The seeds of my voiceover career were sown while I was in high school in the mid-1960s. We had a campus radio station at which I was one of the first members. I continued to learn and grow in college radio and, while still a student, began my professional career in 1969. I worked as a radio DJ for the next 7 years and started picking up a few freelance voiceover jobs along the way.
In 1975 I was recruited by one of my voice over clients, an ad agency, to join their staff where I eventually became Creative Director.
In 1978 my old radio station asked me to come back as Production Director and I remained in that position until 1997. While there, another of my freelance clients, the leading local TV station, recruited me to become a staff announcer, a position I have held since 1986.
My training in the voice-over business began in college at the University of New Hampshire. While heavily involved with the campus radio station I had the opportunity to work with, and learn from, some extraordinarily talented people. In addition, several of my fellow students and I wanted more radio and TV education than the course of study initially offered, so we persuaded the Dean of the Speech & Drama Department (itself an offshoot of the English Department) to offer a degree program in Mass Communication. Not only did I subsequently receive a Bachelor of Arts degree in that major, but my friends and I were instrumental in developing the curriculum.
In my 30+ year professional career I have been equally fortunate to have worked with several more exceptionally gifted individuals (some would call them "genius") and have learned as much as I could absorb from them.
Sennheissher MKH-416 microphone, Harlan Hogan (MXL) VO: 1-A mic, ElectroVoice RE-20 mic, MXL V67N mic, Mackie 1202 VLZ Pro mixer, Focusrite Scarlet 6i6 digital interface, dbx 286a pre-amp, MicPort Pro pre-amp, Creative Labs Extiigy audio board,
Dell Optiplex 960 computer, Dell Latitude E6410 computer,
Adobe Audition recording/editing software, Audacity recording/editing software.
Musicam Roadrunner ISDN Codec.
Besides being a voiceover artist, I spent 18 years as a radio Production Director. That job involved producing and editing countless hours of audio. Many of those early years were spent editing tape the old-fashioned way, with a razor blade between my teeth, but for at least the last decade I have worked with digital audio.
An additional requirement of my Production Director position was writing copy. Over the years I have written literally thousands of commercials, a number of which have won awards.
I have been a regular contributor of tool reviews and, occasionally, humor pieces to the national woodworking publication Woodcraft Magazine and was Associate Editor of "The Collins Complete Woodworker," a book co-produced by Harper Collins Publishers, Woodworkers Journal Magazine and the Smithsonian.