Biography

Dr. Joan Tay is an active solo and collaborative performer and has performed in the USA and her home countries — Singapore and New Zealand. Known for her strong performance persona, Joan “identifies with the music in the best possible way, and lets the…composer speak directly to the audience.” Her playing features a wide color palette, going beyond the idiomatic sounds of the piano. Joan and her duo partner, Dasol Um, were national prizewinners in the 2021-22 MTNA Stecher and Horowitz Two Piano Competition. Joan was also the 2018 Oregon State winner of the MTNA Young Artist Performance Competition.

Joan received her Doctor of Musical Arts and Master of Music (Piano Performance) degrees from the University of Oregon, where she studied with Dr. Dean Kramer and Dr. Claire Wachter. During her doctoral studies, Joan developed a strong interest in the piano music of Johannes Brahms. Her lecture-document, “A Performer’s Companion to Johannes Brahms’s Piano Concerto in D minor, Op. 15,” focused on the music and pedagogy of Brahms.

During her time at the University of Oregon, Joan was a Graduate Teaching Fellow in the areas of Piano Pedagogy and Collaborative Piano. She was a highly sought-after accompanist for vocal and instrumental music. Joan was awarded the Best Accompanist award in 2019, and the Outstanding Graduate Performer in Piano (2019), and Collaborative Piano (2023).

As a Graduate Teaching Fellow, Joan taught private piano lessons to music and non-music majors college students, group piano lessons for adult beginners and weekly piano masterclasses. She also served as the administrative assistant for the piano department.

Joan holds a Bachelor of Music with Honors from the Yong Siew Toh Conservatory of Music in Singapore, where she received a full scholarship to study with Prof. Albert Tiu. Joan was a National Finalist in the Singapore National Piano and Violin Competition in 2015; she performed Robert Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 54 with the Metropolitan Festival Orchestra.

In her free time, Joan enjoys cooking, HIIT workouts and discovering cafes. She is also discovering new hobbies such as knitting and trying to re-learn the violin.