Overview
- The Repair Shop episode, which aired Wednesday on BBC One and iPlayer, featured the restoration of a Cretan lyra owned by Emma MacLennan’s late son, Alex.
- Luthier Becky Houghton repaired the three string, pear shaped lyra, a bowed folk instrument central to music on Crete.
- Alex ordered the instrument in 2013, taught himself to play, performed until 2019 when motor neurone disease ended his ability, and died in 2020 at 31.
- The restored lyra now sits in MacLennan’s home waiting for her grandson to grow, and she and her daughter in law are considering online lessons.
- MacLennan called motor neurone disease a dreadful illness that strips movement and speech, and she praised the show for celebrating human skill and reuse.