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  • Take Lessons

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    Study with Dr. Victor Penniman, world-class musician and educator. Instruction is currently being offered in:
    I have taught guitar privately and at the college level for over 20 years. I offer lessons for all levels, ages and abilities. Whether you want to play steel-string acoustic Folk, electric Blues or Metal, finger-style or flat-picked (or both), or any other style, I work with you to tailor a study and practice regimen to suit your needs and help you play the way YOU want to!
    I began teaching cello when I was 16 years old. 30+ years of intense musical study and experience later, I am able to offer an innovative approach to cello playing for all ages, levels and styles. As with all lessons I teach, YOU, the student, are the focus. We work on the music you want to learn, and we work to discover how you learn it best. With Classical music, sensitivity to historical style and practice are fundamental to my approach, so the study is unique and the results produce students with the insight to know that Bach's music might not want to be played like Brahms, and vice versa. Electric cellos are ALWAYS welcome!
    Bass! It's the instrument that holds the band together. Whether you play upright or electric, your job is the most important one on that stage. The audience may be fawning over the guitar player, or the heart-rending melody of the violin section, but it's YOUR groove, or the musical grounding provided by the bass section, that keeps 'em dancing and/or gives the music its fundamental solidity. Find your groove right here. I will help you do that. All levels and styles.
    Piano is the most fundamental instrument in Western music. No matter what instrument you play, the piano or keyboard is essential to your understanding of harmony and how music in our culture works. It's also a great instrument to play! Whether you want to play Jazz or Classical styles, or play synths and other keyboards, I teach all styles and types, from beginners through intermediate, all ages.
    The Viola da Gamba is a bowed lute, popular in Europe from the end of the 15th century through the middle of the 18th. This is the instrument I know best, and I've studied and played with the best to learn it. Nothing pleases me more than to be able to share this knowledge and passion with others. Whether you are an Early Music hobbyist or a seasoned professional, I offer lessons and coaching in both technique and historical performance practice that will open your ears and mind, or hone them more sharply, and help you to allow the voices of the distant past to speak through your music.
    The Composer's Studio at Ormesby Productions is a multi-studio 24-track digital recording, mixing and mastering environment designed not only as my personal workspace for composition, recording and production, but as a classroom for the aspiring composer and engineer. Professional recording technology is combined with a thorough theory and mentored composition and production program to help you realize the music of YOUR imagination, both here and in the studio you can learn to build and use for yourself!
    Historical Performance Practice and Early Music, meaning music produced in Europe from the earliest written neums to the late 18th c., is my deepest passion as a musician. I hold a Doctor of Music in Operation of Early Music Programs from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music's Early Music Institute, and a Masters of Music in Historical Musicology from Florida State University. I love nothing more than to share the styles and performance practices of European cultures now long extinct, yet living on in music, art and literature.
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    Learn to play Bach in a style much like people of Bach's time would have heard (which is very different from the way Bach's music has been taught traditionally); study the wild and complex music of 14th century France, or learn to read from the first "fake books," published in Venice at the turn of the 16th century... Discover the voices of ancient cultures, and let them speak to you! It can totally change the way you hear and conceive of music. If you are a classical musician, or want to be one, there is no more edifying or useful study.
    Taught in the Composer's Studio at Ormesby Productions (see Theory/Composition), this curriculum focuses on the engineering and post elements of music production. Get your hands on the latest software and hardware controllers, learn to create virtually the acoustic spaces you imagine for the recordings you produce: become an artist behind the mixing board.
    The history of music, whether it's European classical or American popular, has been my passion since I began my music education. From Ancient Greece to the present day, whether you are in need of a tutor for your own Music History class, or wish to study the rich musical heritage of our Western cultures, my 15 years of music history teaching at the college level will open your ears AND mind to the most exciting and revealing mirror of our culture.
    Victor Penniman is a multi-instrumentalist, specializing in Historical Performance on the Viola da gamba, and is also a guitarist, bassist, keyboardist and composer. His current project includes both traditional viola da gamba repertoire and original works for electric viol (Ruby Gamba) and other electronic instruments. He holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Operation of Early Music Programs from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music's Early Music Institute, a Master of Music in Historical Musicology from Florida State University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Music degree from Marylhurst University near Portland, Oregon.
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    He served as music director for the Tygre's Heart Shakespeare Company in Portland, OR, and has performed with The Oregon Renaissance Band, the Oregon Bach Festival Orchestra , the Waverly Baroque Ensemble, the Tallahassee Bach Parley, Indiana University’s Concentus Ensemble, The New York State Baroque Orchestra, and countless other individual projects and performances. He is a founding member of the electric-Baroque ensemble discontinuo, and is a frequent performer on and advocate for the Ruby Gamba, the first production-model fully electric viola da gamba. He has performed and recorded with the Ashley Cox Orchestra, Ben de la Garza, PerPlex, and, again, countless other projects. Dr. Penniman taught for ten years at Wells College in Aurora, NY, where he also earned his tenure. He has served as Director of the Music Program in the Communication & Fine Arts department at Rockhurst University in Kansas City, MO, and as adjunct faculty in Music History at Ithaca College in Ithaca, NY. His teaching repertoire includes Western Music History, American Popular Music History, Studio Recording, choral and chamber music ensemble direction, and he offers private instruction in viola da gamba, guitar, recorder, and orchestral strings.
    I offer lessons at the Ormesby Productions studio in the Ward Park neighborhood of Kansas City, MO either directly through Ormesby Productions, or through TakeLessons.com (KCMO area). Click here to download the direct-lesson contract. If you live in KCK or Johnson County, I work with the Metropolitan Conservatory KC at both the Overland Park and Olathe locations to provide lessons, ensembles, and the Tragical History Tour, a music history enrichment series. Please click on the hyperlinks on the right to find my sign-up pages.
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  • Music By Victor Penniman

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    “...Penniman (is) one of the most innovative musicians performing today. Taking the “non-standard approach” to nearly all aspects of his muic and career, Penniman has succeeded in combining his technical and scholarly knowledge of Early Music with his love of popular music to create a modern fusion that sounds like nothing else.”
    - Wells Express, Sept. 2007
    "Victor is a spectacularly gifted performer on the viola da gamba and he displayed a terrific technique, sensitive ensemble work, and empathetic accompanying… He brings a combination of expertise, enthusiasm and sensitivity to music-making that many of us only wish for."
    - Dr. Jeffrey Noonan, Ph.D., Tavern of Fine Arts Promo (Oct 13, 2012)

    Violist da Gamba Dr. Victor Penniman has performed as a soloist and with numerous Historical Performance ensembles, including Ensemble Iberica, the Kansas City Baroque Consortium, New York State Baroque, the Spire Chamber Ensemble, the Oregon Bach Festival (under Helmuth Rilling), The Oregon Renaissance Band, as well as countless modern groups covering a wide variety of genres and repertoire. Based in Kansas City, MO, he holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in Operation of Early Music Programs from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music’s Early Music Institute, and a Masters of Music in Historical Musicology from The Florida State University. He studied the viol under Wendy Gillespie, Martha Bishop and Tim Scott, as well as Paolo Pandolfo, Yukimi Kambe and Margriet Tindemans.
    Victor Penniman, former student of Oregon’s Glen Moore, has over 35 years of bass- playing experience in all major genres, from classical and jazz double bass, to practically any genre that requires electric bass guitar. Currently Victor is available for electric bass guitar sessions and performances. His unique style and custom-made 5-string fretless electric bass guitar will drive the rock-steady bus of any band, while adding interest to the bottom end. Penniman is not a one- note bassist.
    Victor has played with such diverse bands as g.nome, Blue Sky Mission Club, The Herbs Band, and countless other groups and projects stretching back almost three decades.

    Victor uses Euphonic Audio bass amplifiers.
    A known and respected expert in the performance of Medieval European music, vielle-ist and director Victor Penniman is best known for his fascinating study of the relationship between 14th century French composer and theorist Philippe de Vitry and Petrarch. Penniman is also a highly regarded vielle player, scholar and director of Medieval music. Each concert is thoroughly researched and documented, with careful attention paid to the details of instrumentation and text declamation, though the emphasis is ultimately on the drama of the performance itself.
    Victor Penniman is a multi-instrumentalist, performing not only on the viola da gamba, bass, and various Medieval instruments, but also on guitar, keyboards and vocals. Here is a list of the various bands and projects he is working with. Click on the band name to visit the website and book these terrific ensembles!

    Ensemble Iberica
    Kansas City Baroque Consortium


    CLICK HERE TO BOOK VICTOR PENNIMAN
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  • Composition, Transcription, Recording and Production

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    The Composer’s Studio is the heart of Ormesby Productions. It is at once a full service professional 26-Track digital recording facility and a homey, clean, comfortable space designed to optimize the capacity to conceive a musical idea and realize it, or have it realized, efficiently and accurately, to bring out the best the musical imagination has to give.
    Services we offer include:

    ►Commercial composition: music for film, stage, advertising, or any other purpose
    ►Recording services, including engineering, production and mastering
    ►Transcription services: have any recording transcribed to score: all genres
    ►Live recording services
    ►Live sound reinforcement services (small and medium venues and events )

    ◉Composer’s Studio Package

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    One-on-one instruction in digital recording, synthesis and composition.
    A mentor-style approach to the recording, mixing and mastering of your project, ensuring every step of the way that your project sounds the way YOU want it to.
    The final product includes the know-how you will have gained to start recording, mixing, and even mastering your music your way!

    Prices vary for each of these services depending on location, length of deadline, and other considerations.

    To enquire about any of our studio services, please click here:
    Contact Ormesby Productions










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  • Lectures, Presentations and Educational Resources

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    More to come! Stay tuned!