While at Williams College,[1] he was called to be an intern on the 1992 Vivian Matalon workshop of Jekyll & Hyde and worked his way up, becoming friendly with both composer Frank Wildhorn and arranger James Raitt, and eventually became the music director and conductor of the 1997 Broadway production.
The original songwriters were released, and Howland stepped down from producing to write the music with lyrics by Mindi Dickstein with a book by Allan Knee.
He also has conducted for Ray Charles, Natalie Cole, Brandy, BeBe and CeCe Winans, Carl Anderson, Linda Eder, Sebastian Bach, David Hasselhoff, Rob Evan, Kate Shindle, Lauren Kennedy, Davis Gaines, the Kingston Trio, and Lizz Wright.
His other works include writing scores for Handel’s Messiah Rocks: A Joyful Noise and the webisode series The Broadroom,[3] and music arrangement for Macy's 4th of July Fireworks in 2024.
[5] In July 2023, it was announced that Howland and Nathan Tysen would premiere their score for a new musical adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby in October of that same year at the Paper Mill Playhouse.