MARCOS MACHADO

DOUBLE BASS

Learn more about Dr. Machado’s free double bass lessons on his website!

Dr Marcos Machado is a Brazilian-American world-renowned performer and teacher. He is Professor of double bass at The University of Southern Mississippi, and is the founder and pedagogic director of the Festival Internacional Música no Pampa (FIMP Bagé) in Brazil, now in its tenth year.

Machado has earned both “teaching” and “performing” diplomas from the L’Institut International de Contrebasse de Paris under esteemed double bassist, François Rabbath. He has recorded two solo albums with Brazilian pianist Ney Fialkow, the latest being “Fantasy” (2018). As part of the Austin-based Conspirare Ensemble, he has toured and recorded the CD “Threshold of Night” which received two Grammy nominations, and “A Company of Voices - Conspirare in concert” which also received a Grammy nomination.

Machado has published two volumes of “Tao of Bass” starting a revolution in left-hand technique, which has been adopted as a required technique book by many universities.

“Marcos Machado treats us as intelligent and curious performers, suggesting that instead of blindly adhering to all of the rules and dogma of any given method, we play to our physical and mental strengths by finding those left-hand techniques that work best for us.

— Frank Proto, on the Integral Technique course

MARCOS MACHADO’S BASS

Marcos plays a double bass made by Andrea Spada, an Italian-born luthier who lived in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It’s an unusual size as it is somewhere between a 1/2 and a 5/8 bass. This bass was custom built for Marcos and is based on his spectacular solo bass from David Tecchler (c. 1700). In the videos we filmed, the strings Marcos is using are Thomastik Spirocore medium E and A with Belcanto D and G in orchestra tuning.

To find out the whole story about his bass, take a look at this interview and read what Andrea Spada wrote about making it.