When Marty Merritt came to the Shepherd School of Music back in the 1980s as a double bass major, none of the coursework was under one roof. The orchestra played in Hamman Hall, then the largest space on campus, which was also used as a lecture hall and for plays by Rice Players, the university drama troupe. Practice rooms and faculty offices were in Sewall Hall. Several off-campus properties owned by Rice served as practice spaces and rehearsal studios.
“ Those of us who had rehearsals and performances and classes prior to 1990 were going on and off campus all the time,” he said.
What a difference 45 years makes.
Today, Merritt is the senior facilities manager for the Shepherd School. He coordinates with Rice University’s facilities department on maintenance and repairs. He coordinates work orders and oversees proposals for renovations. He makes sure performance spaces are properly heated or cooled when there are concerts. He’s even been known to change lightbulbs and fix the copy machine.
“I do whatever needs doing,” he said. “I sort of grew up with the Shepherd School.”
That spirit is what led to the job in the first place. As a student worker at Rice, he helped coordinate logistics for concerts, setting up the orchestra and moving equipment. All that was in addition to his studies with Paul Ellison, and being on stage himself.
“ When I graduated in 1985, it had become clear that even though the Shepherd School did not have its own building, there needed to be someone who was a full-time concert production facilities person. And so that job was created for me on July 1st, 1985. I've never really worked in a full-time way anywhere else.”
During his decades at the school, Merritt has seen the creation of Alice Pratt Brown Hall, which houses the Shepherd School, in 1990, and Brockman Hall of Opera, which opened in 2022. His background as a musician would be important during this time. He sat in on discussions about the plans for Alice Pratt Brown Hall, calling himself “a fly on the wall.”
“I learned a lot about acoustics and architecture and things like that,” he said of the experience. Mostly, I listened and learned a lot about what a music school really needs. It was painfully clear from the beginning when we started that project that none of the facilities that we were using at that time were really designed for music or really all that well-suited for music.”
He would use the knowledge he learned 20 years later when Rice built Brockman Hall of Opera, when he “added my voice to the chorus for the design team.”
When Merritt looks back on his career as both student and staff for the Shepherd School, it’s clear he is proud of his experiences, and that he knows it’s a special place. As an undergrad, he expresses gratitude for the chance to learn with incredible professors like Paul Ellison, Paul Cooper, Samuel Jones, and Anne Schnoebelen, as well as getting exposed to so many great concerts, and learning how to listen to music and how to analyze music.
He’s also proud of how successful his fellow alumni are, singing, conducting, and playing in some of the greatest concert halls in the world.
And he admires the commitment Rice made to the Shepherd School.
“ There was a sense that it was important to invest our resources in building programs, attracting faculty, and getting great students, with the belief that once we had a critical mass of high-quality talent, the buildings would come. And, that's exactly what happened.”
Perhaps his best memory of his long decades on campus is one that’s much more personal. He and his wife married in the Rice Chapel, with an orchestra of majors from the Shepherd School supplying the music for the service.
“We were able to put a wind band together in the organ loft, and we used woodwinds, brass, and percussion,” he said. “I always joked that I wanted to have snare drums and cymbals at my wedding. And by golly, we did. They played the Handel Royal Fireworks music. Blanton Alspaugh, who was a friend of both my wife and I, conducted the orchestra. He later went on to become a multiple Grammy award-winning classical record producer. It was a truly wonderful day.”
— Holly Beretto
