Gary Stiffelman joined the Board of Trustees of Claremont Graduate University in 2018.
Over the course of his professional career, Stiffelman with his partners has represented some of the music industry’s most prominent artists, including David Guetta, Lady Gaga, Eminem, Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears, Toni Braxton, Carole Bayer Sager, Prince, Michael Jackson, Nine Inch Nails, Robbie Robertson, and Aerosmith.
For seven consecutive years, The Hollywood Reporter named Stiffelman as one of their “100 Power Lawyers in the Entertainment Industry.”
Stiffelman started his professional career in 1979 with the law firm Mitchell, Silberberg & Krupp. In 1981 he joined Ziffren, Brittenham, LLP and then served as one of the firm’s partners from 1984 to 2015. In 2015, he joined Greenberg Traurig, LLP as a shareholder. In September, 2020, he established his own law practice.
Along with representing recording artists, Stiffelman serves or has served as counsel to independent record labels and publishers such as Kobalt, Rhino, Shout Factory, Interscope, Death Row, LaFace, and Octone. He has been involved in groundbreaking transactions including the purchases of the Beatles catalog, CBS Songs, Motown Records, and Jobete Music Publishing. He also represented the buyer of a majority interest in Rolling Stone magazine and its related businesses as well as the largest LGBT publisher in the sale of its operations.
In recent years, Stiffelman has expanded his practice to new media and technology, representing Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg for her bestselling book Lean In as well as Nasty Gal founder and #girlboss author Sophia Amoruso, Amazon Studios for scripted and unscripted programming, and the D’Amelio influencer and performer family in all areas.
Stiffelman received a bachelor’s degree in pre-medical studies from Kansas University in 1974 and a master’s degree in film from USC in 1976. He received his law degree from the UCLA School of Law in 1979. For six years, from 2008, he taught music industry law as an adjunct law professor at UCLA.
A member and past program chair of the UCLA Entertainment Law Symposium Executive Committee, Stiffelman also is a longstanding member of the Music and Entertainment Committee for the City of Hope (and served as its chair for two years) as well as a founding director of The Private Bank of California. His board involvement also includes serving as a member of the Board of Councilors of the USC Thornton School of Music, among other organizations.