Hi keberoxu,

I'll have to dig my CD's out and check the list of instruments, but I know that he did play wire-strung harp.

Carolan's Receipt: The Music of Carolan, Vol. 1 AllMusic Review by Rick Anderson

"Interestingly, Bell plays a steel-string harp on most of the tracks -- though gut-string harps are more commonly used in Celtic music today, this particular instrument was specifically constructed to resemble the kind used by Carolan himself."

Steel strings sound unlikely to me, especially if it "...was specifically constructed to resemble the kind used by Carolan himself". I think the writer possibly used the word "steel" as a generalisation for "metal".

I'll look at each CD and report back, but the liner notes on Derek Bell's CD called Ancient Music for the Irish Harp states: "Derek Bell plays a brass string harp on Little Molly O (note, Molly is misspelled as Molloy in the liner notes), and Love in Secret, and Lady Iveagh, and The Black Rosebud. On all other selections he play a gut strong (sic) neo-Irish harp.

I have a copy of the CD called Derek Bell Plays With Himself (double-entendre was intentional, apparently he liked to tell dirty jokes) and he plays a lot of different instruments on that album. It's a lot of different styles of music, not just Irish. I had a quick look for it but it is 5.30am here in Australia and the caffeine hasn't kicked in yet. I'll have another look when the sun comes up.

All my CD's are loaded onto my computer so that I can load them onto a USB stick and listen to them in the car, so that's why I have to look through my (relatively unsorted) collection to find it.

Helen