Orville is a nationally acclaimed lap-style dobro player and teacher. He also teaches fingerpicking, flatpicking, and bottleneck slide styles on acoustic guitar, in addition to mandolin and Weissenborn. A mainstay in PNW roots music, he is also available for consultations on recording, arranging, singing, and music theory.

Orville is known as a patient and insightful teacher of music. “My teaching style is based on helping students accomplish their goals,” he says. “I do this by developing an approach that fits their own ways of learning, adding technique and repertoire, and, ultimately, bringing them to a point at which they can teach themselves. Knowledge is power!”

Orville was born and raised in the southern Illinois heartland. He is a singer, instrumentalist, record producer, songwriter, session player, teacher, and, above all, an instinctive and sensitive musician. As his entry in the Encyclopedia of Northwest Music (Sasquatch Press 1999) states, Orville “has become a vital figure on the NW music scene in the 30-some years he’s lived here, appearing on over 400 CDs, movie and TV soundtracks, and hosting a roots music radio show.”

Orville has taught at Puget Sound Guitar Workshop, International Guitar Seminar, Port Townsend Blues Week, Euro-Blues Workshop, and many others.