About Marsaisa

Marsaisa Byrd’s career is as varied as his vocal prowess. Considered a child prodigy by the age of 11 he was singing professionally alongside his late father Marshall Byrd within the Southern Gospel Quartet circuit as his start… He shared the stage with such gospel greats as Norris Turner, The Mighty Clouds of Joy, The Gospel Heavy Weights, the Fantastic Violinaires, and many others.

It was during these formidable early years that he was discovered by a music educator Virginia Uldrick. At age 14 he was auditioned and placed in a school for the young gifted child, “The Fine Art Center” of Greenville South Carolina.

At the Fine Art Center Marsaisa was introduced to art songs (classical singing). He readily embraced it and excelled at the level of national competition by age 16. His early vocals were taught by Mr.Larry Gerber. By age 17 he had garnered numerous awards and landed his first professional starring role. This role was for bass, the character king “Balthazar” in Ahmal and the Night Visitors by Gian Carlo Menotti.

In this same year (Age 17) he would also find himself on the steps of the nation’s capital singing as a soloist with a select group of high school students for the President of The United States (Jimmy Carter). Shortly after his solo performance at the white house in the same month, he received a fully paid vocal

scholarship to any college of his choice IN THE WORLD. He attended Limestone University. After College Marsaisa returned to the world of gospel for over 10 years.

In the interim of all this, he also started to write for Gospel and secular artists. Marsaisa is a published poet and lyricist for multiple musical projects. He ventured back to the classical music world in the late 90s. He auditioned for a role in scenes from the opera “ Die Zauberflöte” and got the role of Tamino.

After taking on this role for a production of scenes, the bass lead “Sarastro” became ill. As fate would have it Marsaisa was able to sing the tenor role and also the bass role as well (since it was being done in scenes all he had to do was change costumes). The audience did not know until reading the credits that Tamino and Sarastro were all Marsaisa and from there until now is all history.

Marsaisa’s vocal range and amazing virtuoso delivery of anything he sings seem endless. He sings multiple languages, his vocal range is 4 1⁄2 octaves starting in the low male register. Some of his most performed styles of singing are Opera, Oratorio, Jazz, musical theater, standards, Jazz traditional, Jazz scat, Jazz Fusion, Rhythm & Blues, and Folk.

The most recent Operatic Roles are “Otello”, Otello by Verdi, “Samson”, Samson et Dalila by Saint-Saëns, and “Don Jose” in Carmen by Bizet.
Marsaisa has performed hundreds of times with orchestras all over the United States. Quad-City Symphony Orchestra, The Charlotte (NC) Symphony 100+, Orlando Philharmonic, Rochester Symphony Orchestra, and Louisville Symphony Orchestra just to name a few.