Michelle Merrill made her North Carolina Symphony debut in 2023 at Summerfest, leading a classical program that featured Mendelssohn’s Fourth Symphony, “Italian,” and also included Bernstein’s Overture to Candide, Jessie Montgomery’s Starburst, and “The Moldau,” by Smetana.

Michelle Merrill began her tenure as Music Director of the Winston-Salem Symphony in 2023 and also serves as the Music Director of the Coastal Symphony of Georgia. She served from 2014-2018 as the Assistant and then Associate Conductor of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra under Leonard Slatkin; she also carried the title of Phillip and Lauren Fisher Community Ambassador.

Her guest conducting schedule includes recent and upcoming engagements with the National Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Opera, National Arts Centre Orchestra (Ottawa), Minnesota Orchestra, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, Cincinnati Pops Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Iceland Symphony Orchestra, Toledo Symphony Orchestra, Sarasota Orchestra, West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, Symphoria (Syracuse), Princeton Symphony Orchestra, and the Round Top Music Festival Institute.

In past seasons, she has conducted concerts with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Jacksonville Symphony, Oklahoma City Philharmonic, Louisiana Philharmonic, Orlando Philharmonic, Sacramento Philharmonic & Opera, Boise Philharmonic, New Music Detroit, and the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic, where she formerly served as the Assistant Conductor from 2012-2015.

Merrill received a 2016 Solti Foundation U.S. Career Assistance Award as well as the 2013 Ansbacher Conducting Fellowship awarded by members of the Vienna Philharmonic and the American Austrian Foundation, which enabled her to be in residence at the world-renowned Salzburg Festival. Born in Dallas, Texas, she holds a master’s degree in conducting and a bachelor’s degree in performance from Southern Methodist University’s Meadows School of the Arts.