The USA International Harp Competition, Inc. Mourns the Loss of Founder Susann McDonald

The USA International Harp Competition, Inc. is deeply saddened to announce the death of Susann McDonald, distinguished professor emeritus of harp at Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, on May 29, 2025 at the age of 90. 

Joining the Jacobs School of Music faculty in 1981, McDonald was recognized as a world- renowned pedagogue, having been recruited by Dean Charles Webb, from a robust concertizing career and teaching positions at the Juilliard School, the University of Southern California and the University of Arizona. Her teaching career spanned 35 years at Indiana University.

Susann McDonald was born on May 26, 1935, in Rock Island, Illinois, to George McDonald and Catherine (Hackett) McDonald. She was a harp prodigy and while still in her teens, left her hometown of Rock Island, Illinois, to study in Paris with renowned harpist and teacher Henriette Renié. In 1955, at the age of 20, she became the first American to receive the Premier Prix de Harpe from the Paris Conservatory. One year later she performed for an audience of 60,000 at the Chicagoland Music Festival at Soldier Field. After leaving Paris, she was under the concert management of Columbia Artists and was known as one of the world’s greatest performers and teachers for the harp.  

“Susann McDonald was a treasured and beloved teacher, musician and friend to harpists around the world.” said Joyce Claflin, President of the USA International Harp Competition, Inc. based in Bloomington, Indiana where their exclusive sponsors are the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, Lyon & Healy Harps and Salvi Harps. The competition was founded in 1989 by Susann McDonald and is among the largest and most esteemed solo harp performance competitions in the world. 

McDonald served as the artistic director of the World Harp Congress from its inception in 1983 until 2011, an accomplishment of which she took great pride. McDonald promoted worldwide friendships and lived to see her students and fellow harpists succeed. In 2008, she received the World Harp Congress Award of Recognition for Service to the International Harp Community at the Tenth World Harp Congress, one of a select few to have received this award. 

In 1981 McDonald started a publishing company, Music Works-Harp Editions with fellow harpist Linda Wood Rollo, and together they created arrangements and teaching methods that are now standard instructional materials used around the world. She served on juries for virtually all the world’s major harp competitions, including Israel, Italy, France, Hong Kong and Mexico. 

McDonald has performed many times on the PBS television show “Joy of Music” with host Diane Bish, an acclaimed organist. She has produced numerous CD’s under labels from Marquis Music, Delos International and Allen Organ Company. 

Inspired by her teacher, Henriette Renié, who wrote daily devotions, Susann began writing her own daily devotional book in the early 2000’s following a devastating house fire. She completed her book “Praise the Lord with the Harp – A Journal of Faith - 365 Daily Devotionals with Scripture and Prayer” published by Author House, Bloomington, Indiana in 2007, with many new reflections on the impact of the fire on her life. The fire also damaged much of her sheet music collection with precious notations and fingerings. The late Eleanor Fell of Vanderbilt Music Company and graduate student Jaymee Haefner (DMA, Indiana University), among others, re-constructed her vast collection of burned harp sheet music that is now a part of her archives that reside at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.

Susann McDonald’s Christian faith was always a guiding light in her life. She was an avid reader, loved to garden and play golf. She enjoyed her golf community, The Wilderness, in Naples, Florida where she spent her winters beginning in 1999.

Susann McDonald is survived by two nieces Amy Brakeman (Cambridge, Massachusetts) and Amanda Mayeda (Culver City, California); and two nephews David McDonald (Los Angeles, California) and Christopher McDonald (Torrance, California).  USA International Harp Competition, Inc.