The Shepherd School of Music
Founded in 1975, The Shepherd School of Music at Rice University in Houston, Texas is one of the nation’s youngest major university level music programs. In just over forty years, it has become one of the most prominent music schools in the country, attracting an international student body of 300 music majors. Our illustrious faculty of artist-teachers is dedicated to the highest possible cultivation of the talents and skills of each individual student.
Shepherd School alumni include Pulitzer Prize and Grammy Award winners; they have debuted on the stages of Carnegie Hall and have appeared with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and the Metropolitan Opera. They hold positions in prestigious orchestras across the globe, including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia and Cleveland orchestras, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra. Graduates of the Shepherd School Opera Program have sung in several of the world’s foremost opera houses and recital halls. The Program has had recent finalists and winners in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. Recent alumni are members of the Metropolitan Opera Lindemann Young Artist Program, the Houston Grand Opera Studio, the Domingo-Cafritz Young Artist Program, the Utah Opera Ensemble Program and the Seattle Opera Young Artist Program.
Since 1991, The Shepherd School of Music has been housed in Alice Pratt Brown Hall, an elegant, state-of-the-art facility designed by renowned Spanish architect Ricardo Bofill. The hall boasts four performance venues, 54 teaching studios, 55 practice rooms, seven classrooms, an orchestra rehearsal hall, an electronic music studio, and production and rehearsal spaces. In the spring 2022 semester, The Shepherd School officially opened Brockman Hall for Opera. Designed by acclaimed architect Allan Greenberg, this new facility houses the Lucian and Nancy Morrison Theater, optimally configured for opera and chamber music. In addition to offering premium performance space, the new building will meet the growing need for additional teaching, rehearsal and practice rooms, and provide a hallmark venue for the university. Alice Pratt Brown Hall, Brockman Hall for Opera, and a connecting plaza, comprise the Brockman Music and Performing Arts Center just west of the James Turrell Skyspace. The school makes an enormous impact on the cultural life of Rice University and the greater Houston community by welcoming 75,000 visitors who attend nearly 400 events annually.