In the grown up world of work, bills, and multitasking, sometimes we can get so tied up with our responsibilities and our goals, that we forget to play. When is the last time you really had fun? Believe it or not, going out and really having fun can sometimes do wonders for your voice over reads. With voice over (and perhaps many other areas of life) we must sometimes remind ourselves to enjoy each moment, and to love what we do.

Often times, when we are learning the art of voice overs, or any new skill, we have to really concentrate on that new skill set. There is frequently a certain amount of tension involved, and work that must be done to truly understand how to apply ourselves to what we’re doing. And yet if there is a lot of tension around that desire to really ‘nail’ a read, it can really get in the way of connecting to the fun, the humor, or even the sense of vulnerability that being in the moment of that read should have.

Of course there are a wide range of tones and feelings in various voice over scripts, and the word ‘play’ may not seem to suit all of them. Sometimes we might lead with a sense of drama, or a sense of seriousness, or professionalism. However, being able to connect with openness, bring in a sense of ease, and allow for spontaneity can still be a huge part of finding a winning read when working in VO. This is why learning how to master and eliminate tension is such an important part of learning to really connect with our work. (Please see my past blog article about connecting to breath which will also help with this.)

One of the things I find very helpful in releasing tension and freeing up these reads is very simple. SHAKE IT OUT! Simply shake your body. Shake your hands, shake your head, shake your feet, jump a little. It’s energizing and releases tension. It can connect us to that sense of play and spontaneity again. Vocal warm ups can also be really great. Singing, going up and down in pitch, doing trills. All of that really helps energize, engage, and activate in a way that can be playful and freeing.

Also, bring a sense of play into your approach of working with scripts. There may a set of descriptive words that describe the tone and feeling of the read. Play around with them to keep yourself from getting locked in. How much range can you find? Can you get more serious? More playful? Can you turn on a dime to find more levels?  Play around with who you’re talking to. How does it feel or sound different when you’re talking to your brother, your mother, your son? Your best friend? Can you play around with location? What if you have a very intimate sounding read? How would it sound if you were in a church? Or staring at the stars? While playing with these elements it can also help you find the choices that may end up being most effective for the piece you’re working on!

Having this sense of freedom, and ability to change it up, will help you when working with directors as well. It helps keep you from sounding stiff or over-rehearsed, and puts you in a place where you can more easily take direction.

Our job as VO artists is to bring life to our reads. When a voice over artist is truly having fun with what they’re doing, we hear it, and we gravitate toward it. This is why so many coaches frequently remind their students to smile. When we fully embrace and live our own lives, it also helps us to embrace the life of the script.

Aria McKenna is an award-winning actress who has worked in films, TV, and the stage. She’s also a sought-after voice talent who has worked for major brands like Disney, Chevy, Fiat, Chanel, Yokohama, and more. You can find her work at ariamckenna.com.

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76” x 80”,  100 % Egyptian cotton ivory sheets (1200 thread count, of course), fluffy, white goose down pillows, comforter folded back, lights on dim, a spray of lavender on the pillow cases, Sarah Vaughn playing on the Bose.  Stretch your arms over your head, enjoy the ensuing yawn, a sip of water, and you are ready to jump between the sheets, consolidate today’s experiences, close the eyes, and SLEEP.

In order to maintain optimal vocal health, sufficient rest is crucial, especially for those of us who depend on our voices for our livelihood. If you don’t get enough hours of shut eye, your vocal tissues can swell. You may find that your voice gets tired more quickly and that you don’t have the dynamic range that you’re accustomed to. As your voice sends out an SOS due to its fatigued state, other non-speaking body parts may try to compensate for your vocal tiredness, creating unfavorable tenseness in your vocal cords.

Additionally, sleep repairs your voice, your body, your memory, and your creativity – all of the cognitive skills necessary to continue to learn and perform well. At the same time, the right amount of rest keeps you from being susceptible to infection by maintaining a healthier immune system – fighting off colds, throat irritation, and other infections.

Another factor to consider is the quality of the sleep you’re getting. Basal sleep is that deep, continuous sleep that lasts about seven to eight hours and leaves you refreshed and ready to perform at a superior level. This is the kind of sleep you want. Unfortunately, it’s not the kind of sleep many of us get. Poor sleeping habits, like waking often during the night, or restlessness due to physical ailments, can accumulate over time, causing what’s called ‘sleep debt’. This debt can make you feel lethargic, depressed, contrary, withdrawn, and just plain TIRED.  Not a great list of attributes as you face a day of marketing your voice, your winning personality, and delivering a stellar performance.

So, you’re climbing into that refuge of rest, you close your eyes, relax your body, and find that slumber escapes you.  Causes abound when trying to figure out the “why” of not being able to sleep. Was the day particularly stressful? Did a producer redirect your performance until you felt you would relish a screaming match? Are there some additional worries on your particular plate? Could you just not find the rhythm and pattern in the documentary voiceover that you promised would have a twenty four hour turnaround time? Did you forget and have a late evening cup of coffee?  Is someone snoring nearby? Or possibly the Mexican chorizo dinner has caused a bit of acid reflux?

Whatever the reason, the inability to sleep can be attributed to something.  So, just as you prepare for a performance, speech, or audition, you have to lay the groundwork for a good night’s rest.

If the sandman has skipped your bedroom for the moment, GET UP! Lying in bed, watching the clock, adjusting the pillows for the ninth time, will only increase your angst. Drink a warm cup of Throat Coat tea with lemon and honey. Read a chapter of a favorite book. Take a warm bath. Plan to get enough natural light during the day. Bring the sunlight into your living space by opening shades and curtains. Get out of the recording booth at regular intervals, take a walk to the mailbox – anything to give your body some exposure to light.

On the other hand, be mindful of limiting artificial light as the evening progresses. Turn off that computer as early in the evening as possible. Avoid high wattage lighting in the bedroom. Skip television or movies that make you feel worried, anxious, stressed, or scared. Stay away from situations that might increase stress, such as arguing, emotionally charged conversations, debating politics or religion.

Use a sleep mask, ear plugs, a sound machine or some type of adjustable white noise designed for relaxation and blocking distractions. Dohm-DS is a white noise machine with exceptional noise-masking capabilities. Simply Noise is a download of white noise available on Apple’s App Store.

Hard though it may be, make an effort to support your biological clock by sticking to a regular sleep schedule. Work towards waking up and GETTING UP at the same time every day. Formulate a routine and stick to it.

One final suggestion on getting that phantasmagorical seven to eight hours of shut eye is to experiment with sleeping positions. A highly recommended sleep position, especially for those of us who use our voices, is to sleep with your head in a raised position. This body alignment can help sinuses to drain, decrease the severity of snoring, and can aid with gastrointestinal problems. Two pillows, a foam wedge, or raising the bed frame on one end are several ways to try this trick.

Prior to lights out, restrict salty snacks.  Salt will contribute to water retention, possibly creating puffiness around the eyes or swelling of extremities. Not only do you want to treat your voice with care, the other parts of the body will be grateful to be included in the healthy plan.

A glass of wine, soda, coffee, caramel macchiato = NO!  Embrace water as your nighttime drink of choice. Your vocal cords and your body will soak up that last bit of H20 and ‘Tomorrow You’ will be incredibly grateful.

Oh, and by the way… Sweet Dreams!

Angela Castonguay is a successful voice-over artist, coach, and author, whose book Feeding Your Voice provides an essential guide to voice care. For more of her work, visit her website angelacastonguay.homestead.com.

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As a person who lives by your voice, you may be familiar with vocal warm ups, tongue twisters, the Sweep exercise, the Cork exercise, tongue and jaw exercises.  Warming up your vocal instrument is absolutely a must before getting behind a microphone and knocking it out of the proverbial vocal ball park.

What we sometimes neglect to consider is how the rest of the body supports the voice and must be warmed up and rarin’ to go as well.  Your face, neck, shoulders, arms, and hands all play a part in an effective and engaging performance.

Gestures, vocal and physical articulation, and breath control all contribute to a praiseworthy performance.  The physical tools that you employ during a vocal delivery can enhance your execution and make a measurable difference in the overall undertaking.

Let’s consider a voiceover session.  Obviously, the client, director, producer and/or sound engineer can see you during a recording session, IF you’re in a studio.  Most of the time, however, no one can see what your body is doing during a session, but physical movement of your body can be detected in your work.  You need to add body movement in order to truly deliver the emotion in your presentation.  Body movements can enhance your voice and enhance the conversational delivery of a script!

Explore and employ tools that can reduce your body tension prior to recording.  One of my favorites was actually suggested by my chiropractor.  His term for it – “the ugly face.”  This exercise is particularly effective for those of us who carry a lot of tension in our neck and shoulders.

Stand in a doorway with your hands at shoulder level, pushing against the doorjamb.  As you push out with your arms and hands, pull your neck back towards your spine, almost as if you were pulling your chin back to your chest.  Hold for a count or two, then lift your chin up and extend your neck outward.  Look down into your left front pocket.  Look down into your right front pocket.  Repeat as needed!

Allow your mind, body, and voice to communicate.  Learn to recognize thoughts, situations, even relationships that create physical tension for you and then, learn to avoid or deal with them.  How many times has someone said to you, “I can hear the stress in your voice.”  Don’t let self-consciousness, anxiety or tension affect your sound.

Focus on this tried and true breathing relaxation exercise.  Inhale through your nose and hold for a count of four.  Exhale for a count of four.  Try to increase your inhale and exhales times, but be mindful that becoming dizzy is not the desired after effect.

As a novice yoga student, I’ve recently been introduced to a new breathing technique called Nadi Shodhana, or alternate nostril breathing.  A breathing technique to keep the mind happy and calm, it is also touted to promote focus and energy.

In order to practice the technique, hold the right thumb over the right nostril and inhale deeply through the left nostril.  Close off the left nostril with the ring finger, and then exhale through the right nostril.  Continue the pattern and repeat in reverse.

For increased breath control and improvement of pitch range try the Sweep exercise described in The Art of Voice Acting by James Alburger.Take a deep breath, hold it, then release it in a yawn.  Take another deep breath and release this breath while making the lowest “HAAA” sound you can achieve.  Gradually increase the pitch of your voice, from low to high.

The CORK exercise is another vocal warm up that helps with articulation.  Mentioned in numerous writings regarding voicing, including James Alberger’s The Art of Voice Acting, and made popular by the recent movie, “In A World,” it’s a quick, easy, and fun activity.  To measure just how effectively it can boost your enunciation, try this.  Record a portion of the copy that you are scheduled to deliver.  Put a wine cork between your front teeth like you hold a stubby cigar.  Then practice the same copy several times over.  Chances are, you will feel the intensity in your mouth and jaw area.  Remove the cork and record the piece again.  There should be an exponential difference in the overall recording, not to mention how much more smoothly the words roll off of your tongue.

Keep things in perspective!  You are not performing a root canal.  Let yourself enjoy performing, use your instincts, be spontaneous, move to the rhythm and patterns you hear in the words of the copy.  Nerves, butterflies, that rush of adrenaline….the tiny surge of excitement can be great as long as you don’t view it as your personal stop sign to an otherwise praiseworthy performance.

Move your hands and arms…. Count on your fingers… Scrunch up your face!… Hunch your shoulders… Strike a pose.

As long as your head stays on axis with the mic, movement is great!

DON’T be inhibited!  Keeping your limbs straight and stiff can definitely affect and be detected in playback.

Try incorporating all or parts of the following warm up routine into your daily schedule.

Face First – Put On a Happy One!

Applying slight pressure, massage your face where the jaw hinges.  Loosen up your muscles and your mouth.

With your lips closed and your jaw slightly open, move your jaw slightly to the left and then slightly to the right.

Stick your tongue out.  Move it up and down, from side to side.  Try to touch your nose with the tip of your tongue.

Roll your neck to the right, then to the left.  Finish with a great big yawn.  Oxygen to the brain cells and all that.

Vocal exercises

A great exercise that will warm up your voice is humming.  With your lips closed and jaw open, focus on humming that happy, foot-tapping tune.

Take a deep breath while you’re humming and hum from your base pitch to a higher note.  Then repeat and hum your way to a lower note.

Tongue twisters are an amazing way to warm up the voice.  Some good examples are…

Which witch wishes to switch a witch wristwatch for a Swiss wristwatch?

Not many an anemone is enamored of an enemy anemone.

Around the rugged rocks the ragged rascal ran.

Please pay promptly.

Happy voicing!

Angela Castonguay is a successful voice-over artist, coach, and author, whose book Feeding Your Voice provides an essential guide to voice care. For more of her work, visit her website angelacastonguay.homestead.com.

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And you know what? That’s a great reason to want to be a voice actor. In fact, it’s the best reason. Unlike almost every other job on the planet, your primary responsibility as a voice actor is to go crazy – and have fun. Now this doesn’t mean there’s no method behind the madness; you’ve got to have the fundamentals of script analysis etched in your brain: who am I…who am I talking to…what’s my connection to the script (I could go on forever, but that’s for another day) – but if you aren’t having fun, no amount of prep will help you land, or keep, that voice gig.

You might be saying, “But isn’t having fun automatic?” You would think so, yet sometimes, when you land that awesome audition, or book that coveted role, fun flies out the window and worry sets in.  “I wonder what kind of read they’re looking for.” “Am I doing it right?” “Gosh, if I land this gig it could be my ticket to the big time,”  et cetera, et cetera. This  negative inner dialogue is so common and so dangerous that acting coaches and casting directors devote entire articles to the subject in trade magazines like Backstage! When you’re stressing over what “they” are looking for….you aren’t having fun!

Why is fun so important? Because fun is the key that unlocks your imagination!

Imagination is what brings the voice actor’s performance to life!  We use our imaginations to:

• Make our character real and interesting.
• Craft a meaningful and historical relationship with the imaginary person we are speaking to.
• Build a vivid location and relatable circumstance in our minds for the story contained in the script.

You’ll be amazed at how compelling and believable these steps can make your commercial performance!

It’s like Robin Williams said, “The more personal and specific you are, the more your audience will relate to you.”

You are going to be nervous at auditions – no doubt about it. But you can still have fun. Here’s how:

• Arrive at your audition/booking at least a half hour early and ask if you can get your script ahead of time.
• Go somewhere where you can prepare and make your choices in privacy (this is extremely important. Remember: the other actors there are not your friends. Don’t get caught up in trivial conversations or checking your phone. Your time is precious!)
• Once you’ve made your specific choices, practice some relaxation techniques, clear your mind, stretch and listen to soothing music. By doing these things you will be releasing useless, negative thoughts and making room for your imagination to run wild!
• Did I mention do not check your cell phone? There is probably no other invention today that does more to zap an actor’s creativity than the cell phone. This is because when you are looking down at that phone you are not observing the world  around you. As actors, it is our responsibility to be “students of life.”
• Practice living in the present moment. When you are present, you perceive emotions and nuances that are “gifts” for your performance.

Each one of us were experts at having fun – until we reached the age when recess stopped!  As children, play-acting was second-nature; we didn’t think about it, we just did it.

Our goal is to look at the recording booth as our playground. So…go have fun, and get paid doing it!

Nancy Wilson is a busy voice-over actor in Los Angeles and is currently training with the legendary comedy group ‘The Groundlings’. She just booked the role of “mom” in SAG/AFTRA’s Old Time Radio show, Father Knows Best. You can find her on Facebook and on her website: www.nancywilsonvo.com.

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You’re in front of the mic and ready to speak, sing, perform a dialog, when the recording sign is turned on and the sound engineer says, “Wait, I’m already getting some mouth noise.”

Really?  How is that possible? I haven’t said anything yet!

Dry mouth, or xerostomia (not to be confused with a disease from the planet Xeros), manifests itself with pops, clicks, hoarseness, and an overall sticky feeling inside of your mouth.  Causes of dry mouth can be anything from a lack of saliva to disease or infection, medicines or medical treatments, tobacco use, alcohol consumption, or dehydration from sickness.  Stress and anxiety can also contribute to dry mouth, so if you have more than a few butterflies at performance time, your symptoms could be heightened.

While post production can work miracles in removing mouth noises from recordings, it’s certainly better to eliminate or reduce the snap, crackle, pops, and bubbles from the source.

General suggestions for on the spot fixes are as simple as chewing on sugar-free gum (not while recording!) or drinking plenty of room temperature water to help keep your mouth moist.

Take a break between sets and give your teeth and tongue a thorough brushing with a flouride toothpaste. I encourage a flouride toothpaste even if the water in your living area is flouridated.  After eating, sugars and starches remain in your mouth and on your teeth.  Bacteria likes to snack on these sugars and starches, releasing acid in the process.  A flouride toothpaste can protect your teeth from this acid and make your tooth enamel stronger.  You want to have a nice, bright smile when delivering your lines.

Check your pharmacy for an effective oral rinse, (i.e., Biotene and Act both have an oral rinse for dry mouth.)   Remember to read the listed ingredients for mouthwashes and don’t use any that contain alcohol.

Get in the habit of breathing through your nose instead of your mouth.  Not only can this help with keeping saliva in your mouth, you’ll have less breath noise to edit out of performance files.

If your living or working environment tends to be dry, perhaps using a humidifier will help.

And once again, limit caffeine and avoid tobacco.

Be conscious of your diet.  Do you notice increased mouth noise after eating certain foods, candies, or drinks?  You may have food sensitivities that are affecting saliva production thus increasing your dry mouth/mouth noise.  With chronic mouth noise it is often worth isolating and eliminating certain foods or food groups for a short period (three to four weeks) to see if you or the director or sound engineer notice any differences.

Natural remedies abound.  Cinnamon, ginger, black pepper, and cayenne pepper are just a few of the spices touted for helping with dry mouth, when mixed with water, honey, vinegar, lemon, or other juices.  I personally find that adding cayenne pepper to a glass of water with a few drops of lemon juice does the trick.  If you find that drinking this mixture is too difficult, simply sprinkle cayenne on some healthy vegetables.

Granny Smith apples get the green light on helping with mouth noise.  With a tart taste, these green slices not only contribute to balancing the smacking sounds, but many medical studies have shown cardiovascular, as well as anti-asthma benefits.

Pineapple, with its high level of acid, and grapefruit, with its hefty water content is another advantageous fix to mouth noise.  Cut in chunks, they package easily and can simply be added to your survival bag that accompanies you to the studio.

One of my colleagues swears by olive oil or canola oil to help alleviate mouth noise.  A teaspoon swished around in the mouth and he says he’s ready to ride, or speak, sing, okay, vocally perform, as the case may be.

Just be prepared for the occasional click, smack, or pop and have your personal collection of remedies handy!  Happy Voicing!

Angela Castonguay is a successful voice-over artist, coach, and author, whose book Feeding Your Voice provides an essential guide to voice care. For more of her work, visit her website angelacastonguay.homestead.com.

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