In 1977, David Mash didn’t think he’d ever play guitar again. He lost the use of his left hand in a botched surgery—effectively ending his career as a guitarist before it had fully begun. The instrument that had shaped his identity was suddenly out of reach, so he sold all of his guitars. But instead of walking away from music, he reinvented himself through technology, eventually founding the Electronic Production and Design department at Berklee College of Music and becoming a pioneer in electronic music education. Now, nearly 50 years later, Mash has returned to the instrument he once thought he’d never play again, with the release of Back to My Roots—his 15th album, and his first to center on the guitar.
ENROLL NOW IN MUSIC PRODUCTION 101, COWRITTEN BY DAVID MASH
At the time, the injury was devastating. “I had always thought of myself as a guitarist, and now I couldn’t play guitar, so who was I, right?” he says. “It took me that one day when I woke up and said, ‘You know, I was never a guitarist—I was always a musician who played guitar. And now I’m a musician who’s going to play something else.’”
The “something else” turned out to be synthesizers. With one good hand, Mash began exploring music technology—a field that was still in its infancy. What started as a practical solution quickly grew into a creative calling. He began incorporating electronic instruments into his work and eventually founded what was then known as Berklee’s Music Synthesis department (now known as Electronic Production and Design). He began collaborating in product development with companies such as Roland, Yamaha, Adobe, Avid, and Korg, which would send him prototypes of synthesizers for him to supply feedback on before they went to market. One of the prototypes included the ARP 2600, a synthesizer built by Korg that would go on to become an industry standard.
Berklee Online Beginnings
Mash parlayed his creative initiative and entrepreneurial spirit into a role as Berklee’s senior vice president of innovation, strategy, and technology. It was in this role that he became one of the first course authors of what would eventually evolve into Berklee Online.
Together with Michael Bierylo, he wrote the Music Production 101 course. Originally called Desktop Music Production, it was the second course ever offered by Berklee Online, following Music Theory 101. Though the course has changed names, shifted its focus across different DAWs, and undergone major updates roughly every two years for more than two decades, it has always been Michael Bierylo and David Mash, and it remains one of Berklee Online’s most popular offerings—now among more than 350 available courses.
A Return to Composition
Despite his work as an executive and consultant, Mash never lost sight of his passion for making music. After accepting that he was “a musician who played guitar,” he re-joined his band Ictus as a musician who played synth.
In 1986 he was finally able to have a successful surgery that restored his hand, but it took about two years before he could actually get it to move right again.
“By then my career was as a synthesist, not as a guitar player, so I really didn’t do much guitar playing until I found that I could play guitar and record synthesizers in the same environment, and that’s when I started going back to it,” he says.
As a recording artist, Mash has been remarkably prolific, releasing seven albums under the name Mashine Music (a moniker he says he plans to change soon, to avoid confusion with AI-generated content), four under Stefan (his middle name), a couple of collaborations, and three albums credited to David Mash himself.
Several of his releases stand out for their innovative approach. His 2022 Mashine Music album, The Lost Book of David Mash, was inspired by a long-forgotten notebook from his college years.
“In my second year at Berklee, I set a goal for myself: to write a song every single day and get it played, so that I could write with no instrument,” he says. “That was my goal—to just hear it in my head.”
The notebook contained more than 50 songs that Mash had planned to arrange and record during the fall semester of 1974. But he misplaced the book and forgot about it entirely—until nearly five decades later, when he rediscovered it in a box while preparing to sell his Boston home. Revisiting those early compositions, he decided to finally bring them to life, recording them for the album and featuring his longtime friend Bruce Nifong on saxophone.
In more recent years, Mash has also experimented with meditative music—an exploration that gave rise to the Stefan alias after an injury.
“I spent an inordinate amount of time at acupuncture and massage places, and they played the worst music you can imagine,” he says with a laugh. “So I decided maybe I could write some meditative, relaxing music that was still good music.”
Back to His Roots
After decades of teaching, consulting, and composing, Mash is now taking full advantage of retirement—not to slow down, but to return to unfinished creative work and long-held musical ideas. His latest album, Back to My Roots—co-produced with professor Peter Bell, and mixed and mastered by professor Bora Uslusoy (who also put it out on his bUMA RecordZ label)—brings Mash back to the guitar for the first time in earnest since the 1970s.
“This was kind of like going back to my roots as a guitarist,” Mash says. “Because I didn’t play guitar for more than a dozen years.”
The album includes new compositions as well as re-recordings of songs originally written and performed by Mash’s early band, Ictus—tracks like “Ictonomics,” “Funktion 80-24,” and “Blüz For Rufe,” the latter named in honor of his cat, Rufus.
Though the Ictus songs that appear on Back to My Roots were played frequently in the band’s heyday, they had never been properly recorded until now. For the new versions, Mash took a more contemporary approach, leaning into funk-inspired grooves where his band had once leaned toward disco.
A Guitar Comes Home
Every track on Back to My Roots features guitar—not just as a texture, but as the musical centerpiece. It’s a full-circle moment for someone who once sold off all his guitars, convinced he’d never play again. One of the instruments featured on the album is a particularly meaningful one: a Segovia model from José Ramírez guitars that Mash bought in 1973 from his childhood guitar teacher, Joe Fava. When Mash lost the use of his hand in the ’70s, he offered the guitar back to Fava——but the gesture didn’t land the way he’d hoped.
“I went back to Joe and said, ‘I can’t play guitar anymore, and I’d like to see this go to somebody who can really play.’ And instead of saying, ‘Okay, I know lots of good players and I will sell this for you,’ he said, ‘You can’t give up! You must keep playing!’ and I tried to explain to him that it was a medical problem, and he said, ‘No … I won’t hear of you stopping playing’ and he never talked to me again. It was one of the saddest things,” says Mash.
Mash eventually sold the guitar to his friend Harry Chalmiers, who later became provost of Berklee. Decades later, when arthritis made it difficult for Chalmiers to play, he sold the guitar to back Mash—for the exact same price he bought it for.
“It’s been appraised anywhere from $10,000 to $50,000,” Mash says, holding the instrument up to his Zoom camera, “but I’m just happy to have it back.”
While many see retirement as a time to rest, Mash sees it as a second act. He is the president of the Bob Moog Foundation, chairs the Board of the Alan R. Pearlman Foundation, and sits on Berklee’s City Music Advisory Board. In his new home of North Carolina, he mentors young musicians through Raleigh’s Community Music School and leads workshops at NC State, helping engineering students understand how musicians think and create.
Mash says he has certainly enjoyed the time to be able to think and create as a musician as well.
“The years that I worked at Berklee, especially from 2013 until I retired in 2017, my job was so big that I just didn’t get to do any music except play a little guitar here and there,” he says. “So once I retired, I had a ton of musical ideas in my head that I just wanted to get out.”
