Lance Bendiksen
- Composer
- Sound Department
- Music Department
Lance Bendiksen is best known for his highly prolific talents as a composer and producer. The Award winning composer has been delivering creative and powerful original film scores and music productions for several decades enriching films and musical content throughout the world.
Lance Bendiksen is an Emmy award winning composer, music producer and an accomplished musician. His first teachers and influences were his Father Lorentz Bendiksen who sang with members of New York's Metropolitan Opera and his mother June Hazel, who was a pianist at church and rehearsals for off Broadway plays. His sister was a ballet dancer who danced with Rudolf Nureyev and his Uncle a playwright who wrote a series of off Broadway play's which his Father acted in. "I grew up on a stage and in studios, and it was always the most comfortable place for me", says Bendiksen. Later key influences included Leonard Bernstein. Bendiksen was introduced to the maestro as a teenager by his teacher and composer Jules Menkin who often took his students on trips to Lincoln Center. Years later Bendiksen would be featured on the same Baldwin concert artist roster along side of Mr. Bernstein. Those early classical influences would eventually lead him to a headlining performance at New York's Carnegie Hall.
Interested in an array of genre's and styles of music while living in the New York Metropolitan area, Bendiksen began to explore his love of musical genres including, Pop, Country, Blues, and Americana. This developed his original sound, with mixing influences from Stephen Foster to James Taylor, to Mozart. He also found a kinship with musical instruments and mastered many, including piano, violin, saxophone, accordion, harmonica, mandolin, and guitar. Instruments would prove to be valuable in his later-career as a composer and producer, allowing him to approach orchestration in a different way than most of his contemporaries. As composers need to be authentic and original this unplanned career path gave me the opportunity to have my own voice in music, Bendiksen said.
As a producer and composer Bendiksen assembled and worked with a formidable network of talented and often acclaimed professionals from session players to engineers and producers. His business artist model (approach) included professional alliances with top recording studios including George Lucas's Skywalker Ranch, Willie Nelson's Pedernales Studio, Sony record's studio, and many more. As he immersed himself in the recording and studio culture he was hired as the GM of a major recording studio where he also accepted the position of staff producer. The studio, boasted a strong client list including the Pretenders, INXS, Michael McDonald, Leon Russell, and many more hit artists. Bendiksen brought Arista recording artist Sarah McLachlan, and RCA's Cowboy Junkies to the studio.
Bendiksen expanded his career during this period and became a VP of several music and film companies. He later founded his own company Bendiksen Productions. He served as the resident producer and composer in several established studios where he began scoring TV soundtracks and film scores. Enjoying the work produced in tandem with hit engineers producers and session players, he expanded an already talented team of professionals. His current production team has worked on a long list of ground breaking projects. Projects from the Star Wars Films, recordings from Johnny Cash Albums, Pink, and Michael Jackson, to recordings of Mozart and many of the Classics.
During his career Bendiksen studied under many prominent teachers including, Sir George Martin, Doug Haywood, and Brian Malouf. He worked on projects that took him to recording sessions at the West Point Military Academy and took his clients all the way to the White House, the Olympics, the Grammy's, and the Billboard Charts. He was one of four independent producers to be hand picked by Steve Jobs to kick off Apple's music recording interests at the release of their iPod
Along with producing and composing in famed studios from New York to Nashville to Los Angeles, Bendiksen has enjoyed designing and building out several recording facilities fueled by the ever growing demand for quality musical content. "Music is one part technology, one part creativity one part business, and the rest all about people", say's Bendiksen. "The fun thing about today's film scores and music productions is that the best in the world at anything is a phone call and digital connection away. It so much fun to hear and see your compositions and arrangements fueled by not only your own talent but with some of the most talented people in the world."
As a composer he's scored, written and produced dozens of projects for TV, Film, and stage, and worked with Network Affiliates NBC, CBS, ABC and PBS. He won his first Emmy for a PBS show called "Life-Wise". The acclaimed documentary film "The Greatest Good" netted him a series of broadcast awards and led him to work on a film called "A Towering Task" featuring Toni nominated actress Annette Bening. The film premiered at the Kennedy Center in September. Bendiksen performed a medley of the score. Bendiksen along with partner Gareth Laffely recorded an album and subsequent film called "Voices of the Guardians" with Native American and Oscar winner Wes Studi.
Bendiksen's composition and production team have won several Oscars, Grammy's and Emmy's along with Platinum and Gold Albums.
Lance Bendiksen currently resides in Kalispell, Montana with his wife Artist Deborah Berniklau. He maintains professional residencies and alliances in Los Angeles, New York, Nashville and Muscle Shoals. His Hobbies include kayaking, hiking, painting, and tennis. He has a son Erik Bendiksen who works at his company as is pianist, engineer, and producer, and a daughter Hannah who is a writer and works at Marquette University.
Lance Bendiksen is an Emmy award winning composer, music producer and an accomplished musician. His first teachers and influences were his Father Lorentz Bendiksen who sang with members of New York's Metropolitan Opera and his mother June Hazel, who was a pianist at church and rehearsals for off Broadway plays. His sister was a ballet dancer who danced with Rudolf Nureyev and his Uncle a playwright who wrote a series of off Broadway play's which his Father acted in. "I grew up on a stage and in studios, and it was always the most comfortable place for me", says Bendiksen. Later key influences included Leonard Bernstein. Bendiksen was introduced to the maestro as a teenager by his teacher and composer Jules Menkin who often took his students on trips to Lincoln Center. Years later Bendiksen would be featured on the same Baldwin concert artist roster along side of Mr. Bernstein. Those early classical influences would eventually lead him to a headlining performance at New York's Carnegie Hall.
Interested in an array of genre's and styles of music while living in the New York Metropolitan area, Bendiksen began to explore his love of musical genres including, Pop, Country, Blues, and Americana. This developed his original sound, with mixing influences from Stephen Foster to James Taylor, to Mozart. He also found a kinship with musical instruments and mastered many, including piano, violin, saxophone, accordion, harmonica, mandolin, and guitar. Instruments would prove to be valuable in his later-career as a composer and producer, allowing him to approach orchestration in a different way than most of his contemporaries. As composers need to be authentic and original this unplanned career path gave me the opportunity to have my own voice in music, Bendiksen said.
As a producer and composer Bendiksen assembled and worked with a formidable network of talented and often acclaimed professionals from session players to engineers and producers. His business artist model (approach) included professional alliances with top recording studios including George Lucas's Skywalker Ranch, Willie Nelson's Pedernales Studio, Sony record's studio, and many more. As he immersed himself in the recording and studio culture he was hired as the GM of a major recording studio where he also accepted the position of staff producer. The studio, boasted a strong client list including the Pretenders, INXS, Michael McDonald, Leon Russell, and many more hit artists. Bendiksen brought Arista recording artist Sarah McLachlan, and RCA's Cowboy Junkies to the studio.
Bendiksen expanded his career during this period and became a VP of several music and film companies. He later founded his own company Bendiksen Productions. He served as the resident producer and composer in several established studios where he began scoring TV soundtracks and film scores. Enjoying the work produced in tandem with hit engineers producers and session players, he expanded an already talented team of professionals. His current production team has worked on a long list of ground breaking projects. Projects from the Star Wars Films, recordings from Johnny Cash Albums, Pink, and Michael Jackson, to recordings of Mozart and many of the Classics.
During his career Bendiksen studied under many prominent teachers including, Sir George Martin, Doug Haywood, and Brian Malouf. He worked on projects that took him to recording sessions at the West Point Military Academy and took his clients all the way to the White House, the Olympics, the Grammy's, and the Billboard Charts. He was one of four independent producers to be hand picked by Steve Jobs to kick off Apple's music recording interests at the release of their iPod
Along with producing and composing in famed studios from New York to Nashville to Los Angeles, Bendiksen has enjoyed designing and building out several recording facilities fueled by the ever growing demand for quality musical content. "Music is one part technology, one part creativity one part business, and the rest all about people", say's Bendiksen. "The fun thing about today's film scores and music productions is that the best in the world at anything is a phone call and digital connection away. It so much fun to hear and see your compositions and arrangements fueled by not only your own talent but with some of the most talented people in the world."
As a composer he's scored, written and produced dozens of projects for TV, Film, and stage, and worked with Network Affiliates NBC, CBS, ABC and PBS. He won his first Emmy for a PBS show called "Life-Wise". The acclaimed documentary film "The Greatest Good" netted him a series of broadcast awards and led him to work on a film called "A Towering Task" featuring Toni nominated actress Annette Bening. The film premiered at the Kennedy Center in September. Bendiksen performed a medley of the score. Bendiksen along with partner Gareth Laffely recorded an album and subsequent film called "Voices of the Guardians" with Native American and Oscar winner Wes Studi.
Bendiksen's composition and production team have won several Oscars, Grammy's and Emmy's along with Platinum and Gold Albums.
Lance Bendiksen currently resides in Kalispell, Montana with his wife Artist Deborah Berniklau. He maintains professional residencies and alliances in Los Angeles, New York, Nashville and Muscle Shoals. His Hobbies include kayaking, hiking, painting, and tennis. He has a son Erik Bendiksen who works at his company as is pianist, engineer, and producer, and a daughter Hannah who is a writer and works at Marquette University.