There are no boundaries in music. Far from this, history tells that all music, and most of all that boundless art we refer to as “popular music”, has its source in the overcoming of geographical and cultural boundaries.
In the same way there are no barriers between different musical genres; barriers only exist between players, or listeners,
Mala Hierba, the quartet founded and led by guitarist and composer Walter Marocchi, was born and developed out of these two arguments: here begins the desire to blend rock-blues roots with the sap of the jazz language and to sow it all on the wide field of ethnical music; without losing a peculiar taste for hazard, the passion for improvisation, the search for a contact between musical forms that are nothing but different “flowerings” of the same seed.

The show Walter Marocchi and Mala Hierba have brought on stage from 2007 to these days is based on “jazz, rock, tango and other impollinations”. And Impollinazioni is the title of their debut album, published in 2009 by Ultra-Sound Records label, and awarded in the same year at M.E.I. as Best Italian Instrumental Album.
It has been said their music offers journeys from Naviglio to Rio de la Plata, with stops at brothels in Paris, turkish baths, favelas and smokey jazz-clubs in New York. But, beyond geography, Mala Hierba is and experiment devoted to inventiveness, free expression and contamination, featuring four musicians who love to break out of the mould.

Fabrizio Mocata has won many jazz and classical contests as best pianist and best new talent.He studied with masters like Bruno Tommaso, Franco D’Andrea, John Taylor, and performed with well-known musicians such as Ares Tavolazzi, Marco Tamburini, Piero Odorici, John Helliwell, Gary Novak, Ron Getz. He is featured on piano and arrangements on the “Mediterranean Accordion” album by the Marco Lo Russo quartet. His current projects include his “Puccini Moods” trio with Gianmarco Scaglia and Ettore Fioravanti, and the Rojo Porteno ensemble, a tribute to the music of Astor Piazzolla. He also wrote scores for T.V. series and toured with italian pop singer Povia.

Carlo Ferrara had a classical musical training. He took a classical guitar diploma at the Riva del Garda conservatory, and played bass guitar in many bands, experiencing blues, funky, jazz and rock: from Grande’s reggae-pop to Supernova’s acid-jazz and Cherry Pie, one of Italy's most appreciated rock-blues bands. As a professional sound technician has worked with musicians such as Enrico Pieranunzi, Rosario Giuliani, Massimo Moriconi, Alberto Rocchetti, Elio E Le Storie Tese, Morgan.
Since 2007 he’s experimenting multiple strings, and is one of the few italian musicians to use a 10 strings bass.

Stefano Lazzari studied drums at the “Thelonious” Music Academy in Vicenza and subsequenlty at the CentroProfessioneMusica in Milan, an institution for young musicians created by Premiata Forneria Marconi's guitar player Franco Mussida. He studied, among others, with drummer Walter Calloni, with John Riley, Garry Dial, Robert Bonisolo, Billy Harper; he has played with Giancarlo Schiaffini, Matteo Pennese, Massimo Falascone, Evan Parker, Fandango, Corte Taverna. He plays drums in the FOG Orchestra, an ensemble devoted to film scores. During the last years he has deepened his interest in flamenco’s rythms related to drums, and studied the cajon, the typical flamenco percussion.