Darien Hiller

Darien’s biggest joy in life is singing. She saw her first musical at six years old, joined her school choir at eight years old, and has never stopped truly just being a theatre kid at heart. Her passions for both performing and teaching lead her to earn Bachelor of Arts degrees in both Music Theatre and Music Education from Carthage College in 2020, and her fascination with the anatomy and physiology of the human voice lead her back to Carthage once again, earning her Masters of Music in Music Theatre Vocal Pedagogy in 2024.

She has worked full-time in the public school system as a music teacher since 2020. In her current position, Darien is a general music teacher at an elementary school for students kindergarten-6th grade, where she also conducts the extracurricular choir and directs the school musical for students 4th-6th grade. In addition to classroom teaching, she has taught voice lessons and done online ACT tutoring virtually since 2021. She has had many incredible volunteering opportunities as well throughout her life, including leading performing arts activities at a summer camp in Chicago, teaching English and lead music & crafts at a summer camp in Hungary, and traveling to New York City as a teaching assistant and acting coach for children aged 5-12 competing in acting at International Models & Talent Association (IMTA).

Darien has acted in around 50 plays & musicals and has directed, music directed, choreographed, or been a part of the stage crew or costume crew for 10 shows. In addition to performing, she has found a big passion for stage make-up and loves to do special effects make-up! She has been a member of numerous choirs, as well as two a cappella groups and a vocal jazz ensemble. Through ensemble singing she has gotten to not only meet some of her closest friends, but also tour six different countries, and create amazing art with others.

Currently working as a private voice instructor, choir director, musical director, general music teacher, and performer, Darien not only gets to pursue her love of singing and theatre, but also enjoys the incredibly rewarding opportunity of sharing those passions with her students as well.