Tamara Brooks

Tamara Brooks (11 September 1941 – 19 May 2012) was an American choral conductor.

Biography Brooks studied at the Juilliard School of Music, where she received degrees in piano (studying under Eduard Steuermann) and in conducting. She went on to have an extremely varied career, of which choral conducting was merely a part.

Brooks conducted concerts in many countries throughout the world (Austria, Cyprus, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Israel, Italy, Japan, Poland, Russia, Taiwan, Turkey, Wales). Her positions included principal guest conductor of the Istanbul Symphony, conductor of the Cyprus Broadcast Orchestra, and guest conductor of the Mozarteum Orchestra Salzburg. She also prepared choruses for such conductors as Abbado, Frühbeck de Burgos, Giulini, Leinsdorf, Mehta, Muti, Ormandy, Rostropovich, Rozhdestvensky, Tennstedt, and Tilson Thomas. In addition to New England Conservatory, Brooks held numerous other important academic positions.

In 1998, Hankus Netsky invited Brooks to take part in a PBS television program entitled Taste of Passover. It was there that she met Theodore Bikel. Ten years later she married Bikel, with whom she toured the world in acclaimed concerts of folk music.

Netsky wrote: "Tamara was incredibly dynamic, charismatic, energetic, a vortex of passion, love, and talent. When she got excited about something, there was no stopping her. And she got excited about a lot of things. When that happened, she was 100% there and never imagined that her students or others might not be as excited about a project as she was."

Brooks died suddenly of a heart attack in Houston on 19 May 2012.