2023 Presenters: Tahya

ASWM Conference May 5-6, Syracuse NY

Registration Links and Conference information here

A dancer, drummer, and independent researcher, Tahya is a woman of central European and Irish descent.  As a little girl, she was inspired by her mother’s reading the Thousand and One Nights and, later,  by the music of Rimsky-Korsakov. Upon hearing the intoxicating melodies and hypnotic rhythms of Egyptian music, she found herself “swept away on a magic carpet ride” that led her to study and teach the “movements and rhythms of the ancient dance of the Goddess, traditionally handed down from one from one generation to the next, grandmother to granddaughter.” She learned dance and percussion from her honored teachers, Susheela, Jamila Salimpour, Mimi Janislawski, and Layne Redmond. These experiences have led her to her work to revive interest in women’s playing the systrum, the instrument of the Egyptian goddesses.

Workshop and Panel Presentation

 Ancient Egyptian Waters of Life & the Goddess Hathor

In ancient Egypt ‘the Water of Life’ sustaining all flora, fauna and human population was the Nile River. Dotting the landscape along the river’s route are temples dedicated to deities of the ancient Egyptian pantheon. Situated on the Nile’s west bank is the temple complex at Dendera, with its main temple dedicated to the Goddess Hathor and an adjacent shrine to Isis oriented to the heliacal rising of Sirius, which corresponds with the annual flooding of the Nile, essential to fertilizing crops. This presentation focuses on Hathor, the ” Mistress of the River,” as goddess of fertility, motherhood, music and dance, plus additional attributes. I also introduce participants to the rhythm of the systrum ~ Hathor’s sacred instrument and ritual iinstrument. In the tradition of her priestesses, we will “shimmer” the systrum to invoke blessings to heal and protect the waters.