Marcos Aycox, aka The Tatted Violinist, found a better queer life through music

Marcos Aycox is an acclaimed musician who’s played at Carnegie Hall, shared the stage with Broadway stars like Tituss Burgess, Jonathan Groff, and Nina West, and collaborated with artistic legends like Sir James Galway, Deborah Voigt, and Natasha Trethewey. But life for Aycox, known professionally as The Tatted Violinist, hasn’t always been easy. In fact, his story is one of amazing perseverance through often brutal circumstances. However, music, he says, has been a guiding light throughout.Aycox grew up in São Paulo where he says life was simply about “survival.” But discovering his love for music, particularly playing the violin, gave him the strength and determination to keep pushing forward. Music became his “sanctuary.” “I was born and raised in Bauru, a city of [around] 300,000 people in the state of São Paulo. Life there was about survival,” Aycox says. “It was loud, fast, and full of contrast — beauty and struggle living side by side.” He explains that the “deeply religious environment” he was raised in made things even more complicated. “I didn’t really have the luxury of discovering myself freely as a child.… So I learned how to shrink. How to edit myself. How to exist in a way that wouldn’t get me in trouble.”In addition to the challenges he faced at home, Aycox says the streets of Bauru often proved to be more difficult. And violent.“I was bullied,” he recalls. “Not just teased — bullied in a way that leaves marks. I was called gay before I even understood what that meant. I was beaten. I had my teeth knocked out. It was physical. It was emotional. It was constant.”Again, music acted as his savior. Aycox says he kept at it and “started advancing,” and even began teaching music at the city’s symphony orchestra in his early teens. That’s when he says “things began to shift.”“Music was the one place I didn’t have to lie,” says Aycox. “It became my sanctuary — the only place where I felt f