Allen Ellis

Though I have been acting for over twenty years, my foray into voice acting is fairly recent: just this year. I am fresh, enthusiastic, and willing to learn! Most recently, I voiced two different characters for an upcoming internet-based 3D-role-playing poker game: a brash Cockney and a Bogart/Cagney-30's-gangster type. I started acting when I was 5. I was in church programs and school plays all the way through college, after which I joined Music Theatre of Idaho, our local music-theatre group, with whom I performed for eight straight years. My silly voices have gone along with that, almost from the beginning. Little boosts along the way have included a stage dialect workshop, a cartoon voice workshop with Pat Fraley, and a vocal symposium based around Dr. Robert Shewan's "Singing and the Brain." I have been singing longer than I have been acting, and I have been playing percussion since I was ten. To me, playing music, singing, acting, dancing, reading aloud, and making people laugh with funny voices are all connected -- almost like different aspects of one big art form. In addition to my theatrical and musical experience, I was also a teacher for seven years. I taught beginning band, junior high and high school band, jazz band, guitar, music history, music theory, and general music. In addition to my B.A. in music education, I have a master of music degree in percussion performance, so I understand principles of practice and perseverance.