The Art of Radio Announcing

(Disclaimer: right now there is limited editing ability, so please forgive the formatting issues.)

Have you ever listened to a radio commercial and thought to yourself…”I could do that...and better than they do!” You know, sometimes the voices sound amateurish, or too loud or seem to put the emphasis on the wrong words.

One day I was talking to Ravishal Bentham, the owner of Konastream Radio. Konastream is played extensively in SL and can also be found on the Internet. Anyway, Rav was talking about having someone record some spot announcements for Kona. I said to myself “Hey, I know I could do that!” So I asked if I could be considered and Rav asked for a demo of my voice.

Recording a little demo of my voice wasn’t too hard. I did that and sent it off to him. He responded rather quickly. He sent me a list of one sentence statements to record about Kona radio, asking me to record each one three times and he would pick the best of the three. Great, I thought!

So I started in and I quickly discovered there is a real art to this! Try saying “Kona Radio” three times and trying to make it sound natural. Where do you place the emphasis? Which word is more important? Do you say it slow or fast? How do you enunciate clearly so that it is understandable? It’s nerve-wracking to try to get it just right. And add to that the limitation of recording with a cheap home headset and laptop…well, you get the picture.

I recorded those spots over and over and over…trying to get them just right. It is a lot of work…much more than I realized at the beginning. Rav kindly took a few of the spots I recorded and actually played them on Kona. Everytime I heard one, I was both proud “Hey, that’s ME!” and embarrassed, because I know they sounded amateurish.

Now when I listen to a radio commercial, I have a much better appreciation for the effort that goes into getting the voice just right. It is an art!