By Elizabeth Jewell
On Sunday, December 7, 2025, JASNA-NC members gathered in person and virtually to celebrate the holiday season and Jane’s 250th birthday, which is on December 16, 2025. The in-person get-together was at Gisele Rankin’s lovely home in Cary, and members brought an array of tasty treats. Karin Wiberg led the in-person meeting, while Regional Coordinator Sara Tavela led the online meeting.
JASNA member Julia Adams presented a program on harp playing using two of her beautiful harps. Julia is president of Oak City Government Relations; she has worked in health-care policy and in integrating arts in NC, with an emphasis on accessibility. She bought her first harp during the pandemic, so has been playing for five years. She began with a traditional Irish song, “Three Little Drummers.”
There are two main types of harps, lever harps (use levers for semitones) and pedal harps (use foot pedals for full chromaticism, or use of the full chromatic scale). Julia demonstrated the difference in the backs of the two harps she brought, one with a rounded back with five holes in it and the other with a more flat back with two holes in it. People who play harps often name them and refer to them as “she/her.” Julia’s preference is for Celtic and Irish music.
Jane Austen would have seen pedal harps. The number of strings a harp has varies depending on the size of the harp; the forty-seven string harp has a range nearly the same as a piano. Harps date back to antiquity, at least as early as 3000 BCE, and were found in Africa, Asia, and Europe. Around 1720, Austrian Jacob Hochbrucker designed an improved pedal mechanism, leading to the “Golden Age of the Harp,” which continued through the Romantic era in the late nineteenth century.
Harps were seen as a symbol of luxury, wealth, and status, although they eventually became mass-produced. The characteristics of harp music—ethereal, graceful, hypnotic—became associated with characters in fiction who played the harp.
Julia played “All in the Garden Green,” a country dance also known as “the kissing dance.” She noted that harps are played with three fingers and the thumb, but never the pinky finger!
Julia discussed the Jane Austen works with harps featured. In Mansfield Park, for example, Mary Crawford’s harp playing becomes part of her charm and a symbol of her desire to make a good marriage. Her harp music charms Edmund, but Julia notes that it is also intended to charm Fanny and help Mary make a friend and confidant of her.
In Persuasion, the Musgrove sisters, Henrietta and Louisa, have a harp and a pianoforte, symbols of their wealth. After a discussion of their brother’s death, the decision is made to take the harp to their brother’s cottage in an attempt to relieve their mother’s sadness during a visit there. So valued is the harp that it is given a place in the carriage and Louisa walks.
In Pride and Prejudice, Georgiana, Darcy’s younger sister, plays the harp (and the piano). In the 2005 film, the harp is seen in the background. Here, again, the harp symbolizes her wealth and social status.
Jane does not list the titles of songs played in her books with one exception: in Emma, Jane Fairfax plays the song “Robin Adair.” Julia played this song for us!
Julia mentioned the harp belonging to Jane’s cousin Eliza de Feuillide (later her sister-in-law, as Eliza’s second marriage was to Jane’s brother Henry). The harp was a 1777 Holtzman harp; it was traced, purchased, restored, and played by Mike Parker in modern times.
Julia notes that both Jane’s work and harps are more accessible now than ever before, with online access to the books and the ability to purchase harps online, as well as listen to harp music on YouTube and other websites.
Sara offered a recap of our year, and we held a quick business meeting to confirm and welcome new leaders to the team: Linda Darden as Co-Regional Coordinator with Sara, and Sue Scott as Membership Officer. We’re grateful to all members of our leadership team and to all volunteers who keep our region thriving! The meeting concluded with Gisele offering the traditional toast to Jane’s birthday. Conversation and more savory and sweet treats rounded off the day.
Sara announced some upcoming events: a virtual Regency ball online on Jane’s birthday, December 16. She mentioned that it has been forty years since the 1985 founding of JASNA-NC (huzzah!). In January we’ll discuss the Art of Dining in Austen’s time. There will be a one-day virtual conference on March 21, and we’ve discussed a Persuasion-themed seaside day coming later in the new year. Happy 2026!