Santiago Alvarez is a harmonica player specialized in Argentine music. He was born in Buenos Aires in 1986 and began studying diatonic harmonica aged 16. In 2008, he moved to New York City where he attended Mannes College – The New School of Music. In 2009, he started chromatic harmonica studies with Franco Luciani. Today Alvarez is one of the leading lights of a younger generation of Argentinian chromatic harmonica players who have devoted themselves to traditional tango music and follow in the footsteps of Hugo Diaz.

For 10 years, Santiago performed with Tanino dúo, a group dedicated to recreating Buenos Aires tango music. With this group Santiago made several tours within Argentina and abroad. Tanino dùo performed in recognized world music festivals and concert halls such as the “Ambria Jazz” (Italy), Edinburgh College of Art (Scotland), Celtic Connections (Scotland), Tarbes en Tango (France), Tango Postale (France), JEFF Festival (Slovenia) among others. Tanino duo recorded 3 albums with several highly regarded Argentine musicians as guests, including Rudi Flores and Juan Falù.

Santiago teaches harmonica at the School of Popular Music (EMPA) and has been a professor of History of Tango and History of Folklore In the EARI School since 2014. While following his musical career, he also completed his degree in Sociology at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA/FSOC) in 2014.

In 2019 Alvarez released his first solo recording “Domingo”, bringing together two important aspects of his life: his passion for Buenos Aires Tango and his renewed interest in studying folkloric music, specially the music of the Argentine littoral known as “chamamé”. Key figures in Argentinian guitar history played on this album, including Rudi Flores and Juan Falù.

Nowadays, Alvarez is a member of several formations such as: “Vuela Chiringa”, “Chucara trio” and “Argento Trio” and tours Europe every year.