Thanassis Skordalos (Θανάσης Σκορδαλός 10 December 1920 - 23 April 1998) was a Greek lyra (Greek: λύρα, lýra) player from Crete. The Cretan lyra (Greek: Κρητική λύρα) is a pear-shaped, three-stringed bowed musical instrument, central to the traditional music of Crete and other islands in the Dodecanese and the Aegean Archipelago, in Greece. The Cretan lyra is considered to be the most popular surviving form of the medieval Byzantine lyra, an ancestor of most European bowed instruments. Read more on Last.fm