I (Jonathan Lutz) was a doctoral candidate in music at Åbo Akademi university researching questions about music in the family and “agency”, if and how familiarity with the zitheroo can strengthen creative impulses and musical self-confidence. A project on “The zitheroo as a tool in health care” was carried out in 1998 and another on the zitheroo in kindergarten 2002-03. Since then I have gathered material through interviews and various projects.

Getting at the music: Musical empowerment through the 15-string diatonic zither
This is a paper I gave at Finland’s national symposium for music research, held 23-25.3.2006 at Åbo Akademi university. Here the zitheroo and its possibilities are the focus. The presentation was in powerpoint form but the contents are about the same.
Getting at the music (J Lutz article 8.12.06)

Paper at MERYC
In April 2005 I held a presentation at MERYC (Music Education Research with Young Children) at Exeter University, England. Here is the presentation in pdf form (7 pages):
Our whole family was inspired right from the start!: Family and preschool experiences with the 15-string diatonic zither in Karis, Finland

Report on the same project in Swedish
This is a more informal report in Swedish on the project with zitheroos in kindergarten and the home:
(2003) Dalgatans daghem projektrapport

Article in Global Health Promotion (not directly related to the zitheroo)
After some years of study I found that Aaron Antonovsky’s “Sense of coherence” (part of “salutogenesis”) and Csikszentmihalyi’s “flow” seemed to fit the questions I posed. I saw these two theories as different aspects of the same dynamic, and since no one had connected the two I wrote an article on this. The article does not discuss the zitheroo directly but aims toward a broader perspective. Below is the abstract, and farther down a link to the text itself:

Here is the article (not exactly the final version but close) as a word-doc:
Flow and sense of coherence

WHEN RIGHT IS WRONG – Meaning and power in the choir
This text is not a research but rather a polemic text, questioning our society’s way of looking at music (especially in choirs – I wrote this in connection with a choral festival) and giving my view of music’s role and possibilities. The zitheroo is in a way also an answer, my way of working for a society in which music is a resource available to everyone.

The text has never been published – too long for a letter to the editor – and ended up in the archive. But perhaps it can stimulate further thought on the subject? Here it is (in Swedish):
När rätt blir fel (02.02.2000)