“... Steven Bernstein’s Sexmob have given themselves one task: to make modern jazz fun.”
— PopMatters

“Millennial Territory Orchestra, a vibrant big band piloted by slide-trumpet virtuoso Steven Bernstein, marries hot-jazz horns with fat backbeats to yield a riotously anachronistic party soundtrack on its new Sly Stone tribute, MTO Plays Sly.”
— Time Out New York

“One of my strongest skill sets is for organization — organizing groups and people…. You get ’em together and you give ’em some structure and you give ’em the freedom to be incredible.”
— Steven Bernstein, to SFJAZZ

Navigating the intersections of countless musical forms in a way that is irreducibly his own, trumpeter, composer, arranger, and bandleader Steven Bernstein has fashioned a career unlike virtually anyone in the annals of music. A specialist on the rare slide trumpet, he continues to explore new concepts with Sexmob and the Millennial Territory Orchestra, two of the most inspired and longest-surviving groups of our time.

Along the way, Bernstein has arranged music for films by Woody Allen and Robert Altman; had his compositions choreographed for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and Twyla Tharp; arranged for project after inspired, out-of-left-field project hatched by the late, great Hal Willner, including an Apollo Theater encounter between U2 and the Sun Ra Arkestra; interpreted the cantorial music of Moshe Koussevitsky with tenor master and loft-jazz legend Sam Rivers (Diaspora Blues); took part in the career revival of The Band’s Levon Helm, an effort that led to three GRAMMY Awards; worked with Lou Reed on the rock legend’s final three albums; and collaborated closely with greats on the order of Roswell Rudd (Trombone for Lovers), Henry Butler (Viper’s Drag, by Butler/Bernstein & The Hot 9), Bernie Worrell (MTO Plays Sly), and more.

Now, after the loss of Willner, Butler, Rivers, Reed, Worrell, and a number of older heroes and colleagues, Bernstein finds himself carrying on their storied legacy. Once heralded as a firebrand and provocateur on the margins, he’s arrived as an eminent figure at the center, helping to expand and redefine the musical establishment itself.

Bernstein’s 2023 effort with Sexmob, The Hard Way, is a special collaboration with producer and longtime collaborator Scotty Hard, in which Hard’s loops, beats, and hip-hop-influenced electronic pieces serve as launching pads for new Sexmob compositions. Vijay Iyer, John Medeski, and DJ Olive appear as special guests. The MTO, meanwhile, rolled out the monumental Community Music series in 2022, devoting Tinctures in Time (Vol. 1) to Bernstein originals (a first for the band); Good Time Music (Vol. 2) to a rollicking set featuring vocalist extraordinaire Catherine Russell; Manifesto of Henryisms (Vol. 3) to a celebration of the late Henry Butler (co-leader with Bernstein of The Hot 9); and Popular Culture (Vol. 4) to arrangements of songs ranging from the Grateful Dead to Eddie Harris to Charles Mingus.

Bernstein also directs the Town Hall Ensemble, which was formed to mark the Manhattan concert venue’s 100th year. The ensemble’s mandate is to celebrate the culture and music of New York of the last 100 years, with a lineup that looks “like an New York City subway car,” Bernstein says, “people of all ages, races, sexes.” Rather than enlist Bernstein’s usual cohorts, the Town Hall Ensemble is “a gathering of the tribes, where every tribe sends a representative.” The result is a roster of players who wouldn’t necessarily find themselves playing together: Nels Cline, Pedrito Martinez, Marc Cary, Bria Skonberg, Lenny Pickett, and more. In addition, Bernstein is an Artistic Advisor of the revitalized Creative Music Studio in Woodstock, a fount of exploratory music founded by Karl Berger, Ingrid Sertso, and Ornette Coleman in 1971.

Born and raised in Berkeley, California, Bernstein formed a lifelong musical partnership in sixth grade with saxophonist Peter Apfelbaum, indispensable MTO member and leader of the Hieroglyphics Ensemble. Together the two absorbed all the great jazz of the era, and Bernstein drew particularly deeply from the influence of Lester Bowie and Don Cherry. He also nourished a great love of Duke Ellington, Jelly Roll Morton, and pre-bop jazz in general, and has dealt with that music on a deep level and celebrated its spirit in his own projects.

Moving to New York in 1979 and coming under the mentorship of lead trumpeter and ubiquitous session man Jimmie Maxwell of the Benny Goodman Orchestra, Bernstein laid the groundwork for the omnifarious activities he pursues to this day. From his early work with John Lurie’s Lounge Lizards, Kamikaze Ground Crew and Spanish Fly, to his appearances with Elvis Costello (Look Now), Laurie Anderson (Heart of a Dog), Antony & the Johnsons (Turning), and Nels Cline (Lovers), to his arrangements for the documentary Leonard Cohen: I’m Your Man, Bernstein has distinguished himself as both a renegade musical thinker and sought-after master of the trade, loved by players, producers, and listeners alike.