At 6ft 8ins (The New York Times and many astrologers say he stood at 6ft 10ins), Noel Tyl was a man hard to miss in a crowd, although his amazing presence owed a lot more than to mere height. Before he became a prominent psychological astrologer, he had distinguished himself as an internationally acclaimed bass-baritone opera singer specialising in larger than-life Wagnerian roles. He appeared regularly with the Vienna State Opera, New York City Opera, the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf and many other major venues over the span of a quarter of a century.

A graduate of Harvard University in Social Relations (Psychology, Sociology and Anthropology) he gradually veered towards astrology through the Sixties, and in 1973 his first book, The Horoscope as Identity, was published. Among many other accomplishments, he was the first to integrate psychological ‘need theory’ into astrological analysis. He wrote 23 books (including Solar Arcs: Astrology’s Most Successful Predictive System; Astrology of Intimacy, Sexuality and Relationship: Insights to Wholeness; Psychological Astrology; and Synthesis and Counselling in Astrology: Professional Manual) and edited 10 more.

At the 1998 United Astrology Congress, he received the Regulus Award for “establishing and maintaining a professional image in the field”. Over many years he established his reputation as a teacher and lecturer of tremendous power while maintaining a busy consultancy. Tyl was a co-founder of AFAN (Association for Astrological Networking), astrology’s world organisation, and retired from the position of Presiding Officer after serving AFAN for eleven years.

In an interview with Michael Erlewine, Tyl reflected on the nature of astrology and the interaction between astrologer and client/student: “If somebody says to me, ‘How do you pick a good astrologer?’ – a question I’ve had on a hundred television shows. I say you look into their eyes, you listen to them speak. You find out that what you know about life is much more important than what you know about astrology. Our symbols mean nothing until we give them meaning from experience. And then astrologers must learn – and this again is the teacher speaking – I want so much for astrology to understand that communication is the art. You can’t necessarily put it on paper.”

“There is an exchange of emotion and rapport and eye contact, this spirit-to-spirit communication that takes place in a good session, reading, that is dependent on artful communication. All of this brings me to the need constantly for the teaching of astrology to be improved. That’s where I feel needed, and I think that the more our educators in astrology get into this artistic dimension of one-on-one, personal interaction through astrology, the more professional, we’re going to be more reliable.”

For more information on Noel Tyl, visit website: http://noeltyl.com 

Noel Tyl tribute Born: 31 December 1936, 3:57 pm, West Chester, Pennsylvania, USA. Died: 31 December 2019 on his 83rd birthday

For the full tribute to Noel Tyl, please see the Mar/Apr 2020  Astrological Journal, page 24, where you will also find personal appreciations  from Roy Gillett, Pam Crane, Lynn Bell, Ray Grasse, Diana Mauriello, Ronnie Grishman, Sandra Walker (NCGR Annapolis), Gez Abel, Michael Erlewinek, Kathleen Larson, Kirk Little and Helene Schnitzer.

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