The palette of restoration features ranges from purely conservation / maintenance work over playability adjustments up to a total renovation, whereby the available substance of the instrument and its state of repair will determine the approach required.
Restoring a harp is more than even a harp repair, but less drastic than a harp renovation.
A careful restoration takes the biography of a harp into account and allows only moderate and reversible intervention (less is often more) so that the charm of a venerable piece can breathe on.
For enthusiasts of antiquities the conservation of a harp is the mostly practised method, as this harp is not requested to be played. However, there may be a collector who wishes to hear his harp in a concert in his living room.
As a harp restorer Beat Wolf reanimated the voice of numerous harps - from Louvet and Naderman up to Holtzman and Erard - thus they are charming many happy harpists for recordings and concerts. Even an early pedal harp by Hochbrucker now sounds in bright freshness after being restored it in painstaking detail work. Today this harp belongs to the Musée de la Musique in Paris. It is represented on a special page:
» The HOCHBRUCKER harp