“We put a lot of effort into our sound design…”

Hey! It’s ViRG! We’re a 4 piece synthesizer group from Virginia. ViRG started as a solo project by me (Piano Whitman). I had always envisioned ViRG as an all hardware synth group but it seemed quite complicated… so it stayed as a bedroom project uploaded to the internet. Some years later, I met Max and Daniel (from Pleasure Business) at our downtown dive bar and we started passing demos back n forth. I felt so lucky to have met people who shared a love for keyboards, art pop, Italian disco, and Campari. It was this moment of “oh.. you GET it.” 

They encouraged me to play some solo gigs for the first time in years. A few months later we got together with my good friend Alex from DC band “Oh He Dead” and played a super fun house show. We clicked and have been touring and sharing bills with our collective bands ever since.

ViRG pulls from our wide range of tastes and influences but filtered thru the medium of synthesis. We don’t do guitars which is challenging in the best way. I feel strongly to keep the performance as genuine as possible, avoiding samples and laptops. Some nights we throw on capes as a nod to Rick Wakeman. We put a lot of effort into our sound design… it’s important to us that the live show becomes an immersive experience. We’re currently working on a record as a full band and hoping to put out some singles this year.

-Piano Whitman for UMBC Zine