Hill’s career as a professional composer of instrumental music began with a commission from flutist Susan Rotholz and cellist Eliot T. Bailen of the budding Sherman Chamber Ensemble (1985). It was the group’s first concert and Hill’s first commission. Land Meeting Sky for flute and cello has since been performed throughout the U.S. and was most recently performed by the Taos Chamber Music Group in Taos, New Mexico - the state and landscape that inspired the piece.

Her choral career took off in 1996 when she won the Dale Warland Singers Choral Ventures Program commission with Poem for 2084 (text by Joan Wolf Prefontaine).

Hill earned a B.A. in music composition and piano performance at Bennington College where she studied with Vivian Fine, and then went on to earn her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Minnesota with principal composition teacher Lloyd Ultan. She has also studied extensively with Libby Larsen.

Her home, studio, and publishing business - Hummingbird Press - are based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.