Louise Hanson-Dyer, founder of Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre
The publishing company Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre (named after the rare Australian lyrebird) was founded in Paris in 1932 by Louise B. M. Dyer (1884-1962), an Australian patron of music from Melbourne who had already built up a remarkable personal collection of early music prints and manuscripts (sometimes referred to as the "Oiseau-Lyre Collection" and today part of the Louise Hanson-Dyer Music Library at the University of Melbourne). The firm's headquarters have been in the Principality of Monaco since 1948. Louise Dyer's main aims were to make available early music that had never before been published in a good modern scholarly edition, and also to support young contemporary composers by commissioning and publishing new works. Her first project was to publish the Œuvres complètes of François Couperin (1668-1733) in time for the 200th anniversary of the composer's death in 1933. The result was a twelve-volume edition that has since been acknowledged to be a monument of fine scholarship, superb engraving, and artistic book design. In recognition of her work for French music, the President of the French Republic awarded Louise Dyer the Légion d'Honneur in 1934.
After the death of her first husband in 1938, Louise Dyer married the British literary scholar Joseph B. (“Jeff”) Hanson (1910-1971). For nearly 25 years they worked together building up a remarkable catalogue of fine editions, often luxuriously produced. With music ranging from the thirteenth to the twentieth centuries, the emphasis of Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre's catalogue has always been the publication of French music, particularly the harpsichord repertory of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In addition, Louise Hanson-Dyer and J.B. Hanson helped in various ways to further the careers of many contemporary composers from Australia, England and France; Georges Auric, Benjamin Britten, Joseph Canteloube, Peggy Glanville Hicks, Gustav Holst, Jacques Ibert, Vincent d'Indy, Darius Milhaud, Albert Roussel, Henri Sauguet, and Margaret Sutherland were among the many artists she helped.
Together with the publication of books and scores, the company built up, during the 1950s, an extensive catalogue of LP records. Indeed, Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre was the first record company to issue 33rpm LPs in France. J.B. Hanson, after his wife's death in 1962, continued her work as a publisher by commissioning a new edition of the complete works of Clément Janequin (c.1485-1558). His particular interest, however, was the recordings. He produced discs of rare and otherwise unrecorded works (often music published by the company), and was also committed to supporting young musicians. Under his direction, Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre brought out hundreds of LPs, helping to launch the careers of a whole generation of young artists. In 1970, less than a year before his death, he sold the recording side of the business to the Decca Record Company, London, who continued the imprint as their specialised early music label.
Margarita Hanson
(photo: Malcolm Crowthers)
From 1971 to 1996, Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre were run by J.B. Hanson's second wife, Margarita M. Hanson. The firm's most significant publishing venture to date (the monumental series Polyphonic Music of the Fourteenth Century) was completed in 1992 under her directorship. Known all over the world as the definitive edition of the entire corpus of surviving fourteenth-century polyphony, this 25-volume series containing well over 2000 compositions, stands (according to a recent review) as "one of the major achievements of musicology in the second half of our century".
Margarita Hanson also undertook the publication of a new series of reprints and revisions of existing editions in light of new scholarship and recently discovered sources. Among these publications is the new edition of the Œuvres complètes de François Couperin. In 1986, in recognition of her work, S.A.S. Rainier III Prince de Monaco named Margarita Hanson Chevalier dans l'Ordre du Mérite Culturel. The next year, the French government named her Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. In 1992 she was awarded the degree of Doctor of Music Honoris Causa by the University of Melbourne.
Upon Margarita Hanson’s retirement in 1995 the Board of Directors
named as Président délégué the musicologist and harpsichordist Davitt
Moroney, who had been with the firm since 1981. During that period he had
supervised production of the remaining Fourteenth Century volumes,
initiated the monumental Magnus Liber Organi series with the help of an international editorial committee, and planned a
collection of keyboard volumes under the title Le Grand Clavier. He
also organised an annual series of concerts of early music, featuring leading
solosits and chamber players, in
Following Davitt Moroney’s departure in 2001, the Board named Kenneth Gilbert, long associated with the firm, as Président délégué. Under his guidance the seven-volume Magnus Liber Organi series is being brought to conclusion, and a number of new editions, including Louis Couperin’s Organ works and revised reprints of earlier Oiseau-Lyre editions, have been published.
As the result of donations to the University of Melbourne given by both Louise Hanson-Dyer and J.B. Hanson, all the company's publications from 1979 have been produced with the financial assistance of the University of Melbourne. The involvement of the University has been substantial, notably since the signing in 1986 of a formal agreement of collaboration between the University and Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre. The company is now owned by the Lyrebird Trust, of which the University of Melbourne is a Trustee.
Since 1993, Éditions de l'Oiseau-Lyre has also received financial support for the publication of the Magnus Liber Organi series from the Monaco government and the SOGEDA (Société pour la Gestion des Droits d'Auteurs) of Monaco. The Fondation Francis et Mica Salabert, whose Musica Gallica series has as its aim the publication of the musical heritage of France, has helped substantially with the Magnus Liber Organi and other l'Oiseau-Lyre volumes of French music.
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