The harp is a stringed musical instrument, which is generally played with fingers or plectrum. The player of the harp is named harpist. It has a long range from C♭1 up to G#7. Harp notation uses both Tremple and Bass clefs like piano.
In a orchestra there could be one or two harps. It has a very complicated tuning mechanism consisting of foot pedals which alterting the tuning of the strings on semitone steps. If a harpist is playing during a performance and needs to change tuning it is recommended that there is enough time available for him to change the pedals tunings. There are many ways of notating pedals positions.
A harp could be sound from dark and warm to more bright and shining. While strings are vibrating they create this beatiful hallmark sound we know.
It sounds clear, sweet, gentle and soft with a fairytale like sonic temper but with a fairly sharp attack.
It is great for creating a fantasy based emotions within the music with its calm and dreamy sound colors - at least at my ears.
Many times there have beed songs that used synths trying to emulate (or at least borrowing some characteristics) the plucky softness timbre of a Harp.
A nice example within our soundbanks lies inside out Guitar Dreams collection for Omnisphere 2 with some harp like sounds, despite they use acoustic guitar samples for its creation. Also Apollo for Omnisphere again has some sounds of this type.
You could listen to the Apollo harp-like synths in the video
In general Harp is a very important part of music's history with its distinctive "Angelic" sound.