The Southeastern Conference has named pianist and professor of music Marina Lomazov a winner of a 2015 Faculty Achievement Award

“I am very humbled to be recognized along with wonderful colleagues throughout the SEC,” said Lomazov, an internationally acclaimed concert pianist and the Ira McKissick Koger Professor of Fine Arts in the University of South Carolina School of Music. “USC has been an ideal place to grow as a teacher and scholar, and it is a privilege to be able to develop my career in an environment with such outstanding students, faculty, staff and leadership.”

Award winners will represent their university for the 2015 SEC Professor of the Year Award and will receive a $5,000 honorarium from the athletic conference. The SEC Professor of the Year, to be named later this month, receives an additional $15,000 honorarium and will be recognized at the SEC Awards Dinner in May and the SEC Symposium in September.

“Professor Lomazov has long been recognized as a shining star at Carolina. Her performances draw large, adoring audiences everywhere she goes," university President Harris Pastides says. “It’s very satisfying to know that our world class athletic conference has recognized a world class pianist from USC.”

Critics have said Lomazov is “a diva of the piano” (The Salt Lake City Tribune), and “a mesmerizing risk-taker” (The Plain Dealer, Cleveland). She has been recognized as one of the most passionate and charismatic performers on the concert scene today, earning prizes in the Cleveland International Piano Competition, William Kapell International Piano Competition and Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition.

Lomazov has performed throughout North America, South America, Europe and Asia. Most recently she’s performed extensively in China. She has been featured on National Public Radio’s “Performance Today,” Bravo television network and WNYC’s “Young Artist Showcase.

Tayloe Harding, dean of the School of Music, considers Marina to be not only an exemplary faculty member, but also a great colleague and a model mentor. “It is gratifying to know,” he adds, “that a faculty member like Marina, who manages a world-class performing career and a stable of fine young piano students and displays a warm and gracious manner with donors and friends, can be recognized in this way.”

Lomazov is the founder and artistic director of the Southeastern Piano Festival, which each summer transforms Carolina into a major cultural destination that draws audiences and young pianists from across the U.S.