But outside work hours, the Government’s Covid vaccine adviser and University of Otago vice-chancellor is too cool for school, and many may be surprised to learn he spends a lot of time in a workshop playing and making his own guitars.
Recently, at his official welcome to the city at Otakou Marae, he gave one of his handmade guitars to the mana whenua of Otakou Marae.
"I work a lot with making guitars, and I can see the similarity when it comes to thinking of how we work on a Te Tiriti-led organisation," he said at the time.
"I want the bespoke model that works for all of us — not the generic factory model."
Prof Murdoch said he started playing guitar as a teenager and first thought about building his own guitar when he was studying at the University of Otago.
"But I didn’t start until about 20 years later when I was recovering from a head injury.
"At the time, I had trouble concentrating on most things, but somehow got into my head that I should make a guitar after so many years of talking about it.
"Planning for that first guitar helped my recovery."
He was "totally self-taught" from books and the internet.
"The first guitar turned out reasonably well and I never looked back."
Since then, he has designed and built 23 instruments – four acoustic guitars, an acoustic bass guitar, two resonator guitars, two solid-body electric guitars, and 14 ukuleles of all shapes and sizes.
"I do try and incorporate native New Zealand woods and paua inlays whenever I can.
"I design them all, but most are based on classic designs.
"I have made a few ukuleles based on the craviola guitar shape, which is a little unusual."
Asked for his favourite player he said, "I’m in awe of too many guitarists to name a favourite".
He said he had built guitars for some pretty famous people, but not people the general public will have heard on the radio.
"Sir Andrew Pollard from the University of Oxford, who played a leading role in the development of Covid-19 vaccines. Andy is one of my oldest friends and was a recipient of one of my early ukuleles made from ancient kauri.
Kate O’Brien, head of vaccines for the World Health Organisation, also has one of my ukuleles."
His instruments are now in the United Kingdom, Iceland, France, Switzerland, Kenya, United States and New Zealand.
As for who would receive his next masterpiece, "stay tuned".
