In 2019, filmmaker Theo Schear and harpist Mary Lattimore co-wrote a proposal to the Unicode Consortium, pleading with the group to create the first-ever harp emoji. It has been approved, and will be available for use later this year or in early 2025.
“I’m a fan of Mary Lattimore’s music, and her music inspired me to take harp lessons back in 2019,” Schear, who creates emoji and worked with Emojination on the project, told Pitchfork over email. “I had co-authored a handful of emoji already, and I’m always looking for new emoji to propose.”
Schear also told Pitchfork how a friend of his, Jennifer 8. Lee, the vice chair of Unicode’s emoji subcommittee, gave him the green light to move forward with the proposal. “Jenny said the harp emoji was worth proposing, despite the fact that musical instruments were generally not being accepted at the time,” he wrote. “Because of the harp’s relevance globally, she figured it would be accepted whenever they came back to musical instruments. I was eager to etch my name in the semiotic history of my favorite instrument, and I’m now very honored to be a co-author with Mary.”
Schear handled the bulk of the proposal, but Mary Lattimore was still a crucial part of the project. “Her authorship was more of an endorsement really, in the way that producers attach big-name executive producers to movies,” Schear clarified.
Lattimore, in a statement to Pitchfork, said, “I was delighted when Theo asked me to endorse this emoji proposal. We harpists have been waiting for this moment!”
In the original proposal, as noted by Harp Column, Schear and Lattimore pointed to the glaring absence of harp representation in the emoji ecosystem, noting: “The harp is an egregious omission to the musical instruments represented. The harp is one of the most recognizable instruments worldwide.” The proposal also nodded to the harp’s celestial connotations: “Furthermore, angels are often depicted with harps, and we should all aspire to be angels.”
The new harp emoji will be included in the beta version of the Unicode 16.0 emoji catalog. The emoji design was created by Emojination’s Aphelandra Messer. Schear has previously co-authored several emoji (beverage box, beaver, and mirror ball, to name a few) with Emojination.
As for future emoji projects, Schear pointed to the public’s appetite for more musical instrument symbols. “ A friend of mine wants a Bassoon emoji,” he wrote. “I think an upright piano or organ would be cool, and my other favorite instrument is probably the kalimba, so I’d love to see that.”