Sol Kaplan papers, 1932-1994

Sol Kaplan was an American film and television music composer and pianist. He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in April of 1919. Kaplan was a successful concert pianist, performing many times, including a notable performance at Carnegie Hall in 1941. That same year, Sol composed his first music score. Kaplan’s career spanned from 1941 to 1979.

His career was first interrupted by World War II, during which Kaplan composed music for the Army Signal Corps and the Office of Strategic Services (the future CIA). After the war, he returned to film composing, and wrote music for dozens of films including Titanic (1953) and Niagara (1953) and Tales of Manhattan (1942) for which he was nominated for an Academy Award. Sol’s career was again interrupted, this time by the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) in April of 1953. Kaplan was accused of being a communist. He protested the claims, refusing to cooperate and found himself blacklisted for a time before going back to work. During this time, he composed the score for Salt of the Earth (1954) but by 1957, he was back at work. For television, Kaplan composed music for shows including Star Trek, for which he composed two scores that were tracked frequently in the show’s first two seasons. He was the musical director for the show, The Zero Hour. Sol also composed music for the Off-Bradway musical, “The Banker’s Daughter.”

Kaplan was married to actress Frances Heflin, and his son Jonathan Kaplan, became a film director. Kaplan also had two daughters, Nora Helfin and Mady Kaplan Ahern. Sol Kaplan died of lung cancer in 1990 at the age of 71.