Marshall McDaniel was born into a family of actors, artists and musicians, and was raised on the stage of the Theatricum Botanicum in Topanga, California, his family-run theater. He started music lessons at the age of four on piano and later began cello at twelve. As a middle and high school student, he played with community orchestras throughout Los Angeles, and after graduation from the distinguished Hamilton Academy of Music, went on to study at Gai State University, Northridge, double majoring in cello and English literature.

He afterwards moved to Germany, studying in Trossingen, Mannheim, and Berlin. In this time he has won numerous scholarships and awards, played with many professional orchestras including the National Theater in Mannheim, and has founded an international award winning and performing Piano Trio. In addition to his cello performance achievements, he is also an accomplished composer, with his new works continuously receiving rave reviews. In training for media composition, he worked closely with Daniel Licht, Michael Levine, Jett Rona and Matthias Weber. He has written original music for film, television, video games, stage, concert, pop, dance, musicals and looks forward to the next project in a new medium.

Marshall is a long time collaborator with Kristian Lever, having previously received the Erik Bruhn Prize for a previous collaboration presented by the Hamburg Ballet and hosted by National Ballet of Canada. For the Origen Festival he created the music for «Connecting Doors» (2020).