São Paulo-born musician Roberto Tibiriçá developed his art under the tutorship of Guiomar Novaes, Magda Tagliaferro, Dinorah de Carvalho, Nelson Freire and Gilberto Tinetti. He studied under Eleazar de Carvalho, with whom he had the opportunity to work for 18 years after winning the OSESP Young Conductors Competition two years in a row.

He held the post of assistant conductor at the Teatro Nacional de São Carlos (Lisbon) and in 1994 he was appointed artistic director and principle conductor of the Brazilian Symphony Orchestra. Between 2000 and 2004 he was artistic director and principle conductor of the Petrobras Symphony Orchestra and between 2005 and 2011 he was artistic director of the Heliópolis Symphony Orchestra, at Instituto Baccarelli (São Paulo). In 2010 he took over as principal conductor of the Minas Gerais Symphony Orchestra, remaining there until 2013. He also served as principal conductor and artistic director of the Campinas Symphony Orchestra and the São Bernardo do Campo Philharmonic, both in São Paulo, and the SODRE Symphony Orchestra in Montevideo, Uruguay.

In 1995 he was elected Musician of the Year of Rio de Janeiro and was awarded the Estácio de Sá Prize by the state government for his work with the Brazilian Symphony Orchestra. He twice took part (2001 and 2004) in the Martha Argerich Festival, in Buenos Aires, on the invitation of Argerich herself. He has also received repeat invitations to conduct concerts with the Simón Bolivar Orchestra at the Villa-Lobos Festival in Venezuela.

In 2010 and 2011, he won the Carlos Gomes prize for Best Symphonic Conductor, for his work with the Minas Gerais and Heliópolis symphony orchestras. In 2011 he was given the Order of Ipiranga (the highest honorary title given by the State of São Paulo), the President Juscelino Kubitschek Grand Medal (given by the Minas Gerais state government), and the APCA Award (given by the São Paulo Association of Art Critics) as best conductor (for his work with the Heliópolis Symphony Orchestra and the Minas Gerais Symphony Orchestra). He occupies seat no. 5 of the Brazilian Academy of Music and since 11 May 2003 he has been an honorary member of the National Academy of Music, in Rio de Janeiro. In 2020, at the height of the Covid pandemic, he debuted the one-act opera Cartas Portuguesas, by the Brazilian composer João Guilherme Ribber, and recorded the Choros for clarinet, piano, viola and cello and the piece Flor de Tremembé, by Camargo Guarnieri, for Naxos.

Roberto Tibiriçá is currently the Musical Director and Principal Conductor of the Symphony Orchestra of Paraná.