Dr. Tamara McCoy

Dr. Tamara McCoy is a pianist and contralto that teaches at and the University of Alaska, Anchorage and Alaska Pacific University. She serves as Music Director at Anchorage Lutheran Church where she produces the Anchorage Lutheran Concert Series.

Dr. Tamara McCoy began her piano studies at the age of five in Anchorage, Alaska. She is a prize winner in several piano competitions, including the Alaska Yamaha State Piano Competition,  the University of Kentucky Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition, and the Bartok-Kabalevsky-Prokofiev International Piano Competition. Tamara has also won several prizes for composition, including first prize in the Anchorage Symphony Orchestra Composition Competition for her Intermezzo for Piano and Orchestra, which she later performed with the Anchorage Symphony Orchestra.

She received her Bachelors degree in Piano Performance at Radford University where she was presented the MTNA STAR award for outstanding teaching ability. Tamara obtained her Masters and Doctoral degrees in Piano Performance at the University of Kentucky. She taught for three years at the University of Kentucky while acting as Head of Faculty at the Music Institute of Lexington. Tamara also served as Assistant Professor of Music on the faculty at the University of Pikeville, where she was voted KMEA District 9 College/University Teacher of the Year for 2008. Tamara has served on the faculty of the 2ndand 3rdInternational Piano Festivals of the City of Vitória, Espírito Santo, Brazil, and the Classical Minds International Guitar Festival.She has most notably performed in New York, Russia, the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom and Brazil.

In 2015, Tamara was awarded an Individual Artist Award from the Rasmuson Foundation to tour Alaska and England, where she made her vocal and pianistic London debut. In 2016, Tamara was a featured artist on the National Public Radio through the Houston Public Media podcast Classical Classroom, where she discussed, performed and recorded Liszt’s Totentanz. In 2017, Tamara was invited and continues to be a teaching artist in the Hiland Mountain Lullaby Project, in partnership with the Carnegie Hall Weill Music Institute.In 2018, Tamara won first prize in theAlaska State and the Northwest Regional NATS Adult Avocational Voice Auditions. In 2020, she was selected to perform her composition at the Lullaby Celebration Concert at Carnegie Hall in New York. In 2021, Tamara was awarded an Adaptation and Innovation performance grant from the Alaska State Council on the Arts to facilitate an Alaskan tour. In 2022, she was awarded a Rasmuson Foundation Fellowship.

Tamara studies voice in the Swedish/Italian School with Nancy Caudill in Alaska and David L. Jones in New York. In addition, Tamara maintains an active teaching schedule for piano and voice students of all ages. Shelives in Anchorage with her husband Eric and her children, Kenny and Molly.

Tamara is certified to teach the Suzuki Piano method in addition to traditional methods. She also holds certification in several levels of the early childhood music program, Musikgarten. Her teaching background includes private/applied piano, choral conducting, class piano, early childhood music, Classical/Rock and Roll music appreciation, World Music, music theory, piano pedagogy, and piano ensemble.