BY MARC CASHMAN
via www.backstage.com
Narrating an audiobook is the most challenging work you can do in voiceover. It takes myriad skills to navigate them successfully but if you can master the 10 skills below, you’ll be successful in accomplishing a performance most audiobook listeners take for granted.
1. Articulation
This involves enunciating words and phrases correctly, clearly, and cleanly. There should be no over- or under-articulation (unless it’s a character); no sibilance or whistling (most commonly heard on the letter S or soft C) or lisping, and little to no mouth noise.
2. Breathing
You must have enough breath so you don’t run out of air at the end of sentences or gasp for breath between or inside sentences. There should be no fading, swallowing, or gulping. Breath control also involves controlling plosives (popping P’s or hard consonants), keeping your volume consistent, and projecting appropriately. It involves managing mouth noise and throat clearing. Too much will require a lot of editing and, subsequently, audiobook companies will not hire talent who require a lot of post-production attention.
3. Delivery
The ability to tell a story compellingly is what constitutes solid delivery. Your delivery must be appropriate to the spirit of the text and the author’s intent and must be consistent throughout the narration. As you’ll most likely be narrating over several days, your voice must match itself from day to day, both in pitch and energy.
Timing and pacing are additional elements of professional delivery and need to be appropriate to the text. Repetitive cadence and pitch patterns must be avoided at all costs—each sentence should be varied slightly so as not to become predictable. Listeners may not know what you’re going to say next, but if you’re constantly starting and ending sentences the same way, they’ll know how you’re going to say it.
4. Eye-Brain-Mouth Control
This skill involves reading the script accurately (not omitting, adding or changing words/phrases). Narrators must strive to mitigate the amount of mistakes/corrections in their delivery. Scanning ahead is crucial because the more mistakes you make, the longer it will take you to narrate the book and the less money you’ll make per finished hour. The ability to lift words off the page effortlessly is a skill that takes a lot of practice.
5. Consistency
Energy, articulation, breath control, pitch control, and characterization are all areas where solid consistency will get a narrator hired repeatedly because audiobook publishers can count on them to deliver.
6. Analysis
This requires understanding the story arc and the characters (in fiction), discerning your listening audience, and employing the appropriate delivery. It involves understanding concepts and making them understandable to the listener.
7. Characterization
Bringing life to your characters is a must. They must be distinct from each other and consistent in their tone, attitude, age, and accent. Their voices much match their given character descriptions (if there are any).
8. Separation
This skill requires no “spillover” or “bleeding” between narrator and character. Making sure the narrator says phrases like “he said” or “she said” before or after a character speaks—in the narrator’s voice, not the character’s—is essential in audiobook narration.
9. Stamina
An audiobook narrator spends approximately four to six hours behind a microphone, per day. This requires unflagging energy and the ability to sound as strong at the end of the day as the beginning. Narrators who are physically fit and emotionally stable will be able to muster the stamina necessary to sustain a professional narration. Performing a 30-second spot is like running a 50-yard dash; a 60-second spot is like a running 100-yard dash; an audiobook is like running a marathon.
10. Investment
All successful narrations demand that the reader be invested in and emotionally connected to what he or she is describing. Painting a picture vocally—as opposed to just reading the words—is what makes for a great narration. Being truly interested in the subject matter, even if it’s boring, draws the listener in, garners great reviews, and motivates an audiobook publisher to hire a talent repeatedly.
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