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Revision as of 10:52, 26 January 2013
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| Marcelo Contento | |
 Promotional Photo | |
| Born | Marcelo Alejandro Rodolfo Contento January 19, 1955 Haedo, Buenos Aires, Argentina |
|---|---|
| Died | July 3, 2012 (age 57) Waltham, Massachusetts |
Marcelo Contento (1955-2012) was a magician, shadowgrapher, jazz drummer and arranger, and engineer from Argentina. He owned and operated Marcelo Contento Productions (Marcprod), a business manufacturing magic effects, in Watertown, Massachusetts with his eldest sibling and brother, Victor.
For many years, Marcprod was considered the top producer of Magicians' props and effects in the market. Contento and his brother put together everything by hand. When Contento was diagnosed with a Brain Tumorand, the company slowly lost its' prominence and eventually was forced to shut down its' workshop in Watertown in 2008.
Born Marcelo Alejandro Rodolfo Contento on January 19th, 1955, to an Italian Physician and a devoted, Italian-born mother, Contento started practicing magic at the age of eight, and at the age of eleven took up drumming after spending some years on the piano and guitar. In his teenage years, he was mentored in magic by the late great David Bamberg (well-known by his stage name, Fu Manchu), and already playing jazz gigs around Buenos Aires, Argentina's capital.
Bamberg taught Contento an art that was then known as "Chinese Shadows" (now more commonly referred to as "Shadowgraphy" or "Hand Shadows"), which he would carry alongside with him through life and eventually develop and hone into a unique skill and performing routine. One particularly important piece of advice Bamberg gave Contento was to finish school and go to College, regardless of what he wanted to do in life, and Contento did just that. He graduated College with the Argentine equivalent of a Master's in Electromechanical Engineering, and began working as an Engineer in companies around Buenos Aires. Concurrently, he diligently continued to practice and perform Magic and Jazz, at one point playing with then-well-known Argentine Guitarist Oscar Alemán and his troupe.