Lap Harp?
The lap harp is commonly referred to as a plucked psaltery type of instrument. This lap harp is usually built in a trapezoidal shape and has 15 strings. The player uses one hand to play although the adventurous player can find ways of using the second hand to make more creative sounds. No music background is required with this instrument. A lap harp can also refer to a regular folk harp such as that with levers that is made on a smaller scale to be held on the lap. They are usually 22 to 26 strings, played with both hands and require some music background to play. But when we refer to a lap harp on this page it is to the psaltery type of lap harp.
