Monuments of Despair, Hope, & Faith

Margaret Petty has been a member of the Salisbury Symphony since 2011 and is principal cellist of the High Point University/Community Orchestra and the Danville Symphony. Her solo performances include Bloch’s Schelomo, Haydn D Major and Boccherini B-flat concertos, numerous chamber works, and original compositions for cello. As cello teacher and chamber orchestra coach at High Point University, she strives to help students develop technique, expressivity, and freedom to better use the full compass of their gifts.

Her cello studies, begun through public school music, continued with Marijane Siegal, Allen Harris, and Leslie Parnas at Boston University. After earning a B.Mus.Ed. at Wheaton College (IL), she taught middle- and high school orchestras in Penfield New York, then completed an M.M. in cello performance and doctoral studies in composition at Boston University. She earned a Diplôme d’études approfondies (D.E.A.) and a Ph.D. in musicology at the Université de Paris IV-Sorbonne, with an 1,100-page dissertation on 20th-century French-language choral music inspired by Biblical texts.

In France, where Dr. Petty resided for thirty years, she taught cello, played in chamber and orchestral groups, and taught music theory and hymnology at the Institut Biblique Européen.

The numerous choral groups she directed (Chantilly, Paris, Alsace) performed in French-speaking countries. She was member of the committee that produced the hymnal Alléluia (2005) for French-speaking Europe and contributed musicological articles to European publications. Her compositions include choral, chamber, orchestral, and cello music. She and her husband live in Greensboro.