About
Georgia Markakis Mills is a New York-based conductor known for her versatility across orchestral repertoire, opera, and contemporary music.
Upcoming engagements include returning as a Guest Conductor with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra in musical story concerts for their Tiny Tots series, Guest Conductor of the Lake Placid Sinfonietta in their outdoor summer series, and returning as a Guest Conductor with the Grossman Ensemble in four world premiere compositions at the Chicago Center of Contemporary Composition.
Equally at home leading symphonic works and cutting-edge new music, Mills has collaborated with prominent artists including Julia Wolfe, Chris Thile, Courtney Bryan, George Lewis, Nico Muhly, Aoife O’Donovan, Dylan Mattingly, Augusta Read Thomas, Judd Greenstein, and Louis Andriessen. Mills has served as a cover conductor for the New York Philharmonic and the Virginia Symphony Orchestra, and as a guest conductor for premier ensembles including Alarm Will Sound, International Contemporary Ensemble, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, Present Music, the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, Metropolis Ensemble, the Berkshire Symphony Orchestra, the New Conductors Orchestra, the New Amsterdam Symphony Orchestra, Ballet Collective, Contemporaneous, NOW Ensemble, and Ensemble Signal. Mills has performed and worked in venues such as Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall, Walt Disney Concert Hall, the Guggenheim Museum, Symphony Space, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, BRIC, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, Roulette Intermedium, the Memorial Art Gallery, the DiMenna Center, the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts, and the Prague National Theatre.
Mills served as the cover conductor for the premiere of Dylan Mattingly’s opera Stranger Love presented by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and Associate Music Director/Assistant Conductor for the premiere of Judd Greenstein’s opera A Marvelous Order with NOW Ensemble. Mills conducted Nico Muhly’s world premiere ballet Third Bird, directed by Isaac Mizrahi and John Heginbotham with Ensemble Signal for the Guggenheim Museum’s Works & Process performing arts series. She also conducted the premiere studio recording of Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Julia Wolfe’s Oxygen for the composer’s Carnegie Hall Residency, and was the assistant conductor for the premiere of George Lewis’ Tales of the Traveller at the TIME:SPANS festival.
Mills is the Music Director of the Skidmore Orchestra in Saratoga Springs, NY, comprised of Skidmore College students alongside progressional musicians in the Capital region. In its 2025-2026 season, the Skidmore Orchestra performed major works by fourteen composers spanning three centuries of music from around the world including Saariaho, Mahler, Ravel, Copland, Brahms, Strauss, Coleridge-Taylor, Pärt, Montgomery, and Dvořák; the season concluded in collaboration with the Skidmore Chorus for Mozart’s Requiem.
Mills earned her Doctor of Musical Arts in Conducting from the Eastman School of Music, where she was awarded the Walter Hagen Conducting Prize and was nominated for the Lecture Recital Prize in recognition of her research on micropolyphonic transformations in the music of György Ligeti. At Eastman, she served as assistant conductor of the Musica Nova Ensemble under the direction of Brad Lubman. Mills is originally from Bethesda, Maryland and enjoys strolling art museums and dancing when she’s off the podium.
Latest
Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra
Guest Conductor for five Tiny Tots musical storytelling concerts featuring works by Georges Bizet, Edvard Grieg, Gabrial Fauré, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Hans Zimmer, Benjamin Britten, Johannes Brahms, and Richard Rodgers
May 12-15 in Rochester, NY
Skidmore Orchestra
Conductor for concert featuring works by Arvo Pärt, Jessie Montgomery, and Antonín Dvořák
April 29, 2026 at Zankel Music Center in Saratoga Springs, NY
Mozart’s Requiem
Conductor for Mozart’s “Requiem” with Skidmore Orchestra and Skidmore Chorus
April 21, 2026 at Zankel Music Center in Saratoga Springs, NY
Contemporaneous: Colgate Residency
Guest Conductor for Ensemble Residency at Colgate University with concert featuring works by Louis Andriessen, inti figgis-vizueta, Zachary Ritter, Julia Wolfe, and Daniel Baneni
March 25-28, 2026 at Colgate University in Hamilton, NY
Skidmore Orchestra
Conductor for Solo Competition Winners concert featuring works by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Johannes Brahms, Franz Doppler, Charles Gounod, Richard Strauss, and Josh Feldman
March 3, 2026 at Zankel Music Center in Saratoga Springs, NY
Present Music: Avant Garden of Love
Guest Conductor for “Avant Garden of Love” concert featuring works by Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Corey Dargel, and John Cage with members of Quasimondo Physical Theatre
Feb 13-14, 2026 at Jan Serr Studio in Milwaukee, WI
Skidmore Orchestra
Conductor for concert featuring works by Kaija Saariaho, Maurice Ravel, Gustav Mahler, and Aaron Copland
December 2, 2025 at Jan Serr Studio in Milwaukee, WI
Ballet Collective: Echoes of the Unseen
Guest Conductor for BalletCollective’s 2025 Commission for Developing Choreographers featuring choreographers Alysa Pires, Chloe Crenshaw and Troy Schumacher, and composers Ellis Ludwig-Leone, Nicky Sohn, and 7038634357 (Neo Gibson), performed by members of the New York City Ballet, Dancing with the Stars and Metropolis Ensemble
October 27-31, 2025 at the cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York, NY
Louisville Orchestra Creators Corps 2026-27
Guest Just to help select the annual LO Creators Corps composer winners (Seare Ahmad Farhat and Susanna Hancock)
September 26, 2025
Metropolis Ensemble
Music Director for Erik Hall’s adaptation of Steve Reich’s “Music for 18 Musicians”
June 20, 2025 at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden in Brooklyn, NY
New Amsterdam Symphony Orchestra
Guest Conductor for concert featuring works by Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, Maurice Ravel, and Antonín Dvořák
April 11, 2025 at Symphony Space in New York, NY
Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra
Guest Conductor for concert featuring string works by Jessie Montgomery, Caroline Shaw, Arvo Pärt, Max Richter, and Anna Clyne
April 1, 2025 at the Sklarsky Glass Box Theater in Rochester, NY
Present Music
Guest Conductor for music-to-film concert of Wu Tsang’s Moby Dick; or, The Whale scored by Caroline Shaw, Andrew Yee and Asma Maroof
February 14, 2025 at the Oriental Theatre in Milwaukee, WI
Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra
Cover Conductor for concert featuring works including the album “All My Friends” by Aoife O’Donovan and works by Antonín Dvořák
November 12, 2024 at the Dr. Philips Center for the performing arts in Orlando, FL
New Conductors Orchestra
Guest Conductor for concert featuring works of John Williams, Frank Ticheli, Maurice Ravel and Paul Hindemith
October 19 & 20, 2024 at Good Shepherd-Faith Presbyterian Church in New York, NY
Berkshire Symphony Orchestra
Guest Conductor for concert featuring works by Ludwig van Beethoven, Missy Mazzoli and Igor Stravinsky
September 27, 2024 At Williams College in Williamstown, MA
International Contemporary Ensemble
Guest Conductor for concert featuring the works of Courtney Bryan
May 5, 2024 at irondale in Brooklyn, NY
New Amsterdam Symphony Orchestra
Guest Conductor for works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven
april 12, 2024 at symphony space in New York, NY
Contemporaneous: Colgate Residency
Guest Conductor for works by Ryan Chase and Harriet Steinke
March 3, 2024 at colgate university in hamilton, ny
International Contemporary Ensemble
Guest Conductor for workshop with composers Emily Howard, Bofan Ma, Megan Steinberg, Robert Laidlow, Zakiya Leeming, and Sam Salem
february 21, 2024 at colgate university in hamilton, ny
Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra
Guest Conductor for concert of works by Nardi, Mozart, Copland, and Stravinsky
February 12, 2024 at first united methodist church in orlando, fl
Alarm Will Sound
Guest Conductor for concert of works by Steve Reich, Texu Kim, Christian Quiñones, and Elijah Daniel Smith
January 16, 2024 with the Mizzou New Music Initiative at the university of missouri in Columbia, MO
Grossman Ensemble
Guest Conductor for world premieres by Sungji Hong, Jeffrey Mumford, Andreia Pinto Correia, and Justin Weiss
December 1, 2023 at the University of Chicago’s Center for Contemporary Composition in Chicago, IL
New York Philharmonic
Cover Conductor for concert with works by John Zorn, Kinan Azmeh & Layale Chaker, and Unsuk Chin
October 27, 2023 at Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall in New York, NY
Virginia Symphony Orchestra
Cover Conductor for concert with works including Ludwig van Beethoven’s Triple Concerto and Symphony No. 7, and Steve Reich’s Duet for Violins and Strings
September 14, 15 & 17, 2023 at Ferguson center of the arts & Chrysler Hall in Norfolk, VA
Contemporaneous: Herron & Le Boeuf
Guest Conductor for the studio recordings of Molly Herron’s An Opening Goodbye and Pascal Le Boeuf’s Imaginary Companions
June 20, 2023 IN Brooklyn, NY
LA Phil: Dylan Mattingly’s Stranger Love
Cover Conductor for the premiere of Dylan Mattingly’s opera Stranger Love performed by Contemporaneous presented by the Los Angeles Philharmonic
May 20, 2023 IN Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, CA
Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra
Guest Conductor for “Chris Thile in Concert”
February 25, 2023 at the Dr. Philips Center for the performing arts in Orlando, FL
Judd Greenstein’s A Marvelous Order
Associate Music Director for the premiere of Judd Greenstein’s opera A Marvelous Order
OCTOBER 20, 2022 IN EISENHOWER AUDITORIUM AT PENN STATE UNIVERSITY
TIME:SPANS Festival
Assistant Conductor for Ensemble Signal’s premiere of George Lewis’ Tales of the Traveller and Darian Donovan Thomas’ Spiral
AUGUST 19, 2022 AT THE DIMENNA CENTER FOR CLASSICAL MUSIC
Nico Muhly’s Third Bird
Conducted Nico Muhly’s premiere ballet Third Bird performed by Ensemble Signal in collaboration with the Guggenheim Museum’s “Works and Process” performing arts series
JUNE 3–5, 2022 AT THE GUGGENHEIM MUSEUM IN NEW YORK, NY
Carnegie Hall: Julia Wolfe’s Oxygen
Conducted Julia Wolfe’s Carnegie Hall Residency virtual premiere studio recording of Oxygen