VO-BB - 20 YEARS OLD!

Lee Gordon · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 1:37 am Post subject:

When I was a senior in high school, a fellow student (Curt Hansen, who later went on to be a successful radio Hobo Laughing

& consultant) was taking a survey, asking kids if we'd like to have a student-run radio station. I said "sign me up."

After high school radio came college radio.

1969 - Junior year in college, I got my first paying radio DJ job at WHEB in Portsmouth, NH.

1970 - Better paying job at cross-town rival station WBBX.

1971 - Returned to WHEB as part-time newscaster. Also got weekend job at hometown station WFEA in Manchester, NH.

1972-74 - Full time afternoon drive DJ at WFEA.

1974-75 - Midday, then PM drive DJ at WPOP in Hartford, CT. Started freelance VO career with spots for a couple of station clients and for friend who owned Brentco, a Hartford ad agency.

1976-78 - Copywriter, then Creative Director at Brentco.

1978-97 - Returned to WPOP (&FM sister station) as Production Director and continued to do freelance VO on the side. In 1986, one of those freelance gigs led to part-time job as station announcer for WFSB-TV, Channel 3, the Hartford CBS affiliate (still have that gig).

1997-present - in anticipation or being downsized out of radio Production Director job, made plans to transition to full time VO. Been doing it ever since.
_________________
Lee Gordon, O.A.V.
Voice President of the United States
www.leegordonproductions.com
Twitter: @LeeGordonVoice

Kristin Lennox · Flight Attendant Joined: 30 Apr 2011 Posts: 858

BA in Theatre ---> stage ---> on-camera ---> VO.

But I still do stage -- I have two performances of Father of the Bride today alone. Smile

VO pays the bills, but theater feeds my soul.
_________________
Always look on the bright side of life.

Dee doo. Dee doot doot doo dee doo.

my website

Tracy Kinkead · Joined: 17 Nov 2012 Posts: 13 Location: Muscle Shoals, AL

It seems many of us have radio in common. Which is a bit of a surprise considering the somewhat "anti-radio" and yes even condescending attitude I encountered from some established VO's when I started dabbling. Maybe it was just by chance that I ran into a few voice artists with that attitude when I got started, but it really did feel like an "Established VO vs Radio Interloper" vibe.

I don't have a blog post...so here goes...

Anyway, long time radio vet. College radio in '85 with my first paying gig in '87 at a couple small stations in mid Missouri. Since then up until around February '12, radio has been my bread and butter. But as you radio vets know there's not a lot of "bread" in radio. At first, as a young single guy the low pay wasn't that big of an issue. But when you add a wife (then ex's) and children, it became an issue.

I've pretty much always had side job for extra money. Many years working a few hours a week in my father's business. The about 12 years ago I found myself in a somewhat unique position of working for two radio stations...not the same company. I commute 37 miles to the station I'm program director, and where I live is a small home town type station. I worked several years doing mornings there and driving to my main gig in Muscle Shoals, AL.

Well that ended in December of '11 when the home town station was sold. I thought, "Okay, what now? Deliver pizzas on the side?" I had a radio friend who got a couple of jobs at a P2P site. I began researching and then dabbling in February '12. Within 5 months I had made more with VO than I ever had in a year with my part-time job.

I started VO to try and make a little extra money each month, but now consider it my "second career" along side my radio job. And honestly I feel like VO has "saved" my radio career. Anyone familiar with the changes in the radio industry over the past 25 years knows what I mean.
_________________
Tracy Kinkead
www.renegadevoice.com

Monk · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 10:21 am Post subject:

Let's see.

In High School while working at the local supermarket, they asked me to record the announcements for in store specials.

After a 6 year stint in the USAF, I went to Northeast Broadcasting and landed my first radio gig. Met Cathy, moved to another radio gig. Went back to school for a degree in Computer Graphics and animation, did VO for several films and animation. (I'm the voice of the Borg in Star Trek:The Experience)

Started doing commercial work with some local studios. Got an agent who insists on putting me on-camera several times a year. I do a lot of theater, going from show to show to show..

Built my own studio, in there a lot doing everything from eLearning to recording robo-call political stuff.

Tah Dah!
_________________
Company, villainous company, hath been the spoil of me...

www.monksvoice.com

Bob Bergen · CM Joined: 22 Apr 2008 Posts: 981

Scott Pollak · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 2:00 pm Post subject:

Lee Gordon · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 3:09 pm Post subject:

Regarding the perceived anti-radio bias, we have to keep in mind there are a couple of different strata of former (or present) radio people: there are the people who have never talked into a microphone at a radio station other than to be "boss jocks," the guys and gals who spin the "Platters that Matter," the "Stacks of Wax for the Jills & Jacks," as well as the news readers who are charged with presenting "just the facts" with as little personality as possible. In either case, if they did any commercials at all, the were limited to straight reads in the same style as they performed their primary on-air functions. These are the people the "no-radio" buyers are seeking to avoid.

The other group of radio vets -- the one most of us here fall into -- are the ones who were involved in production. We were the ones who produced, and perhaps even wrote, and definitely voiced, the "good" commercials, those that exhibited some creativity. In the process, we had the opportunity to hone our acting and timing skills and prepare for our future lives as voiceoverists.
_________________
Lee Gordon, O.A.V.
Voice President of the United States
www.leegordonproductions.com
Twitter: @LeeGordonVoice

vkuehn · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 3:22 pm Post subject:

I did my radio days long, long ago. Then I did "the Moses" thing and wandered in the wilderness for 40 years doing whatever it took to not move my family around like I did in the radio days.

So when I began reading and hearing the "anti radio bias" message from the V-O world, I got the idea that not only was there bias against the old timers who did dry-reads during station breaks between network feeds... but I read loud-and-clear there is also significant bias against more modern-day radio-production style delivery.

I don't doubt some of you are making a good living at V-O by delivering to radio stations the kind of production-voice material you did when you populated the studio. I'm going to guess this works well when your client is a local radio station and they want you to da what someone would still be doing right in their studio if they could afford someone full-time in the new "radio economy".

I'm not far enough into my V-O career to deliver a speech on the subject but I have done a pretty thorough research and the chatter is: Ditch the "radio voice" if you are going to do national advertising; ditch the radio voice if you are going to do long-form stuff like e-learning, book narration, etc.

I guess we each find our niche. At my age, I walked right on past the door marked "v-o for the radio industry" and began knocking on the doors of the folks who purchase long form. If we have this discussion again a year from now, maybe I will deliver a speech for that event. Laugh

Jeffrey Kafer · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 3:53 pm Post subject:

I'll throw out another perspective from someone who has NO radio experience. I see a lot of radio people who think that it's natural progression to go from radio to VO. Why? Because both professions use microphones?

If that's it, then we should extend the courtesy to bingo callers and auction barkers.
_________________
Jeff
http://JeffreyKafer.com
Voice-overload Web comic: http://voice-overload.com

Lee Gordon · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 4:04 pm Post subject:

Jason Huggins · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 5:10 pm Post subject:

A lot of those guys are us now though. "Now approaching Washington Street...Washington Street is next."

Scott Pollak · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 6:50 pm Post subject:

Mike Harrison · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 9:04 pm Post subject:

Jason Huggins · Posted: Sun Sep 22, 2013 10:15 pm Post subject:

I guess I forgot to add that I was a performing musician for about 10 years before trying VO. The vocal training and experience behind a mic really did give me a leg up when I started training for VO. I'd say singers (at least trained singers) have some basics that someone without vocal training doesn't have.

Radio also seems to have a lot of transferable skills, though. I don't think I would say that radio prepares someone to be an voice 'actor' per se, but there is quite a bit to a VO business that has nothing to do with acting chops.

Philip Banks · Posted: Mon Sep 23, 2013 1:02 am Post subject:

Helps if you can bore people witless on the subject of how your experience somehow qualifies you yet excludes others.

I was giving an after dinner speech several years ago and during the Q&As

"Philip, what qualifications do you need to be a Voice Over?" asked the assistant head of something for a Bank.

"Minimum entry level double first in Law and Economics from Merton College, Oxford"

The truth is - Have the reading ability of the average 8 year old girl with the vibrant wonder and imagination of a 5 year old boy. Combine those two things and the earth will be yours and everything in it. Everyone else will simply sound either affected or medicated.