Bio for Steven Alvarez
Steven Alvarez came to Anchorage from the San Francisco Bay Area where he was active as both a performer and educator. Raised in a multi-ethnic military family, Steven grew up in and around many diverse cultures including Hispanic, Native American, Hawaiian, Japanese, and all three coasts of the continental U.S. He graduated from San Jose State University with Bachelor of Arts degrees in Music (Voice and Percussion) and History and minored in Philosophy.
An artist with hands in many mediums, he works professionally as a percussionist, vocalist, stage actor, film and stage producer and music educator. He has produced twelve cultural documentary films and music videos which have been screened internationally at film festivals and broadcast nationally on PBS. His films have won several awards including a Native American Music Award (NAMA) for his music video In This World, produced for the contemporary indigenous band: Medicine Dream. He executive produced Games of the North, a film on the Alaskan Native and Inuit games which was broadcast on PBS in 2011and 2012.
Steven began working professionally as a musician at the age of 16 and worked his way through college performing as both a singer and percussionist. From 1982 through 1989, he played regularly with the Monterey Symphony and Santa Cruz Symphony Orchestras and performed as a guest artist for the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1983 with jazz artist Bobby Hutcherson. He freelanced as a percussionist and vocalist in the San Francisco Bay Area before moving to Anchorage and has shared the stage with Lloyd Bridges, Doc Sevrinson, Jethro Tull, and R. Carlos Nakai. Steven has worked with numerous bands, combos, pit orchestras and theatre companies for more than 30 years. He has recorded local and national radio and television commercials jingles as both a vocalist and percussionist including the 15” Hershey’s Kisses Christmas spot that has run annually for 28 years.
Music directing more than 40 theater productions, he is one of the founding directors of Theater Artists United (TAU). TAU has produced several musical theatre productions and has partnered with many local arts organizations. In October of 2018, Steven co-produced with the Alaska Dance Theatre, and music directed Bernstein and Beyond, celebrating the centennial of Leonard Bernstein’s birth. In October of 2016, he co-produced with the Anchorage Concert Chorus, ALWays: A Tribute to Andrew Lloyd Webber. In 2015, he served as the Artistic and Executive Producer of Spirit – the 7th Fire of Alaska, an Alaskan adaptation of Peter Buffett’s masterwork, for the Alaska Native Heritage Center and Alaska Dance Theatre. In 2008 and again in 2018, he co-produced, with the Anchorage Symphony Orchestra, the premier of Echoes, a multi-media symphonic piece coupling the indigenous song and dance of Hawaii, Alaska and Native America with a symphony orchestra. The piece was also performed in Washington DC at the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) and with the Youngstown Symphony Orchestra in Youngstown, OH.
He has performed on stage in several musical theater productions, having played the roles of Jinx/Forever Plaid, Judas Iscariot and Jesus/ Jesus Christ Superstar, Che/Evita, The Celebrant/Bernstein’s Mass, and The Evangelist for a production of Bach’s St John Passion. Steven regularly presents an innovative theater piece, which debuted at the NMAI that couples film, contemporary song and indigenous storytelling. He has performed as a vocalist and storyteller at venues throughout the country.
Locally Steven serves as the Principal Percussionist with the Anchorage Symphony and Anchorage Concert Chorus orchestras, and is the Principal Timpanist for the Anchorage Opera. He worked with the indigenous groups, Medicine Dream and Pamyua and has performed nationally as a solo artist at the Kennedy Center and at the NMAI’s Classical Native Series. In 2010, he performed at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver with Saturday Night Live percussionist, Valerie Naranjo.
Steven spent fifteen years as a music educator and has administrated private music and dance schools, after school cultural education programs and art organizations for more than 20 years. From 2000 through 2015, he served as the Director of Arts and Education for the Alaska Native Heritage Center where he worked with the Center’s national and local partners, coordinated special projects, directed and produced educational initiatives, public programs, performance art and film festivals.
