PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE (see "training and education in next category, too):
Computer-based training voice-guide (Spanish and English)
Voice of Children's interactive learning table.
Animated Voiceover for Cartoon Characters Training with Sarah Goldberg, Casting Director for Disney Animated Films (group and 1-to-1 training) November, 2011.
Children's interactive audiobooks (3 in a series) on iBooks, voiced each character and narrated in British English
Translate I-Pad apps/scripts from English to Spanish, then perform the voice-over
Radio Commercials (character voices)
Web-based character voices
Video Promo
Voice-mail/Telephone Communication systems
Textbook readings for the Blind
Actor/Narrator for church performances
Reader (Spanish and English) for the Winston-Salem Junior League's program
Read-to-Me
Voice Talent Agent/Coach
Producer of Voice Talent Demos/Auditions
Completed Ph.D. Coursework for Literacy Education
Doctoral Dissertation using a "Read Aloud" strategy to study reading
comprehension (miscue analysis)
MY STORY
My voice is a product of my life, my work and my travels. I was born in Indiana, the home of NO accent. As the youngest of three, I was left alone a lot, many times in front of the TV. Since I was six years old, I have been fascinated with the voices on commercials, trailers, narrated videos, trains, radio announcements, etc. I wanted to be the one saying something important for everyone to hear. But, I moved to Lancaster, Pa. at the age of 10 and soon discovered that in my small school community, there were Dutch accents, Lancaster accents, New Jersey accents, Puerto Rican accents. While beginning to study Spanish, I became fascinated with the world of lingustics AND the world of voice-over. I worked at a resort hotel and interacted with so many different character types, I began to make a game out of imitating and learning the next persona or voice. Where were those voices coming from, and who were those people? And when I hear those voices on TV, do they get paid to record someone else's words or do they, themselves, write those words? Why do they call "pop" soda in Lancaster, and why do I get mocked in Ohio when I ask for a soda? Upon graduation from high school, I trained the Mexican, Puerto Rican and Venezuelan "national" elite gymnastics teams. I was floored by the fact that Spanish had as much variation in dialect as English, depending on region, education/socio-economic status, etc.
I moved to the South, where at 20 years old I met and married a Southern girl with NO southern accent! Her mother was from New Jersey! While studying to be a Spanish teacher, I also studied English linguistics and ESL. I learned English diction from a Theater Arts teacher, whose main goal was to eradicate the Southern accent from his department's Communications/Broadcasting majors. I was the only one without an accent, so he worked with me on "delivery." This evolved into voice-over.
For me, voice-over of ANY sort was, and still is, is a pleasure: narrating books, even textbooks, reading literature or content books aloud to adult students with little or no literacy, etc.
While my interest in voice-over never faded, I did begin to express my passion in different ways. With a Ph.D. in Education and with a great deal of experience teaching Spanish to adult learners, I began to help students write scripts in Spanish and videotape them. At the same time, I read aloud voraciously to my own children, and then began to volunteer to read to the community children at the local Children's Museum, both in Spanish and in English. For example, I read all 504 poems of a book with the same title when my daughter was only 5 months old.
Since Jim Dale's work on Harry Potter and the Sourcerer's Stone, I have been much more intentional about realizing the dream that began at six years old. I have acted in plays, read HUNDREDS of books aloud to my children with the goal of improving my repertoire of voice-over skills. Then, a friend recommended Such-a-Voice seminars, who, in turn, recommended Voice123. The rest, as they say, is History. THAT is why you are reading this "as we speak."
HIgh School Choir
Actor: Mayor Munchkin in "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz"
B.A. Spanish, North Carolina State University
Actor in three Spanish plays
Master of Arts in Teaching Spanish, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Reader/Recorder of Textbooks for Blind Students at UNC-Chapel Hill.
Ph.D. Curriculum and Instruction, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
(concentrations in Literacy Education and Foreign Language Methodology)
Actor/Acrobat: Church performances
Volunteer Reader for Winston-Salem Children's Museum in Spanish and English
Trainer for Clients in Dragon Naturally Speaking (voice/text software) and Pro-Tools
Master Class Graduate: Such-a-Voice, December, 2007.
I use the following in a Whisper Room Enhance studio.
Mac Book Pro
Pro-Tools LE
GT50 Class A FET Microphone
Pop Screen
MBox 2
I am able to make good quality dry recordings and edit out breaths if needed. I can also make multiple recordings with a different "angle" at each take. Without direction, I can usually read copy with different perspectives, emphases, etc. With Pro-Tools, I can edit the dry recording to match any specs provided and/or context or environment (i.e., in a car, in an old government building, in a crowd, etc.
I have EXTENSIVE editing and writing experience, and can gladly edit/write script. However, professionally, as a voice-over talent, I am also able to read the script I am handed, respecting the various professionals present during a recording session.
One of the scripts I wrote has already landed me two jobs. I wrote it in order to audition for a web character described as "soft, southern military officer."
I have not only taught college writing classes and consulted in editorial capacities on many projects, but I also teach pre-service teachers how to teach writing. I am currently writing a book with a close friend, and another with my daughter.