About The Autoharp

The Autoharp is known to have been invented by Karl August Gütter of Markneukirchen, Germany, in the early 1880s, and was developed in the USA from about 1885 by Charles Zimmerman, a German emigrant living in Philadelphia, who saw the instrument as perfect for employing his tone-numbering system of music reading patented in 1871.

The Autoharp went through a period in vogue as a novelty and parlour instrument but fell into disuse around the turn of the century, only surviving through its use for accompanying hymns and group singing in the churches and schoolhouses of the mountain regions of the Eastern USA between the wars where its use as a portable lap device in this context earned it its epithet of 'mountain piano'.

Since the 1920s it has become regarded as a folk instrument of great repute and considerable beauty, particularly in the 1980s during which time there was a great increase in Autoharp knowledge at all levels, especially with regard to construction, tuning, techniques and the use of more adapted chord bar systems.

Mike Fenton is in the forefront of the Autoharp movement as teacher, performer and consultant. Both in the UK and USA, the Autoharp has a long association with the schools, its potential as a tool for teaching music having long been recognised by educators.