Jim Patton

Voice actor, Audiobook Narrator

jimbpatton2021@gmail.com

Jim Patton is a professional voice actor and audiobook narrator recording from his home studio in Las Vegas.  He has acted in audio drama for over ten years and has narrated audiobooks for a few years. He has coached with veteran narrators, Joel Froomkin (15 weeks+), PJ Ochlan (5 weeks+), Paul Ruben, Joe Arden, and Jack de Golia.

His home studio audio quality has been approved by Penguin Random House audio engineers as a pre-requisite for PRH-directed recording sessions.

He has guided projects as a rights holder through ACX, Findaway/Spotify, and Spoken Realms and can help authors through the publication/distribution process.

Audiobook Samples

Dark fantasy – 3rd Person, M/M  – Fantasy hero threatening his evil brother from Christopher Russell’s Divinities Twilight Rebirth.  The full 45 minute podcast performance of the Rebirth Prologue is at this Youtube link.

Western drawl – M/F 3rd person – A short selection from TL Ryder’s  Vella, “Angel at Large” about Billy Bob, a cowboy dark angel speaking to a young woman with a baby.  The 5 minute version of this clip is at this Youtube link.

Horror, M/M/F, 1st person – A jowly, balding, middle-aged serial rapist/killer comes out to his wife, hoping she will assist or at least understand him. He is encouraged by the evil God/narrator.

Horror, M/F/F, 1st person – The haunted house, who is God, forces an inhabitant to self-mutilate with the help of a long-dead friend. The narrator/protagonist is the house itself – narcissistic, sarcastic evil personified, slowly inhabiting its inhabitants til they are dead and then owned completely.

Fiction, M/M/M ,3rd person, NY character accent – 
The narrator relates a scene in Heaven where judgment is pronounced on a soul from O. Henry’s “The Guilty Party”. In this sample, O. Henry breaks the fourth wall by addressing readers directly at the beginning and end. The sample ends with commentary about the story from the narrator’s perspective. Includes a New York accent. 

Fiction, M/F, 3rd Person – This is a short 3rd person character narrator followed by F/M/F dialog, then 3rd person non-character comment on the story.   It is the ending of “The Last Leaf” with a dominant female voice at mid-clip explaining her friend’s survival from an illness.

Western M/M/F/M/M – 3rd person limited –  an action-sequence, chase scene, from the protagonist perspective.  Southern, general American, Scandinavian, and Irish accents

Romantic comedy 3rd person, British RP, and NY accents – Farcical 1915-ish  romantic comedy, M/F protagonists + British M + NY M. See the Narrator Notes for Love Insurance

Chicago style Tony Soprano M/M/M mafia gangster, with Chicago accents, 3rd person, two separate clips, one grilling a mark, and the other discussing the situation with another gang member.  This was an audition clip.

Comedy, Historical fiction – 1st person with Irish, Southern accents –  M/M/M Two Irish soldiers in the Confederacy talking, one of whom has infiltrated Yankee lines, gotten drunk, and is pretending to be a Yankee soldier

Poignant M/M dialog and third person narration. Two old men reflect on their lives as one is dying

Variety of southern characters in a Civil War fictional memoir.

Nonfiction, 3rd person omniscient, humorous – A third person nonfiction narrative is expressed like fiction with character voices. This nonfiction story telling style is possible because the subject is larger than life with copious humor. I call this “Paul Bunyan nonfiction”. 

Nonfiction, First person narrative of a San Quentin prisoner relating the story of an attempted escape.  The book was nominated for a SOVA award.

About - Jim Patton

I am an audiobook narrator recording from my professional home studio near Las Vegas.  I’ve been interested in theater my whole life, but the occupation that fed my family precluded a full time acting effort. As a result, I became an audio drama actor, allowing me to exercise my acting creativity from the confines of my home studio at a time of my choosing. Having spent hours auditioning, acting, editing, and performing in this manner convinced me that audiobook narration is a reasonable and desired goal.

I acted in high school, but I became hooked when I played Hamlet in a college production. I have since acted in community theater when I had the opportunity, but eventually, I found that remote audio acting was the most convenient.

I have a doctoral degree in electrical engineering. I worked as an international power system field engineer, located in the Middle East, South America, and Africa where I spoke French and Spanish. I then became a tenured university EE professor and a university administrator before retiring a few years ago. 

Accents

Narrator Accents:  I am comfortable speaking in a western US accent or a number of southern US accents and feel confident I could maintain them through an entire book.

Character Accents: I am a relatively quick study at a variety of accents.  I have voiced several British accents, along with German, French, and generic Spanish accents quite frequently and could maintain them through a major character role. I can, with study, voice a wide variety of other accents for relatively minor roles.

Coaching

I have completed PJ Ochlan’s six-class Masterclass Series and have had private coaching with him. I will continue to seek out high-level coaching whenever possible.

I am also an alumnus of PJ’s workshops on ‘Character Voice Toolbox’ and ‘How To Be Your Own Dialect Coach’.

I was pleased to attend Jack de Golia’s, ‘Character Voices 101’, offered by the Las Vegas-based Voice Actors Studio.

I have completed Don Baarns’ complete courses on Studio One and Rx and enjoy editing/mastering my own work.

I have completed Acting for Audiobooks, a 15 week acting course delivered by award-winning narrator and director, Joel Froomkin

I have privately coached with Paul Ruben on mystery/thriller narration and with Joe Arden on romance narration.

I have attended Johnny Heller’s New England Retreat and will attend Joel Froomkin’s Audiobooks at Sea cruise in the spring of 24.

 

Let's connect!

Questions?

jimbpatton2021 (  at  ) gmail (  dot  ) com

(612) 208-6396