Special Announcement - Lyre 2026 at the Goetheanum

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It is with great pleasure that we announce to the friends of the lyre all over the world:

We will be celebrating from
Wednesday, July 29 to Sunday, August 2, 2026 in Dornach, Switzerland:
“100 Years of the Lyre Impulse – International Festivity Days at the Goetheanum”

We would like to warmly welcome all the friends of the international lyre community. Let us come together from as many countries as possible at the Goetheanum, where the lyre was rediscovered as a modern instrument in 1926, in a festive musical gathering, playing and listening and exploring the variety of developments. A letter with further details will follow soon.

Best regards: Stefan Hasler, Viola Heckel and Hanna Koskinen, (Section for the Performing Arts at the Goetheanum), Susann Temperli (Leier Network Switzerland), and Christian Giersch (Leier Forum Germany)

Colin Tanser's 'Everyman'

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In addition to a variety of music we will be working on with master teacher Anna Prokhovnik Cooper during the 2024 Lyre Conference this August, we will prepare and perform Colin Tanser’s Everyman with the participants in our Youth Program forming the children’s choir. 

Colin Tanser wrote Everyman, a three movement piece for lyre and children’s choir, for the International Lyre Conference in Belfast in 2006.  Since then, it has been performed at schools and in conferences all over the world.

The medieval morality play “Everyman”, by Anonymous, outlines the difficult life pilgrimage of the main character, Everyman.  At the beginning, Everyman receives these comforting words from the character, Knowledge: “Everyman, I will go with thee, and be thy guide, in thy utmost need to go by thy side.”

Everyman

The title page of Tanser’s piece uses this quote as an epigraph and then outlines the movements and the sources for the words of Everyman’s journey.

EVERYMAN

“Everyman, I will go with thee,
And be thy guide,
In thy utmost need to go by thy side.”

Music for Lyres and Children’s Voices
1.The Journey – 2.Strange Land – 3.Rainbow
Words:  Adaptations of Psalms 133 & 137
And William Wordsworth’s Rainbow

Beautiful songs for the children's choir appear in each movement, accompanied by lyres throughout.  Everyman is a beautiful and memorable piece of music.

We invite our readers to listen to a selection from Everyman with children singing, accompanied by 200 lyres, in our 2021 LANA Blog post from July 20, 2021, In Memory of Colin Tanser.

Each participant in the 2024 Lyre Conference will receive a copy of the Everyman lyre part that has been selected on the registration form according to ability level and lyre range designation.  The LANA store also has the complete score with all parts available for purchase here.

In addition, hard copies of the full score will be available at the conference itself.

FINAL NOTICE – LANA Study Group Begins February 24 – RSVP Required

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LANA is initiating a study group for members and friends! It will be held via Zoom at regular intervals, and the subject matter will be related to the lyre, to music inspired by anthroposophy, and to the Movement for Musical Renewal.

Madonna Tempi Raphael

Our first study will be a reading and review of Reinhold Faeth’s article entitled ‘The Madonna Pentagram’, where he outlines the reasons for revising the order of the Madonna Sequence images.  It was published in Zeitschrift Seelenpflege, January 1998.  In 2002, Raffael-Verlag, publishers of ‘Madonnen Bilder’ prints and cards, adopted a revised sequence of these paintings, based on this article. Our study will use the English translation by David Barford and Rose Edwards, January 2003. Because the order of the pictures differs from that traditionally used, we felt it would be helpful to share this article and give others the opportunity to work through this important and well-presented content.

The study will begin on Saturday, February 24 and continue monthly for 4 sessions. In order to accommodate LANA members from different parts of the world who have already expressed an interest to participate in this study, we have made the time decision as follows: 1300 EST, 1200 CST, 2100, 1900 France, 2000 in Israel, and 700 (Sunday) in Wellington, New Zealand.

Please RSVP via email to Debbie Barford dsbarford@yahoo.com.

Zoom invitation will be sent upon receiving your RSVP, along with further suggestions for study materials.

The article is linked here.

Sets of Madonna cards and large prints are available in the LANA Store.

–Debbie Barford, on behalf of the LANA Board

Mentoring Moment – Winter Lyre Care

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From the Lyre Newsletter for Michaelmas-Advent 2004 Volume #48:

As we are still in the winter season, be aware that heated indoor air can be a major hazard for your lyre! Lyres, as well as other instruments made of wood, can crack if the wood dries out too much over time.  To prevent this possibility, add some humidity to the air your lyre lives in.  The best way is with a humidifier for your whole house, or for the room where you keep your lyre.  If that is not possible, or in addition to room humidity, add moisture to the air inside your lyre case.  You can use a Dampit, or “snake” made for violins and cellos and available at music stores.  Or, make a homemade case humidifier with a piece of sponge inside a film container punched with holes. (2024 note: Since film containers are no longer in common use, the D’Addario small instrument humidifier is another option.)

Protect your lyre further by wrapping it in a piece of silk.  Include the case humidifier or Dampit in the “package”.

LANA Study Group Begins February 24 – RSVP Required

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LANA Study Group Begins February 24 – RSVP Required

LANA is initiating a study group for members! It will be held via Zoom at regular intervals, and the subject matter will be related to the lyre, to music inspired by anthroposophy, and to the Movement for Musical Renewal.

Madonna Cards published by Raffael-verlag

Our first study will be a reading and review of Reinhold Faeth’s article entitled ‘The Madonna Pentagram’, where he outlines the reasons for revising the order of the Madonna Sequence images.  It was published in Zeitschrift Seelenpflege, January 1998.  In 2002, Raffael-Verlag, publishers of ‘Madonnen Bilder’ prints and cards, adopted a revised sequence of these paintings, based on this article. Our study will use the English translation by David Barford and Rose Edwards, January 2003. Because the order of the pictures differs from that traditionally used, we felt it would be helpful to share this article and give others the opportunity to work through this important and well-presented content.

The study will begin on Saturday, February 24 and continue monthly for 4 sessions.

The study will begin on Saturday, February 24 and continue monthly for 4 sessions. In order to accommodate LANA members from different parts of the world who have already expressed an interest to participate in this study, we have made the time decision as follows: 1300 EST, 1200 CST, 2100, 1900 France, 2000 in Israel, and 700 (Sunday) in Wellington, New Zealand

Please RSVP via email to Debbie Barford dsbarford@yahoo.com

Zoom invitation will be sent on RSVP, along with further suggestions for study materials.

The article is linked here.

Sets of Madonna cards and large prints are available in the LANA Store.

--Debbie Barford, on behalf of the LANA Board

Children's Festival Music to Sing and Play

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Book Review: The Child’s Praise of the Seasons – Festival Music to Sing by Christof-Andreas Lindenberg

We continue to honor Christof-Andreas Lindenberg’s 90th birthday by looking at his book of 61 festival songs for children, The Child’s Praise of the Seasons – Festival Music to Sing, published in 1995 by Rose Harmony Association.

In his introduction, Christof-Andreas notes that this book can be seen as a companion to his book written for communities, In Praise of the Seasons – Festival Music to Sing and Play, also published in 1995 by Rose Harmony Association, which also contains some songs appropriate for children to sing. However, the focus in The Child’s Praise of the Seasons is on children singing through the year – in story and verse, in rounds, in harmony, in intervals, in rhythms, and, at times, with the accompaniment of lyres and other instruments: flute, violin, bells, drum, and triangle. These songs arose out of the composer’s many years of working with children in schools that celebrate the Christian seasonal festivals through the year, interspersed with christenings, and other festive moments. There are activities that some of the songs are meant to accompany, such as the “Palm Sunday Hosianna – Song for Boundary Walk,”a “Pizza Song for Summer Camp,” and “Santa Lucia” for a procession with children and candles. There are also two graces, four birthday songs, a “House Blessing,” and “The Robin’s Song – A Blessing for All Seasons.”

The seasonal compass outlined in the companion book for communities stands as an excellent introduction to this one, with this collection focusing on the child’s experience. The contents page contains an outline of the seasons of the year, listing the songs appropriate for each age group in order of the seasons. This is a great help to a music or class teacher looking for music for the children in their classrooms and provides another way to navigate through the year.

Finally, a lovely bonus at the end of this collection offers an explanation of the tone of each day of the week, along with its corresponding planetary (mirrored) scale, to which Christof-Andreas adds a rhythm for each day and then gives us ‘The Week’s Rhythm Songs’ – one for each day of the week. As he states, these songs “combine the tone-of-the-day scale with the other musical rhythms to make the nature of the respective day come alive, accentuating the special character of each day in the week.” Christof-Andreas encourages the use of these songs in the sixth or seventh grade classroom as well as to serve as a basis for one’s further individual exploration.

Debra Barford, Chicago, IL