Bio
As bandoneónist for San Francisco’s Trio Garufa, Adrian Jost has inspired the most discriminating tango audiences, performed his music in the milongas of Buenos Aires and seen People en Español call his album, El Rumor De Tus Tangos, “a fabulous trip through the history of tango. Adrian brings authentic emotional authority to tango music.
Yet he started down his musical path because he liked to push buttons. Literally. “It’s funny,” he concedes, “but at first it wasn’t really about the music. As a kid, I drove everyone crazy toggling switches and pushing buttons. My uncle was a pilot. He’d take me on flights. The cockpit had so many buttons – I was in heaven. One day my family visited a neighbor who was playing an accordion. I saw all those buttons and thought, ‘This is what I want to do!’”
His parents had other ideas. “It wasn’t a ‘respectable’ instrument,” Jost says. “My mother wanted me to play the violin, the piano … I tried them all very politely and at the end of every class said, ‘I want to play the accordion.’” Even so, today he can be found on tour in duo with Latin Grammy winner Pablo Estigarribia, or playing theaters with his band, Trio Garufa on its tour of Colombia.
In 2001, together with guitarist Guillermo Garcia, he founded Trio Garufa, a popular San Francisco based tango band that that enthralled audiences on the West Coast, Argentina, Colombia, Canada and at various Tango festivals.
He has appeared as soloist with the San Jose Symphony, toured with Argentine pianist Pablo Estigarribia, performed alongside singer María Volonté, tango pianist Pépé Motta, Jazz Bassist Marcus Shelby and is currently in collaboration with Seth Asarnow.
His influences include Leopoldo Frederico, Salgan's Nuevo Quinteto Real, Aníbal Troilo and Astor Piazzolla.
His discography includes Tango en el Mate, La Segunda Tradición, El Rumor de tus tangos, Revirado of Tango Pacifico, a five-piece tango group based in Portland, Oregon, playing the music of Astor Piazzolla.