User:Koyaanisqatsi@narod.ru/sandbox

Emahoy Tsege Mariam (Amharic: እማሆይ ጽጌ ማሪያም ገብሩ) (born on December 12 1923 in Addis Abeba), is an Ethiopian classical music composer, musician and a nun.

Early life
Yewubdar Gebru was born in Addis Abeba on December 12, 1923 to a privileged family. Her father Kentiba Gebru and her mother Kassaye Yelemtu both had a place in high society. Yewubdar was sent to Switzerland at the age of six along with her sister Senedu Gebru. Both attended a girls' boarding school where Yewubdar studied the violin and then the piano. She gave her first violin recital at the age of ten. She returned to Ethiopia in 1933 to continue her studies at the Empress Menen Secondary School. In 1937 young Yewubdar and her family were taken prisoners of war by the Italians and deported to the island of Asinara, north of Sardinia, and later to Mercogliano near Naples.

After the War
Yewubdar resumed her musical 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 and later in the Imperial Body Guard where Kontorowicz was appointed by the Emperor Haile Selassie as music director of the band.

A Devotee
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 before visited with her mother. She served two years in the monastery and was ordained a nun at the age of 21. She took on the title Emahoy and her name was changed to Tsege Mariam. Despite the difficult life in religious order and the limited appreciation for her music in traditional Ethiopian culture, Emahoy worked fervently day and night. Often she played up to nine hours a day and went on to write many compositions for violin, piano and organ concerto.

Her Vision
In early 1960s Emahoy lived in Gondar studying the religious music of St Yared, composer and father of Mahlet, the early Ethiopian religious music. On her daily trips to and from the church, she came across young students in Liturgy known as "yekolo temari" One day she asked why these young people sleep outdoor by the church gate. She was told they beg for food and lodging and are homeless while they pursue their education with the church. Emahoy was deeply moved by the sacrifices these young people made to study the Mahlet. Although I did not have money to give them, I was determined to use my music to help these and other young people to get an education, Emahoy told Alula Kebede in her interview on his Amharic radio program on the Voice of America.

Musical Achievements
Emahoy's first record was released in Germany in 1967 with the help of Emperor Haile Selassie. Other recordings followed with the help of her sister Desta Gebru; the proceeds were used to help an orphanage for children of soldiers who died fighting at war.

The Golden Years
Emahoy left Ethiopia following her mother's death in 1984 and fled to Jerusalem, Israel because socialist doctrine in Ethiopia during the reign of dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam attacked her religious beliefs. Emahoy is now 85 years old and she plays the piano at the monastery nearly seven hours a day, she continues to write new solo piano compositions. Emahoy has been recognized by many music critics around the world and there is a growing interest in her life and her music by international media including Le Monde, BBC, and Canada TV.

Compositions
In Anglo Boer War (1999) he explored cluster note (see tone clusters) and microtonal techniques. The piece is a strident anti-war composition written for the hundredth anniversary of the Anglo Boer War (see Second Boer War) and was a collaboration with the artist James de Villiers.

His 63 Moons (2003) composition was heavily influenced by Javanese gamelan music, Shona mbira music (see Shona music) and contemporary minimalist (see minimalist music) composers.

Click Language (2004) continued Spicer's African themes and uses sampled words from southern African click languages such as Xhosa (see Xhosa language), Zulu (see Zulu language) and Khoisan languages as a sound patina for four percussionists, comprising vibraphone, marimba, waterphone and other hand-held instruments. Baobab (2003) employs polyrhythms inspired by southern African drumming and features the vibraphone and marimba. There is a version of Baobab for harpsichord (2006), written for Polish harpsichordist Kasia Tomczak-Feltrin.. He is presently writing an opera for video based on Arno Schmidt's novel The Egghead Republic (Die Gelehrtenrepublik).

Recent works have explored live electronics and acoustic instrument blends, including midi instruments. Since the beginning of 2006, he has worked closely with French woodwind and electronic music soloist and professor of woodwind at the London Royal College of Music, Julien Feltrin. Spicer has also worked with London-based percussion ensemble Brake Drum Assembly. He formed the ensemble Caos Harmonia to perform his music in 1997 and has also performed with London-based new music group - The Kluster Ensemble.

Selected works

 * Antarctica (1995-6) - for electronics, video
 * Virtually Ambient Shostakovich (1997) - for voices, sampler and keyboards
 * Anglo Boer War (1999) – for voices, strings and electronic manipulation
 * String Quartet Four (2000) – for string quartet
 * Sequenzas (2000) – for piano
 * Auto da Fe (2002) – for orchestra
 * In Memoriam Valdemar Rodriquez (2002) - for orchestra
 * 63 Moons (2003) – variations for world music instruments, percussion and synthesizers
 * Bigga Digga (2004) - for voices
 * Shakespeare Whispers (2004) - for voices
 * Baobab (2004) – for percussion quartet
 * Click Language (2005) – for percussion quartet and electronics
 * pHyTHoN (2005) - for French horn & piano
 * Four Pieces (2005) - for brass quintet
 * Bird (2006) – for vibraphone and electronics
 * Euclid Alone (2006) – for Paetzold Great Bass, tenor recorders & electronics, French horn and percussion quartet
 * The Anthropic Principle (2006) – for midi wind controller and laptop
 * Polonnaruwa (2006) – for laptop electronics
 * Baobab (2004) – revised for harpsichord (2006)
 * Haut Voltage (2006) - improvisation for midi wind controller, clarinet and laptop electronics
 * Tiktaalik (2006) - for any instrument
 * The Giraffe Sleeper (2007) - for chamber orchestra, piano and laptop electronics
 * Cold, Cold (2007) - for laptop electronics and manipulated voice, words by Chris Edwards
 * For Dimitri Voudouris (2007) - for laptop electronics, electronically manipulated alto saxophone and French horn
 * The Antikythera Mechanism (2008) - for natural horn & electronics
 * Nazca (2008) - for chamber orchestra & laptop electronics
 * Hydrogen (2008) - for flute & laptop electronics
 * A Scent Of Knife Blossom (2009) - for solo cello
 * For James de Villiers (2009) - for laptop electronics
 * Archaeopteryx (2010) - for low recorder quartet and electronics
 * The Book of Graphic Scores (2010) - for any instrument
 * Kailasanatha (2012) - for laptops, violin, alto sax and electric guitar electronics (collaboration with Paul Sharma)
 * Goodbye (2012) - for piano & electronics