Maggie Snyder: 2025 Meigs Teaching Professor

Headshot by Dorothy Kozlowski 

Maggie Snyder, professor of viola at the Hugh Hodgson School of Music, is one of three UGA faculty members named Josiah Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professors in 2025. The professorship is the university’s highest recognition for instruction at the undergraduate and graduate levels. 

Snyder teaches individual weekly lessons and a weekly studio class; coaches chamber music ensembles; offers technique, orchestral excerpt, and repertoire classes; oversees degree recitals; and mentors master’s and doctoral students. She also teaches popular sections of First-Year Odyssey and GradFirst classes.“I have seen her studio grow, and its trajectory has been steady and remarkable,” wrote Mark Cedel, professor of music and director of orchestral activities. “Not only have the numbers of students increased, but the quality and the level has grown as well.”

Snyder regularly seeks out innovative teaching techniques and develops new courses that she offers beyond her regular academic load to broaden student experience, expertise, and real-life work preparedness. One such course is a GradFirst Seminar that not only prepares first-semester graduate students to better engage in their research and curricular pursuits, but also prepares them for professional life with curation of their dossier of application and audition materials for the performing musician. The class also includes a unit on grant-writing to sustain their research projects beyond the classroom.

Many of Snyder’s students have been admitted, often with considerable scholarship or assistantships, into distinguished graduate music programs. Others have been selected for prestigious summer music festivals or hold full-time positions in professional orchestras in the U.S. and abroad.

Beyond instruction, Snyder often seeks out innovative cross-departmental collaborations. She spearheaded the 2023 residency of celebrated composer and violist Kenji Bunch that brought together the department of dance, the UGA Symphony Orchestra, composition students and chamber music students.

Snyder’s work has been recognized with the Sandy Beaver Teaching Excellence Award and a Creative Research Medal. This summer, Snyder joined the Classical Tahoe Roster for the summer festival in July 2025 and returned for her 17th summer as Artist-Faculty at The Brevard Music Festival. Additionally, Snyder released her 6th commercial solo recording with Arabesque Records, Women’s Works for Viola, Sounds of Discovery, featuring previously forgotten works and newly commissioned works by women composers for viola.

One colleague wrote. “She stands apart from many in her profession in her ability to both perform and teach at the highest levels...rethinking how she and her students will serve the art form in a changing world.”

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