I'll have to see the pix later, I am waiting on a work e-mail and can't do the download time, but thank you.

I have no lap to speak of but have thought about melody picking, tabletop.

There are a lot of autoharpers who play melody regardless of holding style, but I believe they do it by chording to eliminate as many wrong notes as possible and then pinching the area where the desired open string should be, its neighbors thus being damped out of the playing field as I like to call the strings.

When I try melody picking though it is with fingerpicks on open strings, no chording, like I play my lap harp, but I always get lost. For me the AH is best as a rhythmic foundation for the rest of the players or, when just me, for singing/songleading. (Our little pickup group is short on rhythm except me!!!!)

I prefer to use voice and to whistle to get the melody across because melody will just pour out of me with no further effort and frankly I am either too lazy to practice practice practice or too wired into the experience of the music to worry who is doing the melody. In our playing, I set the rhythm and dynamic and then sort of disappear into the middle of all the fun. So it isn't the autoharp's deficiency at work.

I do also love autoharping the chords for fiddle tunes, Carolan's, etc. when my husband fiddles or plays mandolin, and with just me electrified it is quite something when we get going. Much richer than the usual arrangements I hear of such music with guitar, hammered dulcimer, lap dulcimer, etc. I would love to add AH to one of those lineups to see what would happen.

AH blues also is excellent, esp. electrified. Effects pedals next?