Dr. Cheryl Frazes Hill is in her 10th season as director of the Milwaukee Symphony Chorus. Among the many works she has prepared with the chorus, Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, Beethoven’s Missa solemnis and ninth symphony, and Handel’s Messiah were most recently performed to celebrate the chorus’s 50th anniversary season. Frazes Hill has also prepared the Milwaukee Symphony Chorus in Mahler’s Symphony No. 8, performed with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus at the Ravinia Festival under the baton of Marin Alsop. Frazes Hill’s choral preparation of Brahms’s German Requiem, conducted by Ken-David Masur, was recently released through the MSO Classics label.

Additionally, Frazes Hill has served as associate conductor of the Chicago Symphony Chorus since 1987. Recently celebrating her 50th season with the CSO, she began as a singer with the ensemble in 1976 and was then appointed to the conducting staff by Margaret Hillis, the chorus’ founder and first director. Over her tenure with the CSO, Frazes Hill has prepared the Chicago Symphony Chorus for maestros Alsop, Boulez, Barenboim, Conlon, Levine, Mehta, Salonen, Tilson Thomas, and many others. Recordings of Frazes Hill’s choral preparations on the CSO Resound label include Beethoven, A Tribute to Daniel Barenboim, and Chicago Symphony Chorus: A 50th Anniversary Celebration.

In addition to her roles with the Chicago and Milwaukee symphony orchestras, Frazes Hill is professor emerita at Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts, where she served for 20 years as director of choral activities. Under her direction, the Roosevelt University choruses were featured in prestigious and diverse events, including appearances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Sinfonietta, the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, and the Illinois Philharmonic. The Roosevelt Conservatory Chorus received enthusiastic reviews for their American premiere of Jacob ter Velduis’s Mountaintop. Other recent performances included the internationally acclaimed production of Defiant Requiem and a semi-staged production of Considering Matthew Shepard.

An accomplished vocalist, Frazes Hill is a featured soloist on the Grammy-nominated CBS Masterworks release Mozart: Music for Basset Horns. Frazes Hill has earned numerous awards, including the Illinois Governor’s Award, Northwestern University’s Alumni Merit Award, the Commendation of Excellence in Teaching from the Golden Apple Foundation, the University of Chicago’s Outstanding Teaching Award, and Roosevelt University’s Presidential Award for Social Justice. Frazes Hill is the recent recipient of the prestigious 2022 Harold Decker Conducting Award from the American Choral Director’s Association and the 2023 Mary Hoffman Award of Excellence for her distinguished work in the field of music education.

Frazes Hill serves as a frequent guest conductor, clinician, and guest speaker, working with ensembles and young conductors throughout the U.S. Her book — Margaret Hillis: Unsung Pioneer — was released by GIA Publications in 2022. As an advocate for female conductors past and present, Frazes Hill has joined conductor Marin Alsop as a featured speaker for the Ravinia Festival’s symposium “Breaking Barriers: Women on the Podium” and has collaborated with Alsop and her female orchestral conducting fellows on rehearsal strategies with choruses. Frazes Hill shares her scholarship through published articles for national educational and choral journals on topics of her research in choral conducting and music education.