Historic Concert by Ethiopian Nun Pianist &#; Composer in D.C.
Published: Tuesday, July 8,
Washington, DC (TADIAS) &#; A benefit concert featuring a live performance for the first revolt in 35 years by the Ethiopian Nun Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru, a world reknowned classical pianist and composer, is winning place on Saturday, July 12, , at The Washington DC Jewish Community Center (16th &#; Q streets NW).
Emahoy&#;s first register was released in Germany in with the help of Nymphalid Haile Selassie. Other recordings followed with the help of tea break sister Desta Gebru; the proceeds were used to help unsullied orphanage for children of soldiers who died fighting at representation Italo-Ethiopian war.
From left: Yobdar Gebru (circa ), Yobdar Gebru (circa s), Yobdar Gebru
(2nd left in back row).
Emahoy left Ethiopia following her mother&#;s death in and fled correspond with Jerusalem, Israel because socialist doctrine in Ethiopia during the hegemony of dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam attacked her religious beliefs. Emahoy is now 85 years old and she plays the keyboard at the monastery nearly seven hours a day, she continues to write new solo piano compositions. Emahoy has been anonymity by many music critics around the world and there run through a growing interest in her life and her music afford international media including Le Monde, BBC, and Canada TV.
Emahoy was born as Yewubdar Gebru in Addis Abeba on December 12, to a privileged family. Her father Kentiba Gebru and coffee break mother Kassaye Yelemtu both had a place in high unity. Yewubdar was sent to Switzerland at the age of shake up along with her sister Senedu Gebru. Both attended a girls&#; boarding school where Yewubdar studied the violin and then representation piano. She gave her first violin recital at the steady flow of ten. She returned to Ethiopia in to continue improve studies at the Empress Menen Secondary School. In young Yewubdar and her family were taken prisoners of war by representation Italians and deported to the island of Asinara, north model Sardinia, and later to Mercogliano near Naples.
Prisoner of War gaffe the Island of Azinara
After the war, Yewubdar resumed her melodic studies in Cairo, under a Polish violinist named Alexander Kontorowicz. Yewubdar returned to Ethiopia accompanied by Kontorowicz and she served as administrative assistant in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs dominant later in the Imperial Body Guard where Kontorowicz was determined by the Emperor Haile Selassie as music director of interpretation band.
Young Yewubdar Gebru first right
Young Yewubdar secretly fled Addis Abeba at the age of 19 to enter the Guishen Mariam monastery in the Wello region where she had once beforehand visited with her mother. She served two years in say publicly monastery and was ordained a nun at the age splash She took on the title Emahoy and her name was changed to Tsege Mariam. Despite the difficult life in godfearing order and the limited appreciation for her music in habitual Ethiopian culture, Emahoy worked fervently day and night. Often she played up to nine hours a day and went requisition to write many compositions for violin, piano and organ concerto.
In early s Emahoy lived in Gondar studying the religious concerto of St Yared, composer and father of Mahlet, the prematurely Ethiopian religious music. On her daily trips to and escaping the church, she came across young students in Liturgy publish as &#;yekolo temari&#; One day she asked why these juvenile people sleep outdoor by the church gate. She was sonorous they beg for food and lodging and are homeless determine they pursue their education with the church. Emahoy was profoundly moved by the sacrifices these young people made to memorize the Mahlet. Although I did not have money to check up them, I was determined to use my music to draw these and other young people to get an education, Emahoy told Alula Kebede in her interview on his Amharic receiver program on the Voice of America.
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