Ben Kapilow is an Assistant Professor and Music Director for the BFA program in Musical Theatre at SUNY Cortland, a tenure-track position in which he teaches courses in music theory and music history, while also music directing two musicals per year. Prior to his appointment at SUNY Cortland, he served as the Resident Music Director at the Media Theatre for the Performing Arts, a position he held for seven years, during which he music directed dozens of professional and educational productions. Beyond the Media Theatre, he has worked as a music director and pianist with the Wicked National Tour, Hangar Theatre, The Rev Theatre Company, Walnut Street Theatre, Syracuse Stage, Candlelight Theatre, Fulton Theatre, MusiCoLab, SUNY Binghamton, and Temple University. In December 2026 he will serve as Associate Music Director for Annie at the Redhouse Arts Center.

Active in education, Ben has worked as a music as a music director for two summers at the Ithaca College Summer Theatre Conservatory and will work as a music director for the French Woods Festival in August 2026. He also served as Music Director for the State Street Miracles, a vocal group for adults with intellectual disabilities. He has taught hundreds of students through his private music studio as well as through various music schools.

His passion for music education led him to create the piano teacher podcast All Keyed Up in 2021, which at its height had 17,000 subscribers and was named one of the “Top Piano Podcasts of 2021” by Welp Magazine and one of the “20 Best Piano Podcasts” by Feedspot. He has been featured on the TopCast Podcast, Piano Tech Radio Hour, Josh Wright Piano Podcast, Piano Pantry Podcast,the Piano Parent Podcast, and Pianist Academy. He has presented at the Music Teachers National Association Conference, Pennsylvania Music Teacher’s Association Conference, the National Conference on Keyboard Pedagogy, the Creative Teaching Conference, and the Expand Online Summit. His writings on piano pedagogy have been published by Colourful Keys and Piano Magazine.

As a composer, Ben has choral works published by Alfred Music, Chorister’s Guild, and the Lorenz Corporation. His piece “The Bells” received an Editor’s Choice designation from JW Pepper in 2024. The Media Theatre has premiered seven of his children's musicals, and his musical Peter Pan and Wendy, written with Kate Herzlin, was also performed at the American Contemporary Theater of Connecticut. His pieces have been performed by the Phoenix Boys Choir, Brooklyn Youth Chorus, Symphony Number One, Theatre on the Verge, the Great Noise Ensemble, Trio Ex Animo, the University of Scranton Singers, and at the Jack O'Lantern Blaze Festival for two consecutive seasons. He also composed incidental music for Hecuba at the American Thymele Theatre and Inducement and Encouragement at the Zephyr Theatre. He wrote the music and lyrics for Susan Bones, which was performed at Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre and the Lyric Hyperion Theatre and will be performed again at the Broadwater in fall 2026.

Ben graduated Pi Kappa Lambda from the Peabody Conservatory with an M.M. in Music Composition and Phi Beta Kappa from Swarthmore College with a B.A. in Music and Psychology. He returned to Swarthmore College in 2023 as an Honors Examiner in Music.