Mark is an Assistant Professor of Instruction in Music Theatre and Design and the resident music director in the Department of Theatre Arts. Before coming to the University of Iowa, Mark was based in New York, where he held guest artist residencies at the Gallatin School of Interdisciplinary Studies at New York University; CUNY-Brooklyn College; CUNY-LaGuardia College; Long Island University, Brookdale campus; and Boston College, teaching composition and sound design for theatre, and engaging in the devising of new work and the revival of classic plays and musicals.

An Innovative Theater and Audelco Award-winning composer and music director, and a Henry Hewes American Theatre Wing sound design nominee, Mark is known for his work in intercultural theatre, new play development, and musical theatre adaptations. He has received commissions from off-Broadway, regional theaters, colleges, and producing organizations across the country. His scores are distinctive for their kinetic blending of original music, live Foley, and spatial, environmental soundscapes. His work with wearable technology is featured in a lead article he authored for the 2017 Spring Edition of Theatre, Design and Technology (TD&T), entitled: Wearable Sound Technology: The Making of Magic in Caryl Churchill’s “Fen.” His development of the AR/VR music-theatre work, ARatorio for the Mis-Remembered with Director Mary Beth Easley and Creative Director Kalen Novak (MFA Design) is featured in their co-authored paper, Making the Unimaginable Real (TDF&T, Vol. 61, Issue 2, 2025). 

Representative work includes music, sound, and live Foley for The Service Road by Erin Courtney (Adhesive Theater Project, Brooklyn, New York); Original music, sound, and wearable technology design for Fen by Caryl Churchill, directed by Mary Beth Easley (Brooklyn Center for the Performing Arts); Original music for Court-Martial at Fort Devens by Jeffrey Sweet (The New Federal Theater in association with Castillo Theatre, New York – Audelco Award winner); Music and lyrics for Same Train, a spoken-word musical developed with playwright, Levy Lee Simon and director Mary Beth Easley (National Black Theater Festival); Krasang Tree, a chamber opera based on the writings of poet U Sam Ouer, developed through intergenerational outreach within the Cambodian refugee community of Minnesota (Theatre de la Jeune Lune, Minnesota); God, the Crackhouse and the Devil (LaMama E.T.C., New York) by Levy Lee Simon, featuring original music for hip-hop jazz sextet; Original music and second-line brass arrangements for a Mardi-Gras adaptation of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, commissioned by University of Iowa. 

Recent work includes electro-acoustic score and ambisonic sound design for Body Concert by master puppeteer Kevin Augustine of Lone Wolf Tribe, currently touring the US, Canada, and EU and winner of Grand prize for Best Music at the 2024 17^th International Lalka Tez Czlowiek Festival in Warsaw, Poland; Live Music and Foley for the premiere of Kevin Lawler’s a body in the wild grass, directed by Mary Beth Easley (Great Plains Theatre Commons);  Original music and sound design for People Vs. Nature by Kevin Augustine and LWT (LaMama ETC 2024); Music and Sound design for The Marriage of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein, written and directed by Edward Einhorn (Edinburgh Festival 2025; and Jermyn Theatre, London West End, 2022); Music and sound design for The God Projekt by Kevin Augustine and the LWT (LaMama, ETC 50th anniversary season opener); Music and sound for the U.S. premiere of Privatopia by Maria Efsthatiadis (LaGuardia Performing Arts Center); Original songs for the 2015 premiere of Exposed by Robert Brustein (Boston Playwright’s Theater at the Boston Center for American Performance); and Music direction for the Audelco-award winning revival of Martin Duberman’s In White America produced by the New Federal Theater and Castillo Theater.

As a music director, Mark has directed contemporary musicals off-Broadway (Algonquin Theatre), at Regional Theatres (e.g. Capital Repertory, Albany NY; Central Square Theatre, Cambridge, Massachusetts) and at the University level. Since joining the faculty, Mark has been expanding the Music Theatre track and is the Music Director for the department’s Music Theatre Ambassadors.  He has music directed productions of Sunday in the Park by Stephen Sondheim (2019); String by Adam Gwon and Sarah Hammond (2022); Something Rotten by John O-Farrell and Carey & Wayne Kirkpatrick; Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim; Side Show by Bill Russell and Henry Krieger; and the 2024 Playwright Festival Production of Razor Creek by UI MFA Playwrighting alum, K.T. Peterson and Paige Scott.

In addition to his creative work and scholarship, Mark has been an engagement and outreach teaching artist for over 18 years, partnering with BAM, Roundabout Theatre, New York City Children’s Theatre, Arts Connection, Center for Arts Education, Brooklyn Arts Council, among other organizations. He has worked with K-12 students and seniors in the New York tri-state area to develop original musicals, songs, and theatre pieces based on their life experiences. From 2010 to 2016 he was the lead composer and music director for George Street Playhouse’s Summer Theatre Academy. He has received two NEA grants to teach songwriting, musical theatre, choral and percussive arts to cross-generational students throughout Brooklyn.

Mark has been a regular guest artist and teacher at the Great Plains Theatre Conference in Omaha, Nebraska where he has co-taught with Professor Mary Beth Easley the immersive workshop The Energized Space; and participated in the development of plays from the New American Theatre Movement. In the summer of 2019, he was commissioned to compose music and sound, and perform for the premiere production of Epic by Iowa alum Ellen Struve, directed by Michael Garcés of the renowned Cornerstone Theatre. Featuring an intergenerational cast of members from the Communidad Maya of Omaha, this work wove together a re-telling of the Popul Vuh with current stories of immigrants who have made the perilous trek from Guatemala to seek refuge in the United States.