Dr. Tamara Reps Freeman holds three degrees in music education, learning to play every string, woodwind, brass and percussion instrument. She began her college career at SUNY Potsdam, Crane School of Music. She was one of only two students who was selected to be a conducting protege of Maestro Brock McElheran. In 1991, she earned her M.A. Music Ed. from Montclair State, studying violin performance in the studio of NY Philharmonic violinist, Oscar Ravina. From 1982-2012 she taught instrumental music and conducted grades 5-12 orchestras and bands in the Ridgewood Public Schools, the Thurnauer School of Music Orchestra, the Garden State Academy of Music orchestra, two NJ All-State Opera Festivals, three NJ Regional Orchestra Festivals, the Cadets of Bergen County and the NYC Symphonic Ensemble.
 
During her teaching career, Dr. Freeman learned that during the Holocaust, music served as a
source of resilience and resistance for prisoners. Music’s multitudinous powers further enlightened Dr. Freeman’s approach to helping ensembles and audiences also benefit from the power of music. The 1994 NJ Holocaust education mandate propelled her to earn a Doctorate of Musical Arts degree from Rutgers.   For 25+ years, Dr. Freeman is the artistic director and Interfaith Choir Conductor of the Annual Ridgewood Holocaust Commemoration, conducting world premiers of Holocaust memorial music she commissions from rising star composers from top conservatories. She was the artistic director and conductor of the 2018 Tennessee Teen All-State Holocaust Concert in Symphony Hall, Nashville TN performed by over 250 students of all ages, religions and ethnicities. She was honored to conduct the North Jersey Symphony Orchestra in its May 2023 concert, where she taught and directed five archival Holocaust songs.
Dr. Freeman is the Holocaust ethnomusicologist for the Association of Holocaust Organizations,
the international alliance of Holocaust museums, Holocaust education commissions, and university departments of Holocaust studies. She is a professor of Holocaust music, culture and education for Yeshiva University where she created and teaches three zoom graduate courses attended by educators from all over the world. Dr. Freeman travels throughout the U.S. teaching music composed in the WWII ghettos and concentration camps. She performs Holocaust music lecture-recitals playing her 1935 Joseph Bausch viola, a relic of the Holocaust. Her teaching and performance venues have included the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., the Dallas Holocaust Museum, the El Paso Holocaust Museum, the Belz Museum in TN, the Chattauqua, NY Institute, and the Museum of Tolerance in NYC. Dr. Freeman is a contributing author to “Voices of Democracy in Music Education: Diversity and Social Justice in the Classroom” published by Routledge Press in August, 2015.
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