FAQ

The next edition takes place on Saturday April 20, 2024, live in TivoliVredenburg.

We'll announce our full line-up later this year.

Each venue has its own guarded cloakroom, upon arrival we will let you know which cloakroom you can use. In addition to this free cloakroom, you can also rent a locker for €2 or a large locker for €4.

TivoliVredenburg is located next to the central train station, in the city centre of Utrecht. Amsterdam and Schiphol Airport are just 30 minutes by train; Rotterdam and The Hague only 45 minutes. There are daily international trains from and to Brussels (2 hours), Cologne (2,5 hours) and Paris (3,5 hours). For more info, go to www.ns.nl or www.nshighspeed.nl (international).

We can recommend the BUNK hotel. It's a design budget hotel, nearby TivoliVredenburg.

All harpists, regardless of age and nationality, are welcome to apply! There are no entry restrictions.

Candidates who pass the preliminary round of the competition will be invited to submit a video preview of their original program. All the details concerning the content, file format, and deadline are outlined in section D2 of the 2022 Rules & Regulations.

The "original program" is an adventurous new concept that sets the DHF World Harp Competition apart from all other harp competitions. Rather than asking competitors to prepare a set of required repertoire, we invite everyone to design their own program. Approach it as if you were designing a concert program. Think about your unique strengths as a musician and what you would like to express artistically. Think about what kind of experience you want to create for the audience. The jury will be looking for the best all-around performer: technically, musically, and artistically. For more tips and inspiration, watch this video. We are curious to see what you come up with!

Just like you would for a normal concert, you are welcome to program music that includes other performers or invite colleagues to collaborate with you, as long as the main feature of the program remains you playing the harp. How much collaboration should you do? We don’t have an answer for this, but keep in mind both the costs and the benefits. Collaboration can add dynamic to your performance, but more doesn’t always mean better. And involving extra people can bring in fresh ideas, but it also incurs extra expenses, which are not covered by the Dutch Harp Festival. It’s up to you to strike the right balance.

In the special case of a program that involves multiple harps, the short answer is yes, but it’s a bit more complicated than that, so keep reading. You cannot actually apply as a group, since there can be only one contestant per application. So if you wanted to perform as a harp quartet (for example), then you would have to select one member to represent you as the official competition contestant. However, keep in mind that if you are selected for the finals, there will be travel and accommodation provided only for the main contestant.

Finalists who are invited to perform at the Dutch Harp Festival will receive travel reimbursement to and from Utrecht as well as accommodation and meals during the festival. No other travel is required.

Yes! Feedback will be provided starting in the video round (we do not provide feedback following the preliminary round). Due to the unique format of the competition, there won’t be an opportunity to receive feedback from the jury in person, however we will collect written feedback from the jury members and forward these on to you following each round. We believe that receiving feedback is important for musical growth, which is why we make sure to give our candidates the opportunity to hear the jury’s reaction to their performance.

Check out our video “All About the Jury” to learn how adjudication works at the DHF World Harp Competition. There are three separate juries, consisting each of different jury members, each one responsible for a different round of the competitions: the preliminary round, the regional rounds (this year conducted digitally as the "video round"), and the finals. On these juries will be a mixture of both harpists and non-harpists. We ensure that none of the harpist jury members are teachers of any of the candidates. Non-harpists are professional musicians with distinguished careers in other areas such as performance, conducting, composing, and music business. In order to minimize the amount of contact between the candidates and the jury members, we only announce the names of the jury members once the competition has begun.

Yes! Prior to 2018, competitors were required to perform only on official competition harps. Now, since we are opening up the competition to all kinds of harps, we will also allow anyone to bring their own harp if they wish, and that includes pedal harps.

We will try our best to provide harps for anyone who requests to use a competition harp at the finals. Just let us know on your application form what kind of harp you would need. Some harps are easier to find than others, however, so if you play a unique type of harp, we may only be able to provide a close approximation.