Frank Frederick to Voice “Monster Energy” Supercross Review

Frank Frederick has been chosen once again to be the VO for the 2008 “Monster Energy” Supercross Review which will air on CBS and SPEED-TV in Canada and the U.S.A.; Sunday May 4th, 2008 (Check local listings). Frank has been “the voice” for the Supercross Preview and Review for the past two years as well as the MonsterJam (Monster Truck) Review in 2007.

This show is a review of the SX Season from start to the previous evenings finish; just hours earlier. The years wrap up of the season includes the final standings and awards for each of the Pro Motorcycle racing events plus a look at top riders of the year as they raced for victory.

The FIM and the AMA have combined this year to create one winners circle for the year. Riders for teams Honda, Monster Kawasaki, Yamaha, WBR Rockstar Suzuki, MDK Honda, Team San Manuel, and others compete in one of the countries top viewed racing sports.

For current standings click on http://www.supercrossonline.com for details of the season.

Source: Frank Frederick

“The Art and Science of Self-Evaluation” now available on CD

Professional Voice Talent, teacher and MCA-I Member Connie Terwilliger’s 3-hour presentation during VOICE 2007 - “The Art and Science of Self-Evaluation: Do you have what it takes to make Big Money with your voice?” - is now available for purchase.

This two CD set includes an additional seven minutes on self-evaluation created for a podcast and comes with an 18 page workbook. It may be purchased online at Connie’s website.

It offers insight on the tools required to be successful as a professional voice over talent and cover four key elements:

• Talent: Is your voice in demand or does it need a bit of work? What is your signature sound, your money voice? Big money takes something unique and special that grabs people by the ear. It’s a combination of your natural ability and acting know how.

• Business: You need to know that you can actually run an office, negotiate rates and get invoices sent out. Follow up, due diligence, customer relationship management (CRM). Do you need the security of a regular paycheck?

• Marketing: Marketing is a major part of voice over career. Market yourself by following up, meeting new contacts, and advertising your services. Do you know how to do this? Do you hate to do this?

• Technology: In today’s world, technology places a large role in how voice talent do business. Research hardware and software but also know your limitations.

The formula for success is simple: “Find the people who want to buy what you have to sell.” But first you have to know what you have to sell. You have to know how to approach the people who want to buy it. Then you need to create something to give then that shows them that they want you.

This CD set will step you through these basics and is great for a broad range of people - the wannabe, the newbie, the part-timer looking for extra income, or the pro looking for new markets. It is not about acting, but about understanding IF you can act.

Spend 3 hours with Connie as she works the crowd and helps you find out if you have what it takes to make Big Money with your voice.

Connie Terwilliger is a working voice talent and scriptwriter. She teaches voice acting and media performance classes at San Diego City College when she is not in her studio recording voice tracks for clients around the globe. Additionally, Connie is Past President of the National Board of Directors of the Media Communications Association-International (MCA-I). www.mca-i.org You will find script samples and audio demos on her website at www.corporatevideo.com

Source: Connie Terwilliger

Ancient Audio Makes Debut 150 Years Later

An “ethereal” 10 second clip of a woman singing a French folk song has been played for the first time in 150 years. The recording of “Au Clair de la Lune”, recorded in 1860, is thought to be the oldest known recorded human voice.

A phonograph of Thomas Edison singing a children’s song in 1877 was previously thought to be the oldest record.The new “phonautograph”, created by etching soot-covered paper, has now been played by US scientists using a “virtual stylus” to read the lines.”

When I first heard the recording as you hear it … it was magical, so ethereal,” audio historian David Giovannoni, who found the recording, told AP.

“The fact is it’s recorded in smoke. The voice is coming out from behind this screen of aural smoke.”

The short song was captured on April 9, 1860 by a phonautograph, a device created by a Parisian inventor, Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville.

The device etched representations of sound waves into paper covered in soot from a burning oil lamp. Lines were scratched into the soot by a needle moved by a diaphragm that responded to sound. The recordings were never intended to be played. It was retrieved from Paris by Mr Giovanni, working with First Sounds, a group of audio historians, recording engineers and sound archivists who aim to make mankind’s earliest sound recordings available to all.

To retrieve the sounds scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) in California made very high-resolution digital scans of the paper and used a “virtual stylus” to read the scrawls. However, because the phonautograph recordings were made using a hand-cranked device, the speed varied throughout, changing the pitch.

“If someone’s singing at middle C and the crank speeds up and slows down, the waves change shape and are shifting, Earl Cornell, a scientist at LBNL, told AP.

“We had a tuning fork side by side with the recording, so you can correct the sound and speed variations.”

Previously, the oldest known recorded voice was thought to be Thomas Edison’s recording of Mary had a little lamb. The inventor of the light bulb recorded the stanza to test another of his inventions - the phonograph - in 1877.

“It doesn’t take anything away from Thomas Edison, in my opinion,” Mr Giovannoni told Reuters.”

But actually, the truth is he was the first person to have recorded [sound] and played it back.”

The new recording will be presented on 28 March at a conference of the Association for Recorded Sound Collections at Stanford University in California.

Source: BBC News

Rita Pardue’s Nothing-To-Do Fun Shop Chronicled in new eBook

The Nothing-To-Do Fun Shop was produced in conjunction with California State University-Los Angeles as Rita’s Master’s degree project. The program aired on KWNK in the San Fernando Valley and later was welcomed at KCSN in Northridge, California.

This activity/devotional book chronicles the first season’s activities as they appeared in the Los Angeles Family Magazine. Each activity page includes an inspirational family-favorite Bible verse to memorize. Rita Pardue developed a class curriculum traveling to schools teaching radio-related topics including scriptwriting, public speaking and audio production.

Pardue’s passion for children’s radio programming and ten years of producing this non-profit show earned her the Los Angeles Times/NBC 4 Women Making History Award recognizing her goal to provide children and their families with wholesome entertainment and a love for theater of the mind that only radio can deliver so well.

Rita Pardue, MA, BA Radio/TV/Broadcasting has over 20 years experience in radio and voiceovers. She is the owner of Angel Wings Productions. She was the Mid-day LA Host for KKLA,the number one Christian radio station in Los Angeles, 1998-2004. She is a speaker, author and educator.

Rita has created award-winning production, under her company “Angel Wings Productions”, working with clients that include: Walt Disney Home Video, Fisher-Price, Sanrio, Time Warner, and Living Air Products to name just a few.

Source: Rita Pardue via Christian Services Network

Me Talk Pretty One Day

I often imagine that the voice heard on an audio book is the voice of the book’s author, but most of the time I am wrong. Talented voice actors usually provide the narration. Some of Salem Public Library’s devoted audio book fans become just as fond of the actors as of the books themselves. Doubtless there are some authors who should never narrate the audio version of their own literary baby, but with many writers, it’s a treat to hear the author read his or her own words. Here are some of my favorites.

When it was first published, I read Bill Bryson’s memoir, “The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid” and loved it. I love the audio book more. Bryson, although born and raised in Des Moines, Iowa, has spent most of his adult life in England.

He has developed a peculiar accent — not quite British, but definitely not typical of a son of the Hawkeye state. His plummy accent, added to a delivery that can only be described as perpetual astonishment, makes the audio book a delight.

Radio personalities are natural choices for self-read books. Listeners would probably riot if anyone other than Garrison Keillor read his many Lake Wobegon tales. “This American Life”’s Sarah Vowell and David Sedaris bring us a variety of audio gems. Vowell, a self-proclaimed nerd, has a squeaky, nasal voice that might be annoying if she weren’t so funny and smart. Listening to her “Partly Cloudy Patriot,” a series of essays on the nature of patriotism is like listening to that brilliant, slightly subversive kid we all knew in high school. Sedaris has recorded many of his books, including “Holidays on Ice,” “Me Talk Pretty One Day,” and “Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim.” He writes about everything from his job as an elf in a department store Christmas extravaganza to struggling to learn French, and it is all funny. Also enjoyable is “Fresh Air’s” book critic Maureen Corrigan’s “Leave me Alone, I’m Reading.”

Sometimes a good audiobook can introduce a listener to a subject he or she might not ordinarily choose. This was true for me of “Freakonomics” by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner. Read by Dubner, this book discusses some of the surprising factors, from cheating to child-rearing, that the authors claim are what really make our economy tick.

Another fine offering is “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” by Barbara Kingsolver. Kingsolver, best known for her fiction, tells the true story of her family’s move to Appalachia. We hear the voices of the whole Kingsolver clan as they tell of their attempt to get back to the land.

Source: WilliametteLive.com

AFTRA Votes to Suspend Joint Bargaining Agreement with SAG

In an abrupt move, AFTRA’s national board of directors Saturday overwhelmingly voted to suspend its joint bargaining agreement with SAG and negotiate its primetime TV contract alone with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

SAG’s national board was notified of the decision by AFTRA’s president Roberta Reardon and national officers Susan Boyd Joyce, Denny Delk, Bob Edwards, Matt Kimbrough and Shelby Scott at what was to be an afternoon joint meeting of both unions’ national boards. In a statement, Reardon said over the last year, AFTRA has worked hard to “maintain the integrity” of the joint bargaining process, “so we could sit across the table from the industry with total and unequivocal unity.” She added, “SAG Leadership has made this impossible.”

She claims a recent attempt by SAG’s Hollywood leaders to “de-certify an AFTRA daytime soap opera,” is among the ways the union has “engaged in a relentless campaign of disinformation and disparagement.” As a result, she added, it shakes AFTRA’s confidence in SAG’s “ability to live up to the principles of partnership and union solidarity.” Reardon said AFTRA would now devote its energies to negotiating a new contract for its members as soon as possible, and she added hope that someday both actors unions can rebuild “the historic trust between these two organizations.

SAG president Alan Rosenberg blasted the decision, saying it is “calculated, cynical and may serve the interests of their institution, but not its members.” Rosenberg said, “We remain focused on negotiating the best terms for actors covered by the TV theatrical contract. We spent weeks working with our fellow actors in AFTRA on joint proposals to improve the lives of all working actors.” Read more

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