Jean Altshuler has been playing the harp since she was seven. She attended Music and Art High School in New York and graduated from Oberlin Conservatory on a harp scholarship. After many years as principal harpist with several American orchestras she moved to the Lake District where she now lives. She is a founding member of Harps Northwest and has taught
workshops on early music and Eastern European tunes arranged for lever harp.
She met classical guitarist Ed Heslam in January 2016 after seeing an anthology of his music beside the unique and extraordinary musical stones at the Keswick museum of local history. Since then she has enjoyed learning and playing Ed’s arrangements of tunes from Cumberland and Westmorland. They have performed at venues throughout the North of England and Scotland.