He became the first openly transgender person accepted to the Reform Jewish seminary Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in 2003.

[5][6] From 2010 to 2018, Zellman served as the assistant rabbi and music director at Congregation Beth El in Berkeley, California.

[9][10][11] He is a lecturer in the music department of San Francisco State University, where he directs the Treble Singers, formerly known as the Women's Chorus.

[2][14] Zellman was born and raised in California, and has lived mostly in the San Francisco Bay Area since 1996.

[15] In 1999 he adopted he/his pronouns and a masculine gender expression, as he experienced harassment and felt it was "very dangerous" to have a non-binary presentation at that time.