Celebrating Rumi’s Birthday

“Love is the bridge between you and everything.”
~ Rumi

Join us to celebrate our fellowship in love and spirit with whirling dance (Sema), meditation, live music, prayers, and poetry. We will be celebrating the birthday of Jalāl ad-Dīn Mohammad Rūmī

Our ceremony will be shared multi-nationally online with live music including Pir Seyed Salman, Master Farima Berenji, Dr. Lloyd Miller, Evan Phillips, and Homeyra Banejad.

Join us for sacred and mystical Sufi poetry (Farsi and English), meditation, whirling with live music, prayer, and zikr.

We will whirl and journey together to celebrate love, unity, and allow the light to enter our soul. Open your heart! Listen! Turn, dance, and move in anyway that makes you feel alive!

$10 sliding scale donation. Your donation is greatly appreciated.

Our gathering is not a performance. Come and join our sacred circle. You are welcome to set and feel the healing energy and prepare a poem to share as we journey together to be closer to the light.

Register

Guidelines and Tips

• We kindly ask for no interruptions during the ceremony. We will mute all participants during the ceremony then unmute for open participation.
• If you are whirling from home prepare to wear comfortable clothing, whirling skirt (optional), socks or soft-soled shoes. Avoid eating a large meal 2 hours prior.

Farima Berenji

Farima Berenji is an Iranian-born scholar and an award winning, internationally acclaimed performing artist, choreographer, instructor, lecturer, dance ethnologist, Sufi master, and archaeologist specializing in classical, folkloric, and sacred dances of Persia and the Silk Road. Her training spans a lifetime of intensive collaboration and research with master artists, scholars, and spiritual teachers worldwide. She is the founder and artistic director of the Simorgh Dance Collective, a worldwide collaborative devoted to teach dance technique, interpret, illustrate, present, and perform dances of the Silk Road. In 2018, Farima became the first American-Iranian woman honored to be a TEDx dance speaker and performer. Farima is a member of the International Dance Council (CID – UNESCO), UNESCO, and the National Folk Organization (NFO). Read more..

Seyed Salman Hosseini

Seyed Salman Hosseini possesses a bachelor degree in music ethnology and is an Iranian traditional music researcher, composer and a master musician of tambour, setar, tar, and rebab. He directs the traditional Persian music ensemble Cherikeh which has been performing sacred and traditional music for many years. Seyed has produced many albums including Javdanegni and Tabeh Ghaleh. He is the music director and composer for films such as Song of God and Gadam Yar. Seyed has composed and performed more than 40 concerts and TV programs including composing music for national broadcasts of Iran. He has performed professionally in Iran, Germany, Syria, and the Iraqi Kurdistan region. Additionally, he is a Sufi master and has his own school of music and mysticism.

Dr. Lloyd Miller

Dr. Lloyd Miller received his PhD in Persian Language and Literature from the University of Utah after spending seven years living in Iran where he had a weekly prime time television program titled “Kurosh Ali Khan va dastan”. His program featured musicians and other artists from around the world. Lloyd was urged to leave Iran during the revolution in the late 70s, though he had never planned to leave. An expert in world music including American jazz, Lloyd has made numerous recordings. The most popular being “Oriental Jazz” first released in 1968 and recently re-released by Vinyl Me Please selling thousands of copies worldwide. A film about Lloyd’s extraordinary life, including 6 years in Europe as a jazzman and university student where he played with some of the most well-known musicians of the time, is soon to be released. Titled “” the film will be screened in Finland October 25 at the World Music Expo. It was in Paris that Lloyd met Dr. Daryush Safvat who became his lifelong mentor and who taught Lloyd the importance and significance of Persian classical music. Founder of Eastern Arts, with the blessing of Dr. Safvat, Lloyd has taught music, philosophy, history, dance and culture to thousands of students at various universities for over 40 years. Read more…

Homerya Banejad

Homerya Banejad is an Iranian daf player and vocalist. As a member of the Iranian Musician Union of Iran she has performed in Iran and the US with Sima Bina, Hamed Nikpay, Simin Ghanem, and many more artists!