Steve Sandberg is an eclectic musician with a lifetime of experience in many worlds of music.
He is a three-time Emmy-nominated composer whose scoring, songwriting and musical direction for “Dora the Explorer”, “Go, Diego, Go!” and “Dora and Friends” helped make these shows the landmarks they are in children’s television worldwide.
He began classical piano studies at age 4 and won a BMI composers award before attending Yale University, where he majored in musical theory and composition.  At Yale, his studies with noted African art theorist Robert Farris Thompson inspired him to immerse himself in the world of Afro-Caribbean music.  Upon returning to NYC he played with, arranged and composed for some of the great salsa artists of the 1970s and 1980s, including Celia Cruz, Ruben Blades, and Daniel Ponce (featuring Tito Puente).  A highlight of this period was an appearance in Rio and São Paolo opening for the legendary João Gilberto in a duo with vocalist Bebel Gilberto. He also toured with David Byrne (“Rei Momo”) as keyboardist and vocalist.
Steve has conducted and arranged on Broadway (Chronicle of a Death Foretold) and for many regional and Off-Broadway theatres, including the New York Shakespeare Festival. He has written music for the theater, film, and HBO and MTV.
His latest project is Steve Sandberg Quartet.  The Quartet’s first CD, released on the artistShare label, was hailed as a breakthrough recording whose compositions masterfully blend classical and world music genres with the excitement of virtuosic improvisation. Dan Bilawsky of All About Jazz called the recording a “breathtaking composite of world music, jazz, and classical expressions. In other words, it’s Sandberg’s whole musical existence merging into a single stream. In these eight tracks, he delivers unto us an exultant music that’s incredibly personal and precise in its direction, yet universal in its language and ability to connect.”
The group, which has performed at Birdland, the DiMenna Center, and other top venues, features violinist Zach Brock, heralded as “the pre-eminent improvising violinist of his generation,” well known for his work with Snarky Puppy and Stanley Clark.