Son of José Avilés Cáceres and Angelina Arcos, Óscar Guillermo Avilés Arcos, the First Guitarist of Peru, was born in Callao on March 24, 1924.

His love for Creole music began listening to his father sing and play at meetings with friends. “My father played five musical instruments, and my mother two. Everyone around my dad played an instrument and he sang, I drank from those people, ”says Óscar Avilés. But the one who taught him to play the guitar was his maternal grandmother, Mrs. Carmela Alván. At first, his father opposed his playing the guitar, because he wanted him to dedicate himself to his studies. But then he changed his mind: “When I was 13 years old, my dad told me that he didn’t want me to learn to play the guitar, that the studies were first, but one day my mom found me playing inside the closet and caught my attention. That served for my father to realize that he was my thing. A year later, he enrolled me in the National Conservatory of Music and hired Professor Isidoro Purizaga to give me private lessons. That was the happiest day of my life.” Then his teachers were Nicolás Wetzell, Otiniano, Morales and others.

He studied primary school at the Salesian School in Breña and secondary school at the Francisco Bolognesi Educational Center and the Modern School.

At the age of fifteen, the Goycochea radio administrator hired him to work accompanying the famous duo “La limeñita y Ascoy”. With the string group Núñez, Arteaga and Ascoy ”he wins the radio contest organized by the journalist Roberto Nieves of the newspaper La Noche.

Along with Miguel Paz, Oswaldo Campos and Panchito Jiménez he joined the Trovadores del Perú (1946). Between 1947 and 1952 he was part of the trio Los Morochucos, with Alejandro Cortez and its founder Augusto Ego Aguirre. After a break of ten years they got back together between 1962 and 1972.

In 1952 he founded the first Creole-style Guitar School. With the singer-songwriter Chabuca Granda he made artistic tours between 1955 and 1970, recording several albums. Accompanied by the Augusto Valderrama Orchestra, he recorded the collection “Eternal Peruvian Waltzes” in Brazil.

During the 1970s he formed a trio with singer Arturo “Zambo” Cavero and composer Augusto Polo Campos, recording albums that had many hits. Likewise, he recorded albums with top-level artists such as Jesús Vásquez, Panchito Jiménez, Eloísa Angulo, Los Hermanos Zañartu, Cecilia Bracamonte, Los Ases del Perú, Zoila Zevallos, Nicomedes Santa Cruz, Los Hermanos García, among others.

Throughout his long and successful artistic career, Óscar Avilés has received many distinctions. In 1987 the Organization of American States distinguished Óscar Avilés together with Jesús Vásquez, Arturo “Zambo” Cavero, Luis Abanto Morales and Augusto Polo Campos with the title of “Artistic Heritage of America”. That same year the Ministry of Education awarded him the “Palmas Magisteriales”. In the year 2000, the National University of San Marcos gave him the title of Doctor Honoris Causa, in honor of his renowned career.