Harnessing your Natural Speaking Voice- It’s Probably Perfectly Fine!
The northeastern air is becoming crisper.. baseball is winding down- or
should I say up?... and the addiction to outdoor swimming doesn’t feel as
compelling.
With these observations comes inspiration to open my Stevens Nomenclature
book to more of you. We’ll start with Home Base.. and move on to
Breaststroking In next time.
Home Base
For all of us who believe we ‘recognize someone’s voice’ : the reason for
this is that each of us speaks in a unique fluctuation of pitch.
It’s the rolling incantation of voice and speech sounds that carries our
message to a listener’s ear. If you picture the 5-lines on which music
is written- somewhere around the middle is a black dot- or note- that
signifies your personal ‘Home Base’. This is your own ‘neutral pitch’.
It’s the place you ‘start from’ most often when you speak.
When we begin to speak- we essentially have 3 choices: We can start from
Home Base.. or from a spot that is slightly higher or slightly lower.
The reality is that the rise and fall in pitch of our personal speaking
voices doesn’t travel that far from Home.
The majority of my clients who need ‘voice work’ have invariably lost their
Home Base in effort to project their voice.. in effort to sound ‘urgent’..
or when trying to artificially make their information sound ‘interesting’.
Whether you’re anchoring, tracking or doing a standup- the trick is to
figure out or re-discover your Home Base- and then roll out your speaking
from there. This concept is great for speakers who become incrementally
higher without realizing it.. and for speakers who end up talking from their
‘neck and face’ in effort to project and ‘speak with authority’.
For many new or semi-seasoned ‘speaking journalists’: it’s important to
know your Home Base- and to easily and naturally tap into it. The
presentation of your journalism is a litany of starting.. stopping..
starting .. stopping.. Ie. you have infinite opportunities to restart
from your base.. or to lose your way. With a nod to Thomas Wolfe-
these folks often find they can’t go home again.
2 common ways to find your Home Base:
a- When you’re listening to someone and you hear yourself saying ‘ok’
or ‘got it’ out of politeness (ie. yup- I hear you) : the long /a/ in ok or
the /ah/ in got should be pretty close to your Home Base. This comes
from the fact that you’ve phonated without worrying about how you’ll sound…
you’re not carrying a message (ie. information or a sentence).. and you’re
essentially making a neutral ‘non-semantic’ utterance.
b- If you’re tracking or doing a standup: try doing a 3-2-1 countdown.
Your goal is to hit your Home Base starting from ‘3’.. so you now have 2
opportunities to make an honest mistake. The idea is to ‘feel the 3’..
relax into your phonation as you say it.. and let your ‘2’ and ‘1’ ever so
slightly fall into a “1-1-1” phonation that feels very comfortable..
neutral.. and sounds pleasant. If you believe your ‘3’ has pretty much
nailed your Home Base- then the ‘2’ and ‘1’ will serve to reinforce it.
* Always remember that it’s important to phonate ‘from your stomach’- as we
discussed in an earlier blog. Your countdown can be done in one
continuous stomach-pulling-in flow. Or if you’re trying to improve
your breathing and resonance- ie. trying to take your voice ‘out of your
face and neck’ and more into a torso rumble- try doing your 3-2-1 in a
series of 3 stomach pumps in. (Bingo! Who knew you’d learn to belly
dance as a bonus?)
Common Pitfalls
Once you have the ‘feel of the 1’ in your countdown- you are ready to start
speaking. Be careful not to do a stupendous ‘3-2-1’ and then default
right back to your ‘old voice’ as you start speaking! It’s a common mistake-
but if you record your practice you’ll hear it.
Remember- the idea is not to flatten your voice.. but rather to learn to
start speaking from the natural, comfortable pitch. It’s most likely
the spot that you target all day long- when you’re not worrying about
‘how you sound’!
Next time- Breaststroking In.
3-2-1… signing off. !
Joanne Stevens
Previously featured on
the Radio Television Digital News Association
as the News Coach blog series.
