The dance peformed by the Whirling Dervishes has been performed for over 700 years by the Sufi, a mystic order of the Islamic faith.

Accompanied by sacred music performed on a zither, flutes, soft percussion and low rumbling chants the dance, called the sema, is a religious ceremony that has transcend into performing art which has helped to keep the ritual alive.

Requiring years of training, the dancers stepped forward and raise their arms, holding their right palm upward toward heaven and their left palm downward toward earth, they gradually started whirling in a counter- clockwise direction, the left foot of the whirler never being raised.

Wearing white costumes with wide bell-like skirts, the dancers see their turning, which may last a half-hour within a larger performance of music and movement, as a means of rebalancing of the world by drawing cosmic energies down to Earth.