A native of Regina, Saskatchewan, PETER TIEFENBACH studied music in Canada, the United States and England. He holds degrees and diplomas in piano performance and church music from Minnesota’s St Olaf College, Northwestern University in Chicago, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama and Royal Academy of Music in London.
From 1994 to 1997, he was the host of the CBC Radio Two programmes The Arts Tonight and Radio Concert Hall. In 1997, he joined the faculty of the Glenn Gould School at the Royal Conservatory of Music, where he coaches singers in the Artist Diploma and Performance Diploma programmes, and teaches a graduate level course in orchestral literature. For the past decade he has also served as Director of Music for Toronto’s First Unitarian Congregation.
Described by the Toronto Star as a “magical accompanist”, he has collaborated with many of Canada's leading singers and instrumentalists, and has toured extensively in North America, to Japan, Hong Kong, England, Hungary and Iceland.
A Juno-nominated composer, his recent commissions include works for the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, Elora Festival Singers, Canadian Brass, Elmer Iseler Singers, Borealis String Quartet, and Saskatoon Children’s Choir.
Peter is involved in two other Gould anniversary events this fall: in September he was one of twelve pianists who premiered newly-composed preludes and fugues based on “Glenn Gould” in a live-to-air concert on CBC Radio Two, and in December he’ll present a family concert by the Toronto Symphony Orchestra entitled “Happy Birthday, Glenn Gould”.
