Drummers

Alex Acuna

Alex Acuña grew up with percussion, and in some ways the world of percussion has grown with Alex Acuña.

Born Alejandro Acuña on Dec. 12, 1944, in Pativilca, Peru, Acuña was part of a musical family – his father and all five brothers were musicians. Acuña began teaching himself the drums at age 4 and he was playing in local bands by the age of 10.

As a teenager he moved to Lima, and with a reputation already developing, he joined the band of notable Latin musician Perez Prado at age 18. In 1967, Acuña moved to Puerto Rico to work as a studio musician and to study for three years at the Puerto Rico Conservatory of Music.

In 1974, Acuña moved to Las Vegas, where he worked with Elvis Presley and Diana Ross, then joined the jazz fusion group Weather Report. He left Weather Report four years and two albums later, becoming a session musician in California and working with the biggest names in the business across a broad spectrum of genres: from Paul McCartney and Joni Mitchell to Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock; from Whitney Houston and Roberta Flack to Carlos Santana and U2.

In the 1980s, Acuña recorded and toured with the Christian jazz band Koinonia, which was composed primarily of other studio musicians. Additionally, he has worked as a music educator at both the University of California, Los Angeles, and at Boston’s Berklee College of Music.

The Alex Acuña discography also includes the 1992 album “Thinking of You,” recorded as Alex Acuña and the Unknowns, along with 2000’s offering “Acuarela de Tambores,” and the 2002 release “Los Hijos del Sol: To My Country.”

Acuña and his love of percussion have moved into the 21^st Century via the World Wide Web. Visitors to http://www.myspace.com/alexacunamusic can listen to a number of the percussionist’s recordings.