Born of Puerto Rican parents and raised in a blue-collar community of walk-up tenements and bustling street life just to the north of and indistinguishable from New York’s "Hell’s Kitchen" on Manhattan’s West Side, John de Clef Piñeiro, a graduate of Yale Law School, is the former First Deputy General Counsel (in charge of Contracts, Real Estate and Corporate Matters) of the New York City Housing Authority and is a composer by avocation. Except for a short stint as a Mannes College of Music undergrad, he describes himself as an autodidact when it comes to his passion for music and composition. He served for two consecutive two-year terms (2006-2010) as the Executive Director of the New York Composers Circle, and is its former (2014-2018) Chairman of the Board. He has been a long-time member of the of New Music USA (formerly, the American Music Center), and is also a member of ASCAP.
As an author, his law-related articles have been published in various professional periodicals both here and abroad, and, as a published poet, his works have appeared in various anthologies of new poetry.
In addition to his work as a composer, he has also been known in the new music community as an editorial contributor of numerous concert and CD reviews and interviews (some of which are available online) for The New Music Connoisseur periodical.
His works have been performed in concert halls and public schools and college venues in New York City and elsewhere in the U.S., and at new music festivals in Europe and Latin America.