Nicky Purser, of the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, is an American pianist of Japanese and British descent. She earned her bachelors and masters degrees and a performer diploma in piano performance from Indiana University Bloomington Jacobs School of Music (JSOM), where she was an assistant instructor for the music theory department and pursued specialized studies in chamber music, choral conducting, and Journalism. Her primary teachers included Edmund Battersby, Jean-Louis Haguenauer, and Valerica Maican. Nicky holds the Licentiate of the Royal Schools of Music, and is a prizewinner of the 2012 Concours National de Musique du Théâtre le Passage vers les Étoiles in Paris, the JSOM piano concerto competition (2010), the Washington Music Teachers Association (WMTA) Bach Competition, and the WMTA Viola Hartman Competition. She has performed in masterclasses for Evelyne Brancart, André LaPlante, Carol Leone, and Rebecca Penneys, and she has received lessons from David Abbott, Monique Duphil, and Thomas Schumacher.