MEET THE DIRECTOR

Originally from central Louisiana (USA), Kevin Tison began his musical education with piano study at the age of thirteen. Over the past thirty-five years, his professional work in music has spanned various roles as a conductor, educator, pianist, arranger, and vocalist. He is in his twenty third year teaching high school choral music – with the past twenty years at Fountain Valley High School in Orange County, California.

Mr. Tison earned his Bachelor of Music from Northwestern State University of Louisiana and a Master of Music from Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, both in piano performance. Additional concentrations of study were pursued in the areas of voice, composition, orchestration, and conducting.

At the conductor’s podium, his work has been extensive and varied from orchestras and choirs to directing musical and opera theater. He has also been featured as a performer on organ, harpsichord, French horn, percussion, and voice, in addition to piano. Before teaching, Mr. Tison served as music director of various churches throughout Louisiana, Texas, and California. He has been nationally recognized and published as a composer and arranger with his works being performed by symphony orchestras across North America – most notably a holiday pops concert premier in 1997 by the Nashville Symphony.

Choirs under Mr. Tison’s direction have performed and received the highest acclaim at regional, state and national levels, from Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor to New York’s Carnegie Hall. Additionally, he has planned and led music tours throughout Hong Kong, China, Macau, France, British Columbia, Romania, Germany, Austria, England, Denmark, Italy, Croatia, New Zealand, and Australia – performing in venues as remarkable as Bath Abbey, the Shanghai Conservatory of Music Concert Hall, the Sydney Opera House, Cathédrale Notre-Dame, St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City, and Vienna’s Stephansdom. This most recent summer, the Troubadours, his chamber choir, performed across the Philippines and Vietnam.

Mr. Tison’s work as an educator, clinician, adjudicator, and performer has been featured in MENC’s Teaching Music magazine. He has also been named an Orange County Arts Educator of the Year along with many other acknowledgements across California and the nation. Mr. Tison has conducted at National Conferences of the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) in Chicago (2011), Minneapolis (2017), and most recently at the Western Division Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah in March 2020.

In addition to his classroom work, Mr. Tison is passionate about educational travel. He serves as part of the Perform International team as an Artistic Advisor and Production Assistant, helping develop choral music festivals and other international performance opportunities.

Making his home in beautiful Sierra Madre, California, Mr. Tison loves spending time with friends, his partner Dollar and their four-legged daughter Bronte! He is an avid pilot, triathlete, diver, hiker, and national park enthusiast – always packed and ready for the next adventure.

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Contact: ktison@hbuhsd.edu

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