Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru (foto Gali Tibbon)
Ethiopian Sister Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru developed into one of the world’s most distinctive pianists and composers. Three piano songs will sound this summer in the Kloosterdreef, the characteristic tree-lined avenue that connects Oosterhout’s three convents. ‘The Homeless Wanderer,’ for example, is a composition about a wanderer, lonely and far from home, who manages to turn fear into friendship. ‘The Song of Abayi’ is about homesickness.
The from socialite to monastic life path of this remarkable woman (1923-2023) is worthy of filming. So Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru studied at a posh Swiss boarding school, was a singer at the court of Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia, became a prisoner of war and three of her brothers were executed. Like many people, including the original inhabitants of two of the three Holy Triangle monasteries, she was a migrant.
Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru spent much of her life in a monastery in Jerusalem. The income generated by her albums and concerts she donated to the church, orphanages and people displaced by war in her homeland of Ethiopia or elsewhere.
Emahoy’s legacy is the Emahoy Tsege Mariam Music Foundation, a self-financed non-profit that funds music education programs in the US and Ethiopia: www.emahoymusicfoundation.org/donate