Benjamin Scheer is an American composer of chamber, vocal and symphonic works. Ben began compositional studies with Augusta Read Thomas and then continued undergraduate studies at the Eastman School of Music with Robert Morris, Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez, Ricardo Zohn-Muldoon and David Liptak. Ben further earned his Master's in composition at the New England Conservatory of Music with Michael Gandolfi. He is currently in the Doctor of Musical Arts Program at the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University. 

 

Ben has been invited to renowned summer festivals that include the Bowdoin International Music Festival, the Atlantic Music Festival, and composition fellowships at the Tanglewood Music Center and the American Conservatory at Fontainebleau. Ben had his first commission in 2013 from the New Haven Symphony Orchestra to write a concert piece, ART Dances, honoring his former mentor, Augusta Read Thomas. It was praised as a “surprise sonorous gift, he made full use of all the resources the NHSO had gathered for Thursday’s concert", and his next orchestral work, Narcissus was honored by the Minnesota Orchestra Composer Institute. Ben was recently commissioned by the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival to write a string quartet for their 2022 season. His string quartet, The Funambulist’s Double was premiered in Santa Fe by the FLUX Quartet on August 5th, 2022. 

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Ben is passionate about teaching. At NEC, he worked as a graduate teaching assistant for the theory department, teaching undergraduate keyboard harmony. He has also guest lectured for an advanced undergraduate analysis course, for which he designed and taught a full lecture on the “Liebestod” from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde. Ben is a faculty member at the Southern Methodist University Meadows School of the Arts where he teaches music theory. 

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​Ben continues to be stimulated by his love of fine art, coffee, and chess. In addition to his first language English, Ben also speaks French and German.