In today’s episode, I am interviewing a dear friend, Lily Ling, who is music director and conductor of the Hamilton Broadway show. I was connected with Lily through the mentorship program offered by the Maestra Music, an organization supporting women and non-binary musicians working in musical theater. They offered a lot of great webinars during the pandemic, and I was fortunate to be accepted into their program as a first cohort mentee.
Full disclosure, I am not terribly familiar with the industry or practices of musical theater, but through Maestra Music I have made friends in the field. In my conversation with Lily, you will hear me asking lots of questions based on my assumptions of the profession, and her insider responses and her genuine sharing are just something that I love about her as a person and a great musician.
Lily Ling is a Toronto based musician and the current Music Director and Conductor for the And Peggy tour of Hamilton. She is the first female to hold the title of Music Director and also the first person of East Asian descent to conduct the production. Most recently, Lily served as the Vocal Music Coordinator for the Netflix movie adaptation of 13: The Musical.
Other theatrical credit highlihts include Music Director and Conductor for 20th Anniversary Off-Broadway revival of john & jen and Associate Music Director and Vocal Coach for the Chinese language premiere of The Lion King. She holds a BMus in Piano Performance from the University of Toronto and an MFA in Music Direction from Penn State University. She is currently pursuing a Doctor of Education degree in Music and Music Education at Teachers College, Columbia University.