In 1975, an 18-year-old in Florida won state championships on both fiddle and mandolin. Instead of becoming a local legend, Mike Marshall spent the rest of his life rewriting what the mandolin could do. This deep dive follows him from a traditional bluegrass upbringing in Lakeland, Florida, to the moment he heard David Grisman’s jazz- and Latin-inflected acoustic music, packed up, and moved to California to find his idol, eventually joining the David Grisman Quintet from 1985 to 1990 alongside Tony Rice, Bela Fleck and Stephane Grappelli.

We trace his partnership with violinist Darol Anger in the bands Montreux and Psychograss, his 1989 solo debut Gator Strut, the rare 1924 Lloyd Loar-signed Gibson F5 he plays, and his immersion in Brazilian choro with Choro Famoso and the Brazil Duets albums. The episode also covers the Modern Mandolin Quartet’s classical transcriptions, his 2003 collaboration Into the Cauldron with Chris Thile, his marriage to German classical mandolinist Caterina Lichtenberg and their joint recordings, and their online teaching through ArtistWorks.

• Why the mandolin’s tuning in fifths makes jazz voicings so physically demanding
• Inside the David Grisman Quintet and the birth of the new acoustic movement
• Psychograss, Montreux, and building a new acoustic language with Darol Anger
• Mastering Brazilian choro and bringing the mandolin family into the concert hall
• Passing the torch through collaboration with Chris Thile and global online instruction