Noel Tyl

Noel Tyl was an old soul in the truest astrological sense, a man with the Sun in Saturn-ruled Capricorn who built two towering careers by the slow, dependable climb to the top of the ladder. That Capricorn discipline lit up the seventh house of partnership and the other, which is why his life's work became the meeting of astrology and human psychology: he shone through relating, counselling and synthesis. A Harvard graduate in social relations, he first climbed the operatic ladder to become a bass-baritone celebrated for his Wagnerian giants, Wotan and Hans Sachs and the Dutchman, winning the Metropolitan Opera auditions in 1964.

His Moon in Leo made him king and queen at once, a born performer whose emotions moved through voice and stage, and that heart softened the Capricorn severity: true leaders lead from the Leo space. Placed in the third house of communication, this Moon poured feeling into words, and words came by the volume: a twelve-book series, the thousand-page Synthesis and Counseling, the Regulus Award in 1998.

A Cancer Ascendant gave him the matriarch's mask, nobody knows emotion like Cancer, which is perhaps why he could read a chart and a life so tenderly.