Merrill Leroy Ellis

Education

1939 – Bachelor of Music, University of Oklahoma

1940 – Master of Music Education, University of Oklahoma

Graduate studies, University of Missouri

Ellis studied privately with Roy Harris, Spencer Norton (1909–1978), and Charles Garland (University of Missouri).

Career

Merrill Ellis taught music theory and composition during the 1950s at the Joplin Junior College (now Missouri Southern State University) in Joplin Missouri.

Ellis founded the electronic music program at the University of North Texas College of Music shortly after he began teaching there in 1962. North Texas acquired its first Moog Machine for use in Merrill Ellis' studio, late 1965. Ellis was a pioneer in composing and performing live multimedia music on Moogs from the mid to late 1960s. He worked with Robert Moog to design the second Moog synthesizer ever made to be portable for him and his doctoral students to use during performances. Robert Moog gave a nod to Ellis by naming this second model the E-II. It was Moog's second synthesizer and Ellis' second Moog. In March 1970, a Tucson newspaper (Tucson Daily Citizen) mentioned that he had brought a Moog (smaller than the North Texas studio model) for a live performance of "Kaleidoscope."

The electronic music center at North Texas was one of the few in the southwest in the early 1960s. According to Ellis in a 1970 interview, Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center (in New York City) was the largest and oldest. Yale University, University of Toronto, and University of Illinois had prolific computer music labs, too.

The Center for Experimental Music and Intermedia (CEMI) at North Texas is an outgrowth of his accomplishments. When the College of Music designed and erected a new music complex in the late 1970s, a "new music" theater was designed and named "The Merrill Ellis Intermedia Theater" or "MEIT."

Selected compositions

Instrumental works

Opera

Film and television

Awards & honors

1962 — Harvey Gaul Prize, Friends of Harvey Gaul, Inc., and the Carnegie Institute of Technology, Department of Music, for the composition, Organ Fantasy, performed in Carnegie Hall

1964 — Texas Federation of Music Clubs Competition, First Prize for "The Great Gift"

1965 — Texas Federation of Music Clubs Competition, First Prize for "Oboe Quintet"

1965 — Texas Federation of Music Clubs Competition, Second Prize for "Tomorrow Texas"

Ellis became a member of ASCAP in 1966.

ASCAP Award for contributions in serious music; 1967, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1979

Other publications

Electronic Music Composition Manual, Merrill Ellis, Robert Cannon Ehle (born 1939), and Robert A. Moog, North Texas State University (196-?); OCLC 24103657

Selected discography

Louisville Orchestra – Jorge Mester, conductor

Merrill Ellis, "Kaleidoscope," for Orchestra, Synthesizer, and Soprano – Joan Wall, sopranoGeorge Crumb, Echos of Time and the River †originally released 1974 (LP), Louisville Orchestra First Edition Recordings LS711; OCLC 916602, 9846970, 221630245, OCLC 83589462, 221612389, 79876387

Unconventional Trumpet, music by University of North Texas (CD), composers Ellis, Beasley, McTee, Mailman, Austin, Latham, and Tull

Crystal Records (2004); OCLC 57490708

Facets 2, John Holt, Trumpet

Natalia Bolshakova (piano)Crystal Records CD764 (Dec 1, 2004); OCLC 57491034Track 10 – Ellis: Trumpet Piece† Crumb, who shares the album with Ellis, won the 1968 Pulitzer Prize in Music for this composition

Videos

"CEMI: 50 years of experimental music and intermedia at UNT"

"Mutations"

"Kaleidoscope", The Louisville Orchestra, Joan Wall, mezzo-soparano, Jorge Mester, conductor (1974)