Silvio Mora — born in Switzerland in 1979 — is a Swiss-Dominican merengue singer, composer and entertainer. He is one of the very few merengueros who came to the music from outside the country and its diaspora, and he has spent his career in the comic and novelty end of merengue, where the song is built around a joke or a character.

Switzerland to Santo Domingo

His father, Germán Mora, was posted to the Swiss consulate in the Dominican Republic in 1988, and the family settled permanently in Santo Domingo. His mother, Jeaninette Excellente, worked as a beauty stylist and is credited with introducing hair extensions to the country. Mora grew up in the capital — the Zona Colonial among other neighbourhoods — and stayed.

He took to performing early: the flute by eight, and first place in an inter-school talent contest at ten doing Michael Jackson impersonations. At thirteen he began formal training, studying piano with Germania Cadiz and acting with Juan María Almonte at the Escuela de Bellas Artes. He has said he was never settled on what he wanted to be, only that he liked being a musician, an actor and a comedian — which is a fair description of the career that followed.

The hotel circuit

His first professional job came in 1998 at the Hotel Francés in the Zona Colonial, singing in duet with Alinna Vargas, daughter of Wilfrido Vargas. The same year he joined the merengue orchestra at the Hotel and Casino Jaragua under the direction of Janina Rosado, where he stayed until 2001 and became its lead singer and highest-paid performer, known for impersonations and for the energy of the shows.

La Mezcla

In 2001 he formed Silvio Mora y su Grupo La Mezcla and appeared on the television programme Extraordinario. El Camarón, in 2007, was his first real hit, cut in an urban-leaning merengue. A run of novelty records followed: Carrito Rojo de Carrera, El Pollito Pío, El Lobo y la Caperucita and Yo Quiero Volver.

Llegó El Pavo, released in 2016, is the song he is known for, and it went well beyond the merengue audience. His debut album, Silvio Mora Mundial Encendío, arrived the same year with eleven tracks, among them Contigo Yo Me Caso and Como Duele. Perdóname followed in 2022, recorded live with Renato Febles. Novio Con Dinero, Esto Es La Fe and Pégame belong to the same stretch, along with Dime Porqué?, a duet with Sergio Vargas.

Recent work

The comedy connection became explicit later on. In 2024 he cut El Pavo y El Can with the comedians Raymond Pozo and Miguel Céspedes, and returned to them in 2025 for Y El Pavo, Dónde Está? Yo Te Quiero came in 2024, Vivir Para Siempre and Nunca Te Olvidaré in 2025, and Lluvia in 2026.