Forty years ago, Peter Tiboris left his tenured position at a top university, packed up his young family, and moved from middle America to New York to challenge himself musically. From that, he has created an operation that has put more than 4,400 choruses on top stages around the world, presenting 1,493 concerts, largely at Carnegie Hall.
“The key is about the music,” said Mr. Tiboris.
The MidAmerica Productions Model
Imagine being a longtime member of a local church or school choir—perhaps not so much a stretch, as an estimated one in six Americans are. It’s a good choir, but not a famous one. Perhaps it’s never toured. Perhaps it’s only ever performed at a modest, local venue.For these millions of singers, Carnegie Hall may seem like a moonshot.
It’s not solely a matter of talent, but expense as well. The average church choir wouldn’t have the backing of a major management company and recording contracts that the young winner of the Van Cliburn or International Chopin competitions might.
But if that expense was shared among a large group, and the upfront burden of renting the venue was removed, as was the work of selling out thousands of tickets, that dream starts to sound closer to reality. What Mr. Tiboris does is connect talented conductors, choirs, soloists, and composers with the opportunity to seize that reality.
“The rental of Carnegie Hall is expensive, very expensive,” Mr. Tiboris said. “They’re not going to pay that, I’m going to pay that. And we hire the soloists and the orchestra, we do the publicity and the management, and on and on and on.” The proposition appeals to choirs that are serious about the music. Those he invites are thrilled, and the answer is always a resounding yes. “We’re providing a very profound service to the music profession.”
And the benefits are far-reaching. The musicians rise to the challenge to bring their best performance and venues benefit from the staggering number of concerts the company presents, as well as new audiences who may have never attended a classical concert before. Each event involves thousands, who may then each create smaller ripple-effects.
“When you’re in that environment, magic can happen,” Mr. Tiboris said.
From his initial idea grew other projects, including residency programs and concerts and classical music festivals around the world. MidAmerica Productions has presented more than 900 conductors, 1,500 soloists, and 4,700 international choruses. Mr. Tiboris recently conducted for the 50th time at Carnegie Hall, though he was so focused on the music he said he only learned of this anniversary afterward.
“The thing grew from a small peanut,” he said.
Mr. Tiboris’s model is one that seems obvious in retrospect, and today several other companies have copied this approach. But it required someone with all the right relationships—and drive—to set things into motion. Choral music is, after all, an art of connection.
As a longtime choral conductor in academia, he knew all the best choirs in the country, the best choral conductors, and, crucially, had forged a connection with Carnegie Hall.
Forty years is a big achievement, said Clive Gillinson, executive and artistic director of Carnegie Hall.
“We think of ourselves as America’s concert hall, you know, so that the best of everything can appear her, but also so that things from communities all around the country can appear here. So for us, it’s really important that youth orchestras, youth choirs, amateur orchestras, amateur performers—that people feel it really matters to appear at Carnegie. And I think Peter has demonstrated that very clearly,” Mr. Gillinson said.
“It’s important that it should be a very democratic court. It should be something where people from all around the country feel they can appear. I mean, endless people come and see me and say ‘I made my debut with my school choir or my school orchestra when I was a kid at Carnegie Hall and it’s something I’ve always remembered, and that will always be an important part of my life.’ So I think these things, they really matter,” he said.
‘Among Big Trees’
For Mr. Tiboris, it has always been about the music.Mr. Tiboris grew up in the midst of choral music, from age 7 serving as organist in church where his father conducted the choir. Pursuing music for the rest of his life seemed the most natural thing in the world.
He studied music and stayed in academia where he earned his doctorate, taught, conducted, and pushed the limits of how ambitious a university musical production could be. He was ready to challenge himself and “crash through the limit” of his current level when a New York opportunity knocked in 1983.
Mr. Tiboris was invited to bring his 150-member university choir to the sprawling, multi-event 25th anniversary celebration for Archbishop Iakovos, the head of the Greek Orthodox Church in North and South America. Who could refuse the chance to debut at Lincoln Center? But while the group had the will and enthusiasm, it did not have the funds.
It was only the last-minute, generous donation from a choir member who wished to remain anonymous at the time that made it happen. As Alexander Kitoreff writes in a biography of Peter Tiboris, the chorister, a mother of 11, had found in the weekly Monday night rehearsals a much-needed harbor of peace. It had given her a life-changing experience, and she wanted to give back by giving her fellow choir members just that.
It was life-changing for Mr. Tiboris as well. “It was very strong, that concert on January 7,” he said. He had expected his phone to ring off the hook with new opportunities, but it was silent. “And I decided, if they’re not going to call me, I'll take it to them.”
Mr. Tiboris had a winning formula, and it was now a matter of putting in the work. The early days were filled with travel to visit and vet choirs across the country and coordinate endless moving pieces. Luckily, he relished the challenge.
“When I came to New York, I was at the bottom, and I liked working my way up,” he said. “I’m in the environment, which I often say, metaphorically, among big trees. I like living in big trees.”
This has led him to continually pursue far-flung conducting opportunities, such as tours through Eastern Europe during the fall of communism, which led to a chance opportunity to conduct a massive celebration concert in Ukraine marking its declaration of independence from the Soviet Union.
Even 10 years ago, Mr. Tiboris was the kind of person who would, “at the drop of a hat,” do anything.
“Now I’m 76, I’m careful with my time,” he said with a laugh.
“After all these years, I’m kind of doing a full circle back to the music, trying to rid myself of the minutiae,” he said. MidAmerica Productions has grown to a staff of 28, and there are plenty of capable people to handle the operations.
“The thing that has stuck with me is the sound, and the joy of what the composer is trying to communicate,” he said. “That’s where the joy is.”
