THE best time of my life–EVER! I attended my first Vent Haven International Ventriloquist ConVENTion.
I was privileged to meet several famous ventriloquists. Here is one of the photos of me with a famous ventriloquist–Darci Lynne Farmer this kid is fabulously good and won America’s Got Talent. She performed at the conVENTion and was on a panel with several other ventriloquists.
I also got to meet Jimmy Nelson. My toy ventriloquist figure was a Danny O’Day. I was totally in awe!
We had a huge group picture, and that link broke so I am unsure how I can show it here! I am in the far far back, near the guy with the large green dragon puppet. Up front is Jimmy Nelson holding his puppet, Danny O’Day, and his wife next to him is holding Farfel, his dog puppet. I got to MEET him! Such an incredible honor, the number of great ventriloquists who credit their success to his encouragement and his recordings of how to do ventriloquism is huge. In many ways he is the father of all the ventriloquists who teach their craft.
The classes were filled with so much information I only caught part of the total. Amazing!
The shared performances amazed and entertained. The mass of talent represented in that photo is incredible.
The conVENTion is a fund raiser for the Vent Haven Museum. The museum is completely dedicated to the art and puppets of ventriloquism. If you are into puppets, dummies, or even dolls, this is one museum you really do not want to miss!!
Did I ever share the link to the course I not only took but continue to repeat so as to keep improving my ventriloquism? Learn-Ventriloquism. If you ever wanted to learn, this course has been worth every CENT I paid for it and more.
I’ve always loved puppets, from Captain Kangaroo’s Moose puppet with the ping-pong balls, to the Muppet Show on PBS, the passion was there. I failed to catch on to ventriloquism when I had my first toy dummy, but the desire stayed with me. My professors for education courses finally told me, no more class projects with puppets! And my apartment’s dining table was my workshop for molding heads for marionettes. I did my best but the kids that looked could still see my lips move.
Now, years later, I’m learning lip control and improving my breath control. I have two hand puppets with distinctive voices and personalities, and my one “hard figure”, which means the traditional dummy with the jaw that works from a lever, who has the best voice and well developed back-story and personality. I performed at one of the general open mic nights and got laughs. Wow, now THAT is addictive!
Dear Lord, Thank You for all these gifted people and for this conVENTion. Please bless them all and give us excellent lip control. +Amen.