The Harp Foundation, founded in May of 2000, evolved from Hospice of the Valley’s Integrative Therapeutics Program (formerly known as Complementary and Alternative Therapies). In order to expand the harp program into the West Valley and surrounding areas, The Harp Consortium was formed as a separate, non-profit organization providing harp music to individuals in need.  The Harp Consortium later became known as The Harp Foundation (THF) in 2007 when it became a separate community foundation.

The Harp Foundation’s founding members were Hospice of the Valley Sun Health Corporation,   Interfaith Services and Sun Cities Area Ministerial Association.  The Harp Foundation is uniquely positioned as the only collaborative organization between health care and spiritually-based organizations of its kind in the United States that provides therapeutic harp music.   We are now servicing over 40 different institutions, partnering with many organizations and affiliating with several national and internationally based organizations.

Vision for the Future

The vision for the Harp Foundation is to provide a model for other Integrative Therapies to provide loving and compassionate care in mainstream churches, education, and healthcare environments. Our goal is to develop and sustain community partnerships to move forward in the area of providing quality health care alternatives to our diverse  population here in Arizona.  While partnering with like-minded organizations we will model structure, format guidelines and a training manual to be used in daily practice at medical, religious and home environments.  The program will be inclusive of diverse styles of music and musicians, therefore providing clinical training and credentials for practitioners at a college setting, which will provide education and clinical research to support the many positive effects of Integrative Therapies.

The Harp Foundation has expanded its mission to serve developmentally and physically handicapped children, oncology patients, under-served populations, and other individuals with special needs. In particular, THF is serving children and infants who are critically ill and medically fragile through programs at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix, Mercy Gilbert Medical Center in Gilbert, Arizona and Banner Del E. Webb Medical Center.  We have also provided programs to The Foundation for Blind Children, Arthur Hamilton Elementary School and other numerous other private, charter and public schools.

Since its inception, The Harp Foundation has provided over 50,000 hours of therapeutic harp music to individuals and their families in the Greater Phoenix area and throughout Maricopa County.