Mark Benhard, MBA, BMI

While I’ve enjoyed a 30-year professional career serving in senior marketing, communications and PR roles at multiple Fortune-500 and global organizations, playing piano and composing music has been my life-long passion. In college at UCLA, I minored in Music Composition for Motion Pictures & TV and studied under the Academy Award-nominated composer David Raksin, known as the “grandfather of film music”. In my youth, I learned piano composition tutoring with Matt Dennis, who wrote Angel Eyes for Frank Sinatra and was in the legendary Tommy Dorsey Band. Over the years, I’ve composed over 100 original songs, with copyrights filed at the US Library of Congress. For the past decade, I’ve also been working on a unique Broadway musical script called Annabelle and The Sandman, which I co-wrote and includes 17 of my original songs. Prior to Covid, we held a successful Table Read in New York City with 22 Broadway actors organized by the 2-time winning Tony producer Margot Astrachan. Last fall, we held a second table read at the Pensacola Little Theatre. I’m excited to share the the world premiere of the semi-staged production was held on August 14 and 15, 2026 at The Gordon Community Art Center in Pensacola, with the support of PenArts and Pensacola Opera. I also have a regular gig in the piano lounge at The District Streaks in Pensacola and at Christner’s Prime Steak & Lobster in Orlando.