Kirstin Maldonado

Kirstin Taylor Maldonado, born on May 16, 1992, in Fort Worth, Texas, is an American singer-songwriter and Broadway performer best known as a vocalist in the a cappella group Pentatonix. Raised in Arlington, Texas, by her mother, Angelica Maldonado, who is of Spanish and Italian descent, Maldonado is also the daughter of Michael Cisneros, who is of Mexican descent. She expressed a desire to become a singer at age five, and at eight she sang at her mother's wedding reception, an event that led her mother to enroll her in voice lessons. She subsequently became involved in local theater productions, through which she met Mitch Grassi, a future Pentatonix collaborator.

Maldonado attended Holy Rosary Catholic School before enrolling at Martin High School, where she met Scott Hoying. The three friends formed an a cappella trio that gained attention at their school through covers of popular songs. After graduating in 2010, Maldonado attended the University of Oklahoma on a full-ride scholarship as a National Hispanic Scholar, studying musical theatre and joining Kappa Kappa Gamma. She left before completing her degree to form Pentatonix.

In 2011, Hoying contacted Maldonado about assembling a group to compete on NBC's a cappella competition The Sing-Off. The resulting ensemble, Pentatonix, also included Grassi, Avi Kaplan, and Kevin Olusola. The group won the third season of the competition and went on to release seven studio albums, sell over six million albums, accumulate more than 13 million YouTube subscribers and two billion YouTube views, and tour the world. Pentatonix earned three Grammy Awards: Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella on February 8, 2015, for their Daft Punk medley; the same award on February 15, 2016, for their rendition of "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" from the holiday album That's Christmas to Me; and Best Country Duo/Group Performance on February 12, 2017, for a cover of "Jolene" featuring Dolly Parton.

Alongside her work with Pentatonix, Maldonado pursued solo projects. In January 2016, she performed "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" at the World Dog Awards. That February, she appeared in a "Disney Love Medley" video released by the a cappella group Voctave, performing songs from Tangled, Tarzan, and Hercules with her then-fiancé Jeremy Lewis. In May 2016, she appeared alongside Grassi and Hoying in an episode of the television series Bones. On May 19, 2017, she released her debut solo single, "Break a Little," under the name Kirstin, followed by her debut extended play, L O V E, on July 14, 2017, which debuted at number one on the iTunes Pop Albums Chart.

Maldonado made her Broadway debut in 2018, portraying Lauren in the musical Kinky Boots alongside singer Jake Shears and comedian Wayne Brady.

Maldonado met singer and entrepreneur Jeremy Lewis in August 2013 through The Sing-Off, and the two began dating two months later. Lewis proposed on May 29, 2016, in Paris during the Pentatonix World Tour. The couple ended their relationship in October 2017, having previously planned a December wedding. During the 2018 Pentatonix tour, Maldonado began a relationship with filmmaker Ben Hausdorff. The two became engaged in Tokyo in March 2023 and were married on April 21, 2024, in McKinney, Texas. They have two children together, a daughter born on June 28, 2022, and a son born on March 2, 2025.