Hmmm, not so much.
I was super excited about finding Michael via Yelp and his great reputation for being professional. Honestly, these qualities are alot more important to me than actual harp playing skills.
Don't get me wrong - I do assume a baseline of musical ability here, but let's be honest people, there aren't that many professional harp players out there and the ones I encountered previously were more creative, less business type personalities. My event's success is greater influenced by a harpist actually showing up, being responsive, and accountable, than their extensive repertoire and accuracy of Bach's greatest hits.
And if any of our wedding guests feel differently - bring it. Someone actually providing feedback on the musical talent of the harpist at your wedding is grounds for years of ridicule and totally worth the trade. I digress..
With my intentions outlined above, you can imagine how super stoked I was to find Michael's posting here on Yelp and how people were specifically raving about these qualities.
I went to his ultra professional website and thought - wow, I have found my harpist. I emailed him requesting pricing and availability, he promptly responding with pricing (pretty reasonable as far as harpists go) and that he may have a conflict with our wedding date as it was the same as the West Bay Opera, and he would know better in the next few months (this was mid Feb).
I was sad, as the combo of Yelp reviews + professional website + timely and accountable response + evidence of musically legitimacy of playing in an Opera had made me fall even harder for this harp man. I asked him to keep us posted on availability and made a mental note to check back in.
I consciously held my horses for the "couple months" that Michael had indicated and waited until April. I had told my mom about him (standard crush protocol), and she wanted to talk to him since she works for a realty company that he had referenced on his website as having played events for. I suggested she give him a call.
A few weeks later she said she had never heard back. I thought that was odd since he had replied so quickly to me and had indicated he would be eager to work with us if availability allowed. It had been two months since my initial inquiry, so I thought I'd try following up as well. Sent him an email on April 12th saying we still wanted to work with him and wondering if he knew his availability better. No response.
A week later, after both my mom and my unreturned emails, I wondered if it was time to move on from my potential harp man and consider if I could do better. It was ultimatum time. I sent one last email to Michael indicating that we really wanted to work with him but needed to get music locked down soon and to please respond if any interest. That was two weeks ago, no response. Maybe he had been out of town? But ignoring his primary mode of business contact for weeks? I'd like to make up excuses, but it's hard to ignore four unreturned requests.
I was really surprised at the lack of response, but I'm glad I found this out now instead of after booking him. In searching for another harpist on CL, I found an updated posting from him dated last week, so there goes the out of town theory. Sigh. There must have been someone else. read more
