R.E.M. Ice-T. Buddy Rich? Historic Boise music venue to be sold. Developers could be next

Tim Merrill has a lifetime of memories about his parents’ dance hall.

Racing across its floor on roller skates when he was 10. Helping run the place as an after-hours spot in his early 20s.

And the concerts. Those years of unforgettable concerts.

“It’s just been there so long, it has a history,” said Merrill, 73, son of longtime owners Orson and Lydia Merrill.

After 64 years, the Mardi Gras Ballroom – a downtown Boise events center with a rich resume of dances, live music and parties – is being put on the real estate market.

After Lydia’s death last November at 106 years old, the family will sell the property at 615 S. 9th St. and divide up a living trust between 12 beneficiaries, Tim Merrill said. Orson, who bought the Mardi Gras in 1958, died in 2003 at 89.

A call for offers should be presented within the next month, Merrill said.

But the landmark building at 9th and River streets won’t close without a final, nostalgic blowout.

The Blues Brothers Rock ‘N Soul Revue and The Mystics – local bands with fond recollections of that stage – will perform April 9. The show is called “Thru the Years – A Farewell to the Mardi Gras.” It has sold out in advance.

Along with classic rock ‘n’ roll, the room undoubtedly will be filled with classic reminiscing.

The Mardi Gras has hosted events only intermittently in recent years. But it’s still an almost mystical music institution to Idahoans of a certain age.

“It’s been off the map for decades,” Merrill said. “The other venues – like, say, the Knitting Factory or whatever – they did more in one year than we did all that time. The only significance, the historical significance, is that it just sat there for so long that all these (musicians) that wandered through are dead. And like Jimi Hendrix said, when you’re dead, you’re made for life. All of a sudden, some of these old folks are kind of famous … .”

Legendary concerts

Launched in 1928 as an open-air dance venue called the Riverside Pavilion, the space started a new chapter under the Merrills. Orson paid $35,000 for it, Tim Merrill said, and initially made it a roller-skating rink. But he soon turned it back into a dance hall. During the ensuing decades, The Mardi Gras evolved into a chameleon-like entertainment space.

Some of the concerts are near-legendary. The Ventures, Leon Russell and Edgar Winter performed at The Mardi Gras. Johnny Winter, too. Buddy Rich even mentioned it on “The Tonight Show.” The list of concerts goes on: John Lee Hooker, Pinetop Perkins, Willie Dixon, Albert Collins, David Lindley, BoDeans.

There’s a Facebook group about one of the more famous shows: “I Saw R.E.M. at the Mardi Gras in Boise on June 30, 1984.”

In 1992, rapper-turned-actor Ice-T even strutted the stage with his crossover metal band, Body Count.

Blues powerhouse Buddy Guy once packed 1,200 fans into The Mardi Gras – which is about 11,000 square feet, Merrill estimated, and has a legal capacity of 500.

But that wasn’t the biggest show, he added with a laugh. “There was one time that we emptied out the whole room with all the furniture and everything, and there was about 2,000 people in there. I think it was Eric Burdon and War.”

The Mardi Gras wasn’t just memorable for its music and dancing. To Idahoans who knew them, its owners were legendary, too.

The Merrills

Habitually dressed in a tweed cap and bib overalls, Orson Merrill was known for his work ethic, his outspoken views and for being an unconventional authority figure.

He deflated tires of cars parked where he didn’t think they should be and once was found at the center of a melee on the dance floor, wrestling with a teenager. Unaware of who she was, he chased multiple-Grammy Award winner Carole King out of the building during a rehearsal because she’d brought her underage daughter with her.

“I never met anybody that didn’t like my dad,” Tim Merrill said. “… Even though he was kooky and eccentric. I guess you could call it eccentric, set in his ways. Somebody’d spill a Coke on the floor, and he’d stop the whole show and hobble out there with a mop.”

Orson also had a soft side, donating the ballroom free of charge for numerous benefits.

After her husband died, Lydia Merrill became the face of the place. She sometimes slept in the building, Tim Merrill remembered. An Idaho Statesman article about her 100th birthday noted she was still cleaning tables and vacuuming on Sundays.

“And I like being at the dances,” Lydia added. “I love seeing people having a good time on our dance floor.”

‘Things come to a end’

One of three siblings, Tim Merrill was involved with The Mardi Gras only “sporadically” over the decades, he said. From about 2010 to 2015, he kept business steady by renting it out for ethnic celebrations and events.

Since then, the dated venue mostly has gathered dust.

Merrill isn’t sure what the future holds for the property after it sells. Anything is possible, but a developer’s plan would seem like a probable outcome.

“I think what’ll happen to it is the same thing that’s happened to the other empty lots downtown,” Merrill said. “They’re building hotels and apartment houses.”

Either way, The Mardi Gras – the bustling, joyful gathering spot of its heyday – already is a memory.

“It’s dead as a door nail, sorry to say,” Merrill admitted. “But it is what it is. Things come to an end.”