Mark Jurcisin was born in Passaic, New Jersey on December 2, 1958. His first introduction to music was by way of piano lessons at age 13. He almost immediately began composing small piano pieces. His first formal study in composition took place in college, at William Paterson University in Wayne, New Jersey. Here he studied with Hugh Aitken and began composing pieces for more diverse ensembles, although the sole existing piece from that period is "Introspection", a piece fo solo piano written in 1978. He went on to study orchestration with Christine Berl at the Mannes College of Music before receiving his Bachelor of Music degree in Composition at the University of North Texas, where he studied with Thomas Clark and Martin Mailman.
He continued his study and received a Master's Degree in Composition and Theory at Montclair State University. At Montclair State he worked with Karen Goodman, a developmental psychologist, in developing a method of notating infant speech patterns in order to trace the development of language.
He subsequently studied composition privately with Justin Dello Joio before beginning his doctoral study at Temple University with Matthew Greenbaum.
His list of works span from solo and chamber works through music for the theater to large-scale orchestral works; they have been perform live and on radio across the country.
He taught numerous diverse graduate and undergraduate courses at the College of New Jersey for eight years.
He resides near Princeton, New Jersey with his wife, Mari-Celeste Massaro, and their two children.