Ian Penman (producer)

Ian Penman began working for BBC's Radio Newcastle's "Bedrock" show in the mid-1970s. He started writing for local and national music magazines in the late 1970s and carried on until the mid-1980's. To avoid confusion with the NME writer of the same name (who he actually preceded as both a radio and print music journalist) Penman wrote for "Sounds" under the name Ian Ravendale, for "Pop Star Weekly" and "The Sunderland and Washington Times" as Rick O'Shea and "The Northern Echo" as Chris Coupar. Contributions to Radio 1 and Radio 4 were under his own name.

From 1982 to 1992, Penman was a researcher, producer and director for Tyne Tees Television, Border TV and the independent sector, working with Carol Vorderman, Muriel Gray, Janet Street-Porter and many others. He also ran River City Productions, the production wing of Stonehills Studios, the North East's largest independent facilities company.

Penman ran New College Durham's Music Industry Management HND for four years in the mid-1990s. He also promoted hundreds of concerts for the likes of the Bootleg Beatles, B'Eagles, U2our and Voulez Vous. He returned to radio and television production and journalism in the late 1990s, working again for Tyne Tees and BBC Radio Newcastle. He also presented a long-running programme for Wear FM and was Broadcast Journalism tutor at the WOLF FM community and Internet radio project.

Recently, he has concentrated on writing television drama, including "Death Of A Pirate" about the 1960s pop entrepreneur and pirate radio pioneer Reg Calvert. Penman also works as a media and entertainment consultant, does freelance PR and recently taught the Media Marketing module to the University of Sunderland's 2007/08 Media Production MA intake.

In 2008 Penman has undertaken other freelance corporate video scriptwriting and production work, often in conjunction with the Newcastle-based Lodestone Productions company. In association with Lodestone he produced, directed, presented and conducted the interviews for "Vox and Rugs and Rock n' Roll", the first sell-through DVD for The Bootleg Beatles.

He also currently works as a freelance lecturer and broadcaster in both the UK and the Canary Islands and is developing a new television drama.