Jeff Bienstock was born in Los Angeles, California. He studied music at Occidental College before travelling East to attend NYU Steinhardt, where he earned a Master’s degree in Musical Theatre Composition. While still in school, he penned his first musical: The Morning After / The Night Before, which later premiered at the New York Fringe Festival in 2010 and won a Best-of-Fest Award for Outstanding Music and Lyrics. He was also accepted into the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop, and co-created quasi-historical comedy The Bone Wars for the Ensemble Studio Theatre with fellow participant Eric March.
In 2012, Jeff was invited to attend the Johnny Mercer Songwriters Project at Northwestern University, where he was mentored by Andrew Lippa and Craig Carnelia. He also met composer Andrea Daly, with whom he would go on to create Legendale, an original musical comedy about life, love, and video games. This show received presentations at the National Alliance of Musical Theater (NAMT) Festival of New Musicals in 2015, and was showcased at Stephen Schwartz’s ASCAP Workshop the following year. Uniquely, Legendale was given two premieres in 2017: a World Premiere at the Fredericia Teater in Denmark, and an English Language Premiere at the Human Race Theatre in Dayton, Ohio. Both productions were directed by John Simpkins.
Upcoming projects include Pants! The Jimmy Pants Musical, an uproarious spoof of jukebox shows co-written with Broadway composer and music director Joseph Church. A workshop developed by Tony-winning producer Jim Kierstead (Hadestown, Kinky Boots) in conjuction with Off-Broadway’s York Theatre is set to be staged in Spring 2022.
Jeff’s lyrics and original characters have been featured on stages everywhere from 54 Below in New York City to the Wallis Theatre in Beverly Hills. He currently lives in Brooklyn and would be hard-pressed to leave.
Website: www.jbienstock.com