Joseph Alvarez

Tuba & Euphonium, Assistant Instructor

Email: jalvare3@usf.edu
Phone: (813) 974-2311
Office: MUS 342

Joseph Alvarez joined the USF faculty in 2017, teaching applied tuba and euphonium and directing the Tuba Euphonium Ensemble. In addition, he serves as principal tubist of the Venice Symphony and Imperial Symphony and performs regularly with orchestras across the state such as The Florida Orchestra, Sarasota Orchestra, and Orlando Philharmonic.

With a passion for expanding the repertoire of the tuba and euphonium, Alvarez regularly programs newly commissioned works and his own arrangements on recitals. His arrangement of Prokofiev’s Five Songs Without Words is published through Cherry Classics. In recent years, he has premiered two new tuba concerti with the McCormick Percussion Group – Tyler Kline’s Loam and Matthew Kennedy’s In Pursuit of Ghosts. Upcoming projects include the premiere of Matthew Kennedy’s High Anxieties for contrabass tuba and piano.

Alvarez holds degrees from the University of South Florida (BM) and Northwestern University (MM). His primary teachers include Jay Hunsberger, Rex Martin, and Mark Moore. Alvarez was the tuba fellow at the Music Academy of the West for three summers where he studied with Ralph Sauer and Mark Lawrence. He also served as the tuba fellow with the National Repertory Orchestra.

During his time in Illinois, he served as principal tubist of the Sinfonia Da Camera and performed with ensembles such as the Illinois Symphony and Chicago-based new music collective Dal Niente. He also served as a regular substitute with the New World Symphony in Miami. He has performed under the baton of conductors such as Esa-Pekka Salonen, Barry Wordsworth, Leonard Slatkin, James Gaffigan, Yan Pascal Tortelier, Larry Rachleff, Peter Oundjian, and Kristjan Jarvi. 

Alvarez’s recent involvement with Detroit-based Sphinx, a non-profit organization dedicated to the development of young Black and Latinx classical musicians has yielded two grants and highly selective invitations to audition intensives and workshops. In 2021, Alvarez was the winner of the Most Outstanding Instrumentalist - Tuba Division distinction of the Sphinx Orchestral Partners Auditions (SOPA) Excerpt Competition.

In 2018, Mr. Alvarez was a performing artist and adjudicator at the Southeast Regional Tuba Euphonium Conference (SERTEC) in Tallahassee, FL.