As Director of Jazz Ensembles at Boston University (1995-2001), Dr. Caniato taught Jazz History and developed the University's jazz ensemble program. At Boston University he conducted the big band in more than 200 arrangements and original works, many by contemporary writers, and produced the big band's CD Seven Steps to Heaven (broadcast on WBUR). He brought to the college for masterclasses and performances guest artists such as trombonist Hal Crook, saxophonists Bill Pierce and William Humphrey, trumpeters Dave Rezek, Satohiro Miyazawa, and the group Nuages. He conducted the Indian Hill Music Center Big Band in the inauguration concert for the center's new auditorium in Littleton MA (2001).

Dr. Caniato is currently Professor of Music at Fitchburg State University in Massachusetts where he teaches Classical and Jazz history and theory, Film Music, Music Technology, and ensembles. He received the Student Government Association Faculty of the Year Award in 2001. He also directed the graduate summer Teaching and Learning Music Institute there, has developed and taught a jazz arranging course for the online graduate program at Boston University (2006), and has taught abroad (Fitchburg State in Verona, Italy).

An advocate of music instruction for people of all ages, Dr. Caniato has taught students ranging from youth (woodwind faculty at Creative Arts in Reading, MA and Brandeis University's Genesis Summer Program), to graduate students, to seniors (Adult Education in Brookline, MA). He has also served on judging panels for young artist competitions (Thayer Conservatory, Lancaster, MA), as an adjudicator and clinician (Maine Band Directors Concert Band Festival), and mentor for under privileged youth (Boston Center for the Arts)

Dr. Caniato is the author of The Jazz Ensemble Companion: a Guide to Outstanding Big Band Arrangements Selected by Some of the Foremost Jazz Educators (Rowman & Littlefield, 2009) rowman.com/Action/Search/_/caniato/?term=caniato and of various papers such as

Further Considerations on “Crescendo” Form in Some of Duke Ellington’s Swing Era Works. Dutch-Flemish Society for Music Theory, 12th International Conference, Conservatory of Amsterdam, March 13, 2010.

“A View from All Sides: Articulation of Form in the Music of Bill Holman”
International Jazz Composers’ Symposium, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL March 9-11, 2006.

“Outstanding Charts for Jazz Ensemble: Data from a Recent Survey”
International Association of Jazz Educators, Long Beach, California, 2005. Published in the 2005 IAJE Jazz Research Proceedings Yearbook, Manhattan, KS (PDF)

“Beyond Constant Pulse in Jazz: Expansion of Bass Function in Gil Evans”
International Association of Jazz Educators, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 2003. Published in the 2003 IAJE Jazz Research Proceedings Yearbook, Manhattan, KS (PDF)

“The Jazz Conductor’s Baton: A Violinist’s Bow or a Drummer’s Stick?” College Music Society Northeast Chapter 17th annual meeting, Berklee College of Music, Boston, MA, April 6-7, 2002.

“From Popular Song To Jazz Composition: Thelonious Monk’s Ruby, My Dear”.
published in the Annual Review of Jazz Studies #10, Scarecrow Press, Rutgers University, 2000.
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