Arthur Tennent, a renowned choral conductor, voice teacher, actor and author, enjoyed multiple careers as a teacher, concert singer and recitalist, recording artist and the guardian of his mother Madge Tennent’s artistic legacy as a painter of Hawaiian subjects. He was born a century ago and died in 2004.

His son, Buz Tennent, also a musician and concert singer, said his relationship with his father was fortunate.

He “was a true Renaissance man in the most profound sense,” Tennent said. “He generously shared with me his lifelong commitment to the commonwealth of the arts. He was my first voice teacher. He gave me the gift of his time, an insatiable curiosity, and passion for reading, philosophy and semantics. His puckish sense of humor and fondness for puns — and his loving support and encouragement, infused me with an enthusiasm for singing and the noble art of teaching.”

Arthur Tennent was born in New Zealand in 1916 and came to Hawaii when the family — parents Hugh and Madge Tennent and younger brother Val — were en route to England from American Samoa and decided to stay. His father was an accountant, and Madge Tennent was a widely recognized portrait artist who also played and had studied piano. Hawaii became their home.

Arthur Tennent graduated from Punahou in 1935 and went to London to study voice at the Royal Academy of Music. He returned to Hawaii after World War II, married, served as a Honolulu police officer and then left Hawaii to earn a master’s degree in voice at the University of Michigan. Tennent returned to Hawaii for good when his son — born Leslie but known from childhood as Buz — was a teenager.

Buz Tennent is celebrating the centennial of his father’s birth with an afternoon concert Sunday at Atherton Studio. The program will represent the rich diversity of musical interests he shared with his father.

“This is my gift of gratitude to my father. He was born June 11, 1916, and it just seemed to me appropriate and something I wanted to honor him with,” Tennent said.

“I’m opening the program with ‘Hamlet Drinking Song,’ by (Ambroise) Tomas. It’s a rousing audience-pleaser. I got a lot of mileage out of it in my remote youth in New York, singing it at auditions. Then I’m going into some French ‘melodie’: Chausson was a 19th-century French composer who wrote lovely gems, and I end with a song by Poulenc, who was known for his humor, with a song titled ‘It’s Most Important to Have Good Taste,’ about the pomposity of the arts. Then I segue into some German lieder — some of which my father sang and loved, and which I heard him do when I was a small child.”

The second half of the program contains other songs that Tennent, 62, a baritone trained in opera who has often performed in musical theater, learned from his father and enjoyed singing with him. It includes the quixotic anthem of the 1965 Broadway musical “Man of La Mancha.”

“‘The Impossible Dream’ was the signature tune of Father’s,” Tennent said. “And then I’m ending with ‘If I Sing,’ which was part of the Manoa Valley Theatre production of ‘Closer Than Ever’ two years ago.”

Richard Maltby Jr. wrote “If I Sing” in tribute to Arthur Tennent, and Buz Tennent sang it at MVT, as he will again Sunday.

“It’s my ultimate tribute to him,” Tennent said.

The singer has built well on the foundation his father provided. Theater writers familiar with Honolulu’s vibrant musical productions know him not only for his stellar ensemble performance in “Closer Than Ever” in 2014 and for his scene-stealing portrayal of Inspector Javert in Paliku Theatre’s staging of “Les Miserables” in 2013, but also as Emile de Becque in Army Community Theatre’s production of “South Pacific” in the 1990s and as star-crossed Billy Bigelow in “Carousel” at Diamond Head Theatre in 1987.

Tennent earned a Po‘okela Award for his performance as Captain von Trapp in Diamond Head Theatre’s “The Sound of Music” in 2010. The role seemed custom-made for him; he speaks fluent German and sang professionally in Germany for more than decade. He describes himself as “conversational” in French and Italian.

“I spent seven years in New York and almost 13 years in Germany, and now I’m someone who chooses to live here — if that makes sense,” he said. “I think it helped that I listened to lieder growing up on my father’s LPs, and then total immersion when I was there,” he said.

Tennent returned to Hawaii in 2003 and was near his father in his final years. In addition to his work in community theater and opera, he is a professor of voice at Chaminade University and also teaches privately.

“I’m going to take a hiatus from community theater unless something really compelling comes along,” Tennent said. “But I’m teaching, I did an indie film a few years ago and I’m delving more into TV.”

In fact, Tennent’s second speaking role on “Hawaii Five-0” is scheduled to air Nov. 18.