Iano Tamar was born in Georgia and studied piano, musicology and voice at the Conservatory in Tiflis. After her sensational debut as Semiramide in Pesaro, she appeared at La Scala Milan in the roles of Lina in Verdi's Stiffelio under Gianandrea Gavazzeni as well as Alice in Verdi's Falstaff and Lady Macbeth in Macbeth, both productions conducted by R. Muti; these appearances marked her international breakthrough and led to invitations to sing at all the great opera houses of the world. Recently she has been triumphantly acclaimed as Médée in Vienna, Lady Macbeth in Hamburg, Desdemona in Otello in Tokyo, as Elisabeth de Valois in a new production of the five-act Don Carlos at the Vienna State Opera, as Elvira in Ernani and as Mathilde in a revival of Rossini's Guillaume Tell. She has also won acclaim for performances as Marchesa del Poggio in Un giorno di regno in Covent Garden, as Rachel in a new production of La Juive at the Teatro la Fenice, as Tosca in the revival at the Grand Theâtre de Genève, as Leonora in Il Trovatore at the Bregenz Festival (incl. DVD production), as Leonore in Il Trovatore and in the revival of La Forza del Destino at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, as Elisabetta in Maria Stuarda in Lyon and Paris, as Semiramide and Lady Macbeth at Deutsche Oper Berlin; as Amelia in Un ballo in maschera in Hamburg, and as Norma and Elettra in Idomeneo at the Gran Teatro del Liceu in Barcelona.