Sarah Dolan

Sarah Dolan, (Princess Unlucky) makes music to cope with being an especially emotional human being. Her music is often unpredictable and passionately charged. At age 11, Sarah had a friend who played the violin. She adored this friend, and wanted to play something that would compliment her. She came across a small wooden harp called a harpsicle, which she called Merlin. From there they would play songs together, where Sarah would attend her friend’s violin lessons. But then Sarah had a fight with this friend, right before she moved out of the country, and their friendship was over. Sarah didn’t know how to handle that loss, but she picked up Merlin and started plucking out her emotions. Over the years, Sarah and Merlin, (now the electric Merlin II), would make songs whenever she felt alone or had something she couldn’t express. She began classically training under the harpist, Mary Muckle, and completed her Royal Conservatory examinations for lever harp. In 2021, she won a province wide ORMTA student composition contest for her sextet, When Comes the Night, and earn second place in the country. Today she enjoys being part of the music community, playing open mics regularly at Art House Café and Live! on Elgin. She is happy to be in Ottawa, which, despite having a small urban core, is rich with wonderful, talented artists. Sarah has a background in physics, which forms a large part of how she thinks. She has a second acoustic harp named Cecelia.