Versatile and self-taught guitarist Mark Tuinstra, grew up in a musical environment - his father was a drummer and his mother played the piano and guitar. At the age of five he took classical lessons on piano and after a few years he started drumming on an old kit of his father. Soon after the drums the bass guitar followed and at the age of 14 he started to play guitar in several local pop/rock bands. he studied artschool and graduated in journalism but the music grew too big and he turned professional musician 20 years ago .

His focus is wide, he loves jazz and free improv but also African and Indian music, and pop. This shows that Mark loves to play with others, only to PLAY; not restricted to any musical boundaries or conventions. This made him tour all over europe, Brazil, Guatemala, Turkey, Japan, Senegal, Egypt, jordan, beirut, Japan, South-Africa etc. In The Netherlands he played on festivals like Lowlands and the Musicmeeting and in numerous jazzvenues like the BIMhuis in Amsterdam.

Mark currently plays with Fakrutu (a trio with Sean Fasciani on bass and Stefan Kruger on drums), in the Nordanians, The Pelican Three, and classic/electric/calypsoband dr.Jordan institute. Besides that he plays regularly (twice a month) in cafe ZOKU in amsterdam on friday night jazzSessions, he regularly composes music for Dutch television and he is a teacher at De Popschool in Amsterdam and has a studio at de Ceuvel in Amsterdam.