Marguerite A. Mergehenn, a music teacher, vocalist and pianist, died in her sleep Tuesday at the Charlestown Retirement Community in Catonsville. She was 97.

She played musical accompaniment for silent movies during the 1920s, sang on WBAL-Radio in the 1930s and, at the end of her life, performed with the Charles Tones Band at Charlestown.

Mrs. Mergehenn taught piano and voice for 50 years, beginning in 1946 in a studio in her Hunting Ridge home, and later in Catonsville, where she moved in 1955.

She was married in 1933 to Adolph Mergehenn, owner of a surgical appliance business, who died in 1996.

For many years, she maintained a second-floor studio in the 300 block of N. Charles St., where she also instructed music students.

She taught music to Boys' Latin School students at the private school's old Brevard Street campus in downtown Baltimore from 1954 to 1958.

In addition to private students, she taught music and elementary school students in Baltimore public schools from 1925 to 1935, and then in Howard County Public Schools from 1958 until her retirement in 1969.

Marguerite Anger was born in Baltimore and reared on Fort Avenue in Locust Point, the daughter of a grocer and homemaker.

After graduation from Western High School in 1923, she earned a teaching degree from the old Towson State Normal School, now Towson University, in 1925. In 1933, she earned a degree in music from Peabody Conservatory of Music.

A coloratura soprano -- whose voice was described by a critic as being of an "agreeable lyric quality, cool and pure in color" -- Mrs. Mergehenn also studied at the Juilliard School of Music in New York, and in Mondsee, Austria.

During the 1920s, she made extra money playing piano in Baltimore movie houses accompanying silent movies.

"She looked at the screen and decided what to play. If she saw horses, she played fast. If she looked up and saw a love scene, then she played real slow," said her daughter, Charlotte M. Carter of McLean, Va.

During the 1930s, she performed roles in the Vagabond Theatre's productions of Franz Schubert's Rosamunde and Franz Von Suppe's comic opera The Lovely Galatea.

In The Lovely Galatea, newspapers reported that in the "course of the famous 'kiss duet,'" Mrs. Mergehenn and her leading man "osculate ten times each evening, making 50 -- count 'em -- kisses for the week."

During the 1930s, she was a staff soloist and appeared regularly on WBAL-Radio's Dinner Table, earning the sobriquet "Princess of Song."

She also was a featured singer on Time for Romance, a coast-to-coast network radio show broadcast from Baltimore, whose orchestra was under the direction Ruffino Iula, a well-known local bandleader.

Through the years, Mrs. Mergehenn directed the Rustless Iron and Steel Corp. Glee Club and the Lutheran Hospital Nurses Glee Club. She was soprano soloist and music director of Trinity Methodist Church in Northwest Baltimore for 17 years.

Mrs. Mergehenn, a woman of medium build with a full head of red hair, was also known for her stylish way of dressing.

When she moved to Charlestown in 1995, she brought her baby grand piano and continued to give lessons to friends and relatives.

At the retirement home, she joined the Charles Tones, a band that gave a monthly concert for residents.

She was an active member for many years of St. John's United Church of Christ, 1000 S. Rolling Road, where a memorial service will be held at 3 p.m. June 29.

In addition to her daughter, she is survived by a son, Richard P. Mergehenn of Ellicott City; five grandchildren; and nine great-grandchildren.