IU alumna, harpist, remembered as ‘dedicated student'

Throughout Turkey, radio stations are playing the music of IU alumna and harpist Fatma Ceren Necipoglu.

For Distinguished Professor of Music Susann McDonald, this is a fitting tribute to her former student.

Necipoglu, a 2001 IU Jacobs School of Music graduate, was one of the 228 people onboard Air France Flight 447. The plane crashed over the Atlantic Ocean on Sunday en route from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.

The 37-year-old was returning from a performance at the Rio Harp Festival in Brazil when she boarded Flight 447. The plane encountered severe storms near the equator and lost contact with air traffic controllers.

On Tuesday, Brazilian officials confirmed that debris found floating in the water off the coast of Brazil belonged to the missing plane. An oil slick in the area is also believed to be a remnant of the crash.

No survivors are expected to be discovered, which would make this the worst civilian aircraft crash since a November 2001 crash in the New York City borough of Queens that killed 265 people.

Now rescuers are searching for the black box that recorded data from the cockpit of the plane, which could answer lingering questions about the nature of the crash.

But the area is still plagued with severe thunderstorms on a daily basis, and divers are calling the search for more wreckage a “monumental salvage effort,” according to an Associated Press story.

But back in Indiana, McDonald said she is still in disbelief that her student was on board the flight.

“You just never think you will know someone who is involved in something like this,”
McDonald said.

McDonald remembers Necipoglu as a reserved, humble person and a dedicated student.

“But she had a dramatic playing style on the harp,” McDonald said.

As a student and performer, Necipoglu won accolades at harp competitions across the world and was a two-time winner of the Marjorie Schlamp Winters Harp Scholarship from the music school.

At the USA International Harp Competition in 2004, she and composer Garrett Byrnes won the composition competition with their piece “Visions in Twilight.” McDonald said composers delighted in working with Necipoglu.

Before Sunday’s accident, Necipoglu lived in Eskisehir, Turkey, and worked as a harp instructor at the Anadolu University Conservatory in Eskisehir. She and McDonald still kept in touch, and Necipoglu often brought her young students to the harp conferences McDonald organizes.

“It’s just horrible, horrible news to hear,” McDonald said. “It’s devastating.”