Heaven Fan

Biography

Currently serving on the faculty of the University of Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s College, Valparaiso University, Indiana University South Bend, and Anderson University, Dr. Heaven Fan is also a member of the artistic faculty of the MasterWorks Festival. Fan’s performances have been featured on National Public Radio (NPR), TV and radio stations in the US, Canada, Central and South America, Europe, Asia, and Australia. She has been featured on the recordings including the prizewinning album A Ceremony of Carols with the Notre Dame Children’s Choir; Ami Maayani’s The Harp Concerti (Fons) as the First Harp of the Pacific Harp Quartet; The Best of Festival of Carols, Volume 1, and Festival of Carols (Naxos) with Indianapolis Chamber Orchestra, Indianapolis Symphonic Choir, Soprano Maria Jette, and the Grammy Award-winning soprano Sylvia McNair.

A prizewinner in the national Anne Adams Competition of the American Harp Society and the Creative Renewal Arts Fellowship Award of the Arts Council of Indianapolis and Lilly Endowment, Fan was invited internationally as a featured soloist in the MasterWorks Festival, the Festival of Chinese Performing Arts in Boston, the Boston Harp Festival, the World Harp Congresses in Czech Republic and Switzerland, the International Harp Festival of Mexico, and the New Year Concerts of the Qingdao Municipal Opera and Dance Drama Theater Orchestra in China.

Fan is an avid advocate of contemporary and chamber music and has worked with composers in numerous projects and given world premieres in the US, Taiwan, and Australia. She has collaborated in contemporary and chamber music concerts with members of NY’s MET orchestra, Boston, Atlanta, St. Louis, and National symphonies, as well as faculty members of Julliard, Manhattan, and Eastman schools of music among others.

A sought-after teacher, Fan was selected by the Arpas sin Fronteras (“Harps Without Frontiers”) to be featured in a series of interviews, compiled by the National University of the Arts in Argentina, as one of the world-renowned harp professors of the most recognized and prestigious conservatories and universities of the world. She has also been featured as one of the speakers in the 2023 Buenos Aires Harp Week sponsored by Nueva Escuela Argentina de Arpa. In 2017 Fan was invited by the Central Illinois Roslyn Rensch Chapter as the advisor for the first Auditions and Evaluations program sponsored by the American Harp Society. In addition, she was the first harp scholar to publish an in-depth analysis on the New Method for the Harp by the early 19th-century English harp virtuoso Elias Parish Alvars. Fan has been inducted into the prestigious Marquis Who's Who Biographical Registry since 2024 and elected as a member to Pi Kappa Lambda, the National Music Honor Society, and classified by the US Government as an Alien of Extraordinary Abilities in the Arts.

Fan has served on the judging panels for the 2007 National Harp Competition in Taiwan, the 2008 and 2012 Young Artist's Harp Competitions, the FY2012 Individual Artist Program of the Indiana Arts Commission, the 2013 Indianapolis Matinee Musicale Collegiate Scholarship Competition, the 2016 International Harp Competition of Mexico, the 2019 Indiana University Harp Concerto Competition, the 2021 Kansas City Lyra Chapter Harp Competition, the 2021 Ruth Inglefield Composition Contest of the USA International Harp Competition, the 2023 and 2024 Marker and Pioneer International Music Competitions, and the 2024 California Youth Harp Competition. She has moderated the Competition Forum at the 2017 International Harp Competition of Mexico. Fan currently serves on the Board of Directors of the prestigious USA International Harp Competition.

Born in Taiwan, Fan has received her bachelor's degree with highest distinction in both harp and piano from Queensland Conservatorium of Griffith University in Australia, and her master's, Artist Diploma, and doctorate in harp performance from Indiana University under the tutelage of Distinguished Professor Susann McDonald.