Ardent Audio Productions

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Staff

Rich Wenzel l Matt Pavolotis l Paul Hollman l Ken Givens

Rich Wenzel

The founder and owner of Ardent Audio Productions, Rich Wenzel is an accomplished musician, producer and engineer with over 30 years experience in the music industry.

Rich studied music at the University of California Long Beach. He begun his career in the late 60's touring LA venues with his first band opening for acts like The Doors, Van Morrison, and Frank Zappa. After several years as a music instructor at the Peninsula Academy of Music as well as Lamarca Music in Torrance, Rich returned to touring.

For the next decade he played with various LA and Las Vegas show bands, toured the United States and recorded several albums. Then it was off to sea on the Love Boat and several other cruise ships where he was an on-board band-leader. Later Rich continued to play around the world for international Stars Viki Carr, Friends of Distinction and Cecilio & Kapono.

After completing his touring career in major stadiums across the country for acts like The Beach Boys, Dave Mason and Jazz/Rock Flutist Tim Weisberg, Rich took a consulting position for another decade at Yamaha Music corporation and Kawaii USA where he honed his skills as an audio engineer.

Since opening Ardent Audio Productions in 1989, Rich has continued to tour and record as a top studio musician and has always kept up-to-date with the latest trends in musical styles, instruments, recording techniques and computer sequencing.

At Ardent, Rich has worked as producer, arranger and engineer for literally hundreds of clients whose CD's have been distributed around the globe.

Matt Pavolotis

Matt brings 12 years of unique audio experience to Ardent. He is an expert with ProTools, Efx mixing & augmentation, sound design, film sweetening and format conversion. He has worked for some of the biggest audio, film and television production companies in Los Angeles and has recording, mixing and sound design credits in numerous Hollywood productions. These include re-releases of film classics like Mary Poppins (Disney) and The Way We Were (Columbia Tristar) as well as current hit shows like Law & Order (Universal), Home Improvement (Universal), and Felicity (BVI).

Matt obtained a Bachelor of Music Performance with an Emphasis in Sound Recording Technology from the University of Massachusetts.

Paul Hollman

A graduate of Brown University's Theory and Jazz History program, Paul Hollman is a top-notch composer, producer, engineer, sound designer and sequencing specialist.

He has worked with several top labels and studios including Arista, Warner Brothers Online, MTV, Moonshine Records and Media Ventures (Hans Zimmer's studio) to name a few.

Paul is an accomplished pianist, Guitarist, bassist, and saxophone player. He is also highly capable in music-production programs such as Pro Tools, StudioVision, Logic, Reason, Acid and GigaStudio

Ken Givens

If you can hear you've probably already heard the work of Ken Givens! As a composer, arranger, sound designer and MIDI programmer he has worked with notable industry names and corporate clients such as Dick Clark, Jack Morton Productions, Apple Computer, Mazda Motor of America, Coldwell Banker, National Semi Conductor and Toshiba.

Ken has been the musical backbone of various film, television and even interactive gaming projects and even wrote the original music for various radio spots featuring the 2002 Olympic Winter Games in Salt Lake City.

Ken Givins brings a wealth of talent and experience to Ardent.