Michael Tilson Thomas
Tilson Thomas in 2008
Background information
Born	(1944-12-21)December 21, 1944 (age 80) Los Angeles,California, U.S.
Genres	Classical
Occupation(s)	Conductor, pianist, composer
Website	michaeltilsonthomas.com

Michael Tilson Thomas (born December 21, 1944) is an American conductor, pianist, and composer. He isArtistic Director Laureate of theNew World Symphony, an American orchestral academy inMiami Beach, Florida, Music Director Laureate of theSan Francisco Symphony, and Conductor Laureate of theLondon Symphony Orchestra. He gave his final performance with the San Francisco Symphony in April 2025 while fighting brain cancer.

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Tilson Thomas was born, on December 21, 1944, inLos Angeles,California,^[1] to Ted and Roberta Thomas, aBroadwaystage manager and a middle school history teacher, respectively. He is the grandson ofYiddish theater starsBoris andBessie Thomashefsky, who performed in theYiddish Theater District in Manhattan. The family talent goes back to Tilson Thomas's great-grandfather, Pincus, an actor and playwright, and before that to a long line ofcantors; his father, Theodor Herzl Tomashefsky (Ted Thomas), was also a poet and painter.

He was an only child and musical prodigy.^[1] Tilson Thomas studied piano with John Crown and composition and conducting underIngolf Dahl at theUniversity of Southern California, where he graduated from the USC Thornton School of Music '67 and MM '76. As a student ofFriedelind Wagner, Tilson Thomas was a Musical Assistant and Assistant Conductor at theBayreuth Festival.

Tilson Thomas lives in San Francisco with his husband and partner of over 40 years, Joshua Robison.^[2][3][4] The couple married on November 2, 2014.^[5] On August 6, 2021, Tilson Thomas disclosed publicly for the first time that he had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of brain cancer, calledglioblastoma multiforme.^[6][7][8]

On January 9, 2022, Tilson Thomas returned to his hometown to conduct—for the first time since his cancer disclosure—the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Despite the small audience at Walt Disney Hall due to more than 43,000 newly-diagnosed cases of COVID-19 in L.A. County, Tilson Thomas was greeted warmly. He proceeded to lead a concert of works by Gabriel Fauré, Tilson Thomas' ownMeditations on Rilke—wistful reflections on life and death as the composer turned 75 in 2019—and to conclude, a performance of Sergei Prokofiev'sFifth Symphony.^[9]

In February 2025, Tilson Thomas announced that his brain tumor had returned.^[10] His final public appearance was on April 26, 2025, when he conducted the San Francisco Symphony in a belated 80th birthday celebration concert.^[11]

Tilson Thomas has conducted a wide variety of music and is a particular champion of modern American works. He is also renowned for his interpretation of the works ofGustav Mahler; he has recorded all nine Mahler symphonies and other major orchestral works with the San Francisco Symphony. These recordings have been released on the high-resolution audio formatSuper Audio CD on the San Francisco Symphony's own recording label. Tilson Thomas is also known as a premier interpreter of the works ofAaron Copland,Charles Ives, andSteve Reich.

A sampling of Tilson Thomas's own compositions includeFrom the Diary of Anne Frank (1990),^[12]Shówa/Shoáh (1995, memorializing the fiftieth anniversary of thebombing of Hiroshima),^[13]Poems of Emily Dickinson (2002)^[14] andUrban Legend (2002).^[15]

Tilson Thomas has also been devoted to music education. He leads a series of education programs titledKeeping Score which offers insight into the lives and works of great composers, and led a series of Young People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic. Tilson Thomas founded the New World Symphony in Miami in 1987. Most recently, Tilson Thomas has led two incarnations of theYouTube Symphony Orchestra, which brings young musicians from around the world together for a week of music making and learning.

Tilson Thomas currently serves as president of the Tomashefsky Project, a $2 million undertaking formed in 2017 that is intended to record and preserve his grandparents' theatrical achievements, and is on the faculty of theUniversity of Southern CaliforniaThornton School of Music.^[16]

Due to health concerns, Tilson Thomas announced on March 2, 2022, he would be stepping down as the Artistic Director of the New World Symphony and instead serve as the Artistic Director Laureate.^[17]

From 1968 to 1994, Tilson Thomas was the Music Director of theOjai Music Festival seven times. After winning the Koussevitzky Prize at Tanglewood in 1969, Tilson Thomas was named Assistant Conductor of theBoston Symphony Orchestra. That same year, he made his conducting debut with the orchestra, replacing an unwellWilliam Steinberg mid-concert and thereby coming into international recognition at the age of 24. He stayed with the Boston Symphony as Principal Guest Conductor until 1974^[18] and made several recordings with the orchestra forDeutsche Grammophon. He was music director of theBuffalo Philharmonic Orchestra from 1971 to 1979, and recorded forColumbia Records with the orchestra.^[19]

Between 1971 and 1977, he also conducted the series ofYoung People's Concerts with theNew York Philharmonic as well as the Young Musicians Foundation Debut Orchestra based in Los Angeles. From 1981 to 1985, he was principal guest conductor of theLos Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. During a 1985 performance of Mahler's Eighth Symphony at theHollywood Bowl, a (police) helicopter flew over the venue, disrupting the concert. Tilson temporarily left the stage.^[20]

In 2007, he returned to the Hollywood Bowl leading the Los Angeles Philharmonic again in the Mahler Eighth, announcing jokingly, "Now where were we?"

In 1987, Tilson Thomas founded theNew World Symphony inMiami Beach, Florida, an orchestral academy for gifted young musicians whose stated mission is "to prepare highly-gifted graduates of distinguished music programs for leadership roles in orchestras and ensembles around the world."^[21] He played an instrumental role in the development of theFrank Gehry-designedNew World Center in Miami Beach, which opened in 2011, and currently maintains a relationship with the organization as Artistic Director Laureate.^[22] (The two had personal history, with Gehry sometimes having baby-sat for Tilson Thomas back when both were growing up in Los Angeles.^[22]) In March 2022, Tilson Thomas announced that he is to stand down as Artistic Director of the New World Symphony as of June 1, 2022.^[6]

From 1988 to 1995, Tilson Thomas was principal conductor of theLondon Symphony Orchestra (LSO), and recorded with them for such labels as Columbia (now Sony Classical), including the Symphony No. 3 of Mahler. From 1995, he held the title of principal guest conductor with the LSO, and became conductor laureate in 2016.

Tilson Thomas became theSan Francisco Symphony's 11th Music Director in 1995. He originally made his debut with the orchestra in January 1974 conductingMahler'sSymphony No. 9. During his first season with the San Francisco Symphony, Tilson Thomas included a work by an American composer on nearly every one of his programs, including the first performances ever by the orchestra of music byLou Harrison, and culminated with "An American Festival," a two-week focus on American music.^[23]

In June 2000, Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony presented a landmark 12-concert American Mavericks Festival, recognizing the innovative works of 20th century American composers. Additional season-ending festivals in Davies Symphony Hall have included explorations of the music ofWagner,Prokofiev, Mahler,Stravinsky,Beethoven andWeill, including semi-staged productions ofRimsky-Korsakov's opera-balletMlada, Beethoven'sFidelio, and Wagner'sThe Flying Dutchman.

During his tenure, the orchestra began to issue recordings on its own SFS Media label.

In April 2005, he conducted theCarnegie Hall premiere ofThe Thomashefskys: Music and Memories of a Life in the Yiddish Theater, partly as a tribute to his own grandparents.^[24] Other American orchestras have since performed this production, including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra,Los Angeles Philharmonic,Boston Symphony Orchestra,Philadelphia Orchestra,New York Philharmonic, New World Symphony andSan Francisco Symphony. It has also been recorded for future broadcast onPBS.^[25]

Tilson Thomas collaborated with YouTube in 2009 to help create theYouTube Symphony Orchestra, an orchestra whose members were selected from 30 countries based on more than 3,000 video auditions on YouTube. The Orchestra, as well as such soloists asMason Bates,Measha Brueggergosman,Joshua Roman,Gil Shaham,Yuja Wang, and Jess Larsen, and participated in a classical music summit in New York City at theJuilliard School over three days. The event culminated in a live concert atCarnegie Hall on Wednesday, April 15. The concert was later made available on YouTube.^[26] On March 20, 2011, Tilson Thomas also conducted the "YTSO2" (YouTube Symphony Orchestra 2) inSydney.^[27]

In October 2017, the orchestra announced that Tilson Thomas would conclude his tenure as its music director at the close of the 2019–2020 season, and subsequently take the title of music director laureate.^[28][23]

His first television appearances were in theYoung People's Concerts with the New York Philharmonic, airing from 1971 to 1977.^[29] He has also made regular appearances on PBS, with broadcasts featuring Tilson Thomas airing from 1972 through 2008. Eight episodes of WNET'sGreat Performances series have featured Tilson Thomas. He has also been featured on Japan'sNHK and theBBC many times in the last three decades.

In 1976, Tilson Thomas appeared alongsideBugs Bunny andDaffy Duck in a prime-time special,Bugs and Daffy's Carnival of the Animals, a combined live action/animated broadcast ofThe Carnival of the Animals bySaint-Saëns.^[30]

In 2011, he hosted a concert stage show celebrating his grandparents and the music of American Yiddish theatreThe Thomashefskys: Music and Memories of a Life in the Yiddish Theater, which aired in 2012 on the PBS series "Great Performances."^[31]

Tilson Thomas hosted theKeeping Score television series, nine one-hour documentary-style episodes and eight live-concert programs, which began airing nationally onPBS stations in early November 2006. He and the San Francisco Symphony have examined the lives and music of Gustav Mahler, Dmitri Shostakovich, Charles Ives, Hector Berlioz, Aaron Copland, Igor Stravinsky, Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky, and Ludwig van Beethoven.

Keeping Score discography

• Tchaikovsky's 4th Symphony – 2004
• Beethoven's Eroica – 2006
• Copland and the American Sound – 2006
• Stravinsky's Rite of Spring – 2006
• Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique – 2009
• Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 – 2009
• Ives' Holiday Symphony – 2009
• Mahler: Origins and Legacy – 2011

Tilson Thomas has made more than 120 recordings, including works by Bach, Mahler, Beethoven, Prokofiev and Stravinsky as well as his pioneering work with the music of Charles Ives, Carl Ruggles, Steve Reich, John Cage, Ingolf Dahl, Morton Feldman, George Gershwin, John McLaughlin and Elvis Costello. He has recorded the complete orchestral works of Gustav Mahler with the San Francisco Symphony.

• From the Diary of Anne Frank (1990) for narrator and orchestra
• Shówa/Shoáh (1995)
• Agnegram (1998)
• Whitman Songs (1999) for vocal baritone and orchestra
• Poems of Emily Dickinson (2002) for vocal soprano and orchestra
• Urban Legend (2002) for contrabassoon and orchestra
• Four Preludes on Playthings of the Wind (2016) for mezzo-soprano, 2 female back-up singers, chamber orchestra, and bar band
• Meditations on Rilke (2019) for mezzo-soprano, baritone, and orchestra

• Street Song for Symphonic Brass (1988) for 3 C trumpets, B-flat flugelhorn, 4 horns in F, 2 trombones, bass trombone, and tuba
• Street Song for Brass Quintet (1988) for brass quintet
• Five Songs (1988) for vocal baritone and piano
• Grace (1993) for vocal soprano
• Fame, fromPoems of Emily Dickinson (2001)
• Island Music (2003) for 2 solo marimba, 2 tutti marimba, and 2 percussion
• Notturno (2005) for flute and string quintet + harp (also available for flute and piano)
• Stay Together (2006) for electronics

Grammy Award for Best Classical Compendium

• 2021 ConductingSan Francisco Symphony, performing From the Diary of Anne Frank & Meditations on Rilke

Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance

• 2013 ConductingSan Francisco Symphony, performingAdams: Harmonielehre & Short Ride in a Fast Machine
• 2006 ConductingSan Francisco Symphony, performingMahler:Symphony No. 7.
• 2003 Conducting theSan Francisco Symphony, performingMahler:Symphony No. 6.
• 2000 Conducting theRagazzi, the Peninsula Boys Chorus, theSan Francisco Girls Chorus, theSan Francisco Symphony andChorus, performingStravinsky:The Firebird;The Rite of Spring;Perséphone.
• 1997 Conducting theSan Francisco Symphony, performingProkofiev:Romeo and Juliet (scenes).

Grammy Award for Best Classical Album

• 2010 ConductingSan Francisco Symphony, performingMahler:Symphony No. 8.
• 2006 ConductingSan Francisco Symphony, performingMahler:Symphony No. 7.
• 2004 ConductingSan Francisco Symphony, performingMahler:Symphony No. 3,Kindertotenlieder.
• 2000 Conducting theRagazzi, the Peninsula Boy Chorus, theSan Francisco Girls Chorus, theSan Francisco Symphony andChorus, performingStravinsky:The Firebird;The Rite of Spring;Perséphone.

Grammy Award for Best Choral Performance

• 2010 ConductingSan Francisco Symphony, performingMahler:Symphony No. 8.
• 1976 Conducting the Cleveland Boys Choir andCleveland Orchestra Chorus, performingOrff:Carmina Burana.

Peabody Award

• 2007The MTT Files produced byTom Voegeli andAmerican Public Media.^[32]

National Medal of Arts

• 2009 National Medal of Arts.

Kennedy Center Honor

• 2019 Kennedy Center Honor was presented December 8, 2019.^[33]

• San Francisco Symphony
• San Francisco Symphony Chorus
• New World Symphony Orchestra

• Official website
• Michael Tilson Thomas atIMDb
• Michael Tilson Thomas atAllMusic
• Michael Tilson Thomas collected news and commentary atThe New York Times
• Michael Tilson Thomas (April 16, 2001)."Making Anything Sound Good".NewMusicBox (Interview). Interviewed byFrank J. Oteri (published May 1, 2001).

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