Orville Stoeber is an American singer/songwriter, actor and artist. Primarily known for his critically acclaimed 1971 album Songs on UNI records, his work as composer on the cult classic horror film Let's Scare Jessica to Death, and his collaboration with author Margaret Atwood on Hymns of the God’s Gardeners from The Year of the Flood the 2nd book of her Science Fiction trilogy MaddAddam.
Music and acting career
After leaving University of Nebraska in the late 60s for New York, Stoeber, an Army brat, found work in the Off-Broadway theater scene. One of his first jobs was as a featured singer in Robert Joffrey's watershed multi-media ballet Astarte. He also wrote music for A. R. Gurney Jr.’s Tonight in Living Color and Ronald Tavel’s Obie award winning play Boy on the Straightback Chair staged at the American Place Theatre. In l970 Stoeber wrote music for John D. Hancock's short film Sticky My Finger, Feet My Feet, adapted by John Lahr from a New Yorker story, which was nominated for an Oscar. The following year Stoeber released his debut albumSongs and wrote the music for Hancock’s influential horror film Let's Scare Jessica to Death. Stoeber continued to work with director Hancock as a composer and actor in several of his films including, most notably, Bang the Drum Slowly starring Robert DeNiro, and Weeds starring Nick Nolte. He acted in the thriller film Switchback starring Dennis Quaid and Danny Glover, and the Nathan Lane comedy Mouse Hunt. After a long hiatus the reclusive songwriter began recording again in 1997 after meeting literary agent Phoebe Larmore who produced his self-recorded album Whispering Roots in 2000. Subsequent albums My Fatal Flaw and Necessary Imagination were produced with legendary record producer Ted Perlman. In 2009 author Margaret Atwood commissioned Stoeber to compose music for the lyrics from her novel The Year of the Flood. This music was released in 2009 in a CD titled Hymns of the God’s Gardeners simultaneous with the publication of the best-selling novel. Stoeber accompanied Atwood and performed selected hymns in an international musical presentation of the novel tour across the US, UK and Wales as well as in Tokyo and Toronto. In the summer of 2014 HBO optioned Atwood’s MaddAddam trilogy, for a series to be directed by Darren Aronofsky. Stoeber continues to record music and act, most recently juggling both in Hancock’s newest film Swan Song and releasing a CD titled In the Cloud of Unknowing in the fall of 2014. During the past decade Stoeber, also a multimedia artist and art teacher in Venice, Ca., has had his art featured in several galleries including Altered Space and Koplin Del Rio.
