Before she took her vows as a nun, EmahoyTsegué-Maryam was known as Yewubdar. Yewubdar Guebrou was born in Addis Ababa on December 12, 1923 to a privileged family of Kantiba Guebrou Desta and Woizero Kassaye Yelemtu. Yewubdar was sent to Switzerland in1929 at the age of six along with her elder sister Senedou.

Both attended a girls’ boarding school and there she first learned the violin and then 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 Mennen Secondary School. In 1937, young Yewubdar and her family were deported as prisoners of war to the island of Asinara, north of Sardinia, and then to Mercogliano, near Naples. In early 1960s Emahoy lived in Gondar studying religious music of St. Yared, composer and father to Mahlet, the early Ethiopian religious music.

On her daily trips to and from church, she came across young students in Liturgy known as “yekolo temari”. When she enquired about them she was informed they must beg for food and lodging because they left home to pursue an education with the church. Emahoy was deeply moved by the sacrifices they 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 poor students get an education, Emahoy expressed in her interview with Alula Kebede on the Amharic program of Voice of America. You may have heard of Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guebrou’s music such as the Homeless Wonderer, Song of the Sea and Ballad of the Spirits or perhaps you may not. She is a pianist, a composer, a painter, a poet and lyricist in several languages.

 Emahoy is 84 years old and a nun who resides in the Ethiopian Orthodox monastery in Jerusalem. Her first record was released in Germany in 1967 with the help of Emperor Haile Selassie. Other recordings followed with the help of her sister Woizero Desta Geubrou; the proceeds were to help an orphanage. Emahoy left Ethiopia following her mother’s death in 1984 and fled to Jerusalem, Israel. In 1997 she released a CD in Israel financed from her meager stipend at the monastery. She donated the proceeds to help renovate the Holy Trinity Church in Jericho accidentally shelled during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. The church has been closed for religious service ever since.

In 2006 Buda music, a company located in France released a new CD No. 21 with sixteen of Emahoy’s solo piano compositions under the Ethiopiques label. While it is a break through for Emahoy to have worldwide distribution of her music through Buda music’s international distributors, the contract terms give her only 15% from sales in France and a mere 7.5% from sales worldwide. Emahoy has committed the proceeds from Ethiopiques No. 21 to meet the high cost of renovation until the church is fully functional. 

Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou: SEED salutes Emahoy As a distinguished musician and role model to the Ethiopians and other, in acknowledgement of her outstanding life-long contributions to the preservation of our culture through her musical talents, as a distinguished pianist and composer who used the products of her talent to help the less fortunate among us, as a role model to countless young artists and women musicians in particular, as a linguist and a devoted spiritual & humanitarian.