Voice Coaching - Before and After

Phyllis K. Day · **Voice Talent** Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 251

Here is an interesting case. Dave Winsor is very comfortable when speaking on his award-winning morning show. But get him in front of a mic in a recording studio and he gets anxious. It may be hard to hear, but in the first part of this clip, he sounds out of breath and a little nervous, even though this is a comedy piece and he's trying to speak with a commanding voice.

In the "after" piece, the infamous LA Tan copy that some of my students have suffered through, he goes into character and there are no breathing issues, or thinning of his voice as heard on the "before" section.

The biggest issue is the "wobby" sound that his voice has on the first piece. That's what we are working on. Please note that I am not trying to make Dave sound like a radio announcer or get him to push his voice down - but to identify and control the wobbly. The LA Tan copy, and other things we work on are "vocal cross-training." I'll post an example of Dave's non-wobbly work in the following post - and you can again hear how solid he sounds when he's playing a character.

This is just another example of the different kinds of issues that VO talent have that affect their voices. Dave is working on a more emotional basis than on technical - because he can breath correctly when he's in character. As Dave has aluded to in the "Voice Coaching - Let Me Have A Look" thread, he's identified the source of the wobbly sound - and he's doing great personal work on it too.

Phyllis K. Day · **Voice Talent** Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 251

Here is the other piece by Dave that has a solid, non-shaky delivery. Definitely "radio announcer" sounding. LOL.

Phyllis K. Day · **Voice Talent** Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 251

This is not exactly a before and after of production work but it is worth considering what attitude can do to the sound of your voice.

In John's MP3, you can hear in the "before" that he sounds tired, sad even. In the "after," his voice is transformed by his excellent work on a "happy" exercise that I gave him to do. It would seem he's also sitting up straighter, his voice has more body, is clearer and...lighter. The sound wave form is also dramatically different.

This MP3 contains only a short bit of his original "tell me about you" MP3 and a short bit from the one he sent right after doing the writing part of his exercise. Both were considerably longer but these two short sections show the difference.

Your comments, please.