Where voice reigns supreme

I just came back from a fantastic new movie. If In a World...  is playing in a theatre near you, go! It's very cleverly written (winning Best Screenplay at Sundance) and directed by the talented Lake Bell. A blend of romcom and family dramedy, it is a funny and heart-warming film. But voice coaches like me and our clients will appreciate it on a different level: it offers a glimpse of the actual work that produces those rich, compelling tones we hear in movie trailers and on TV. In homage to the late, great Don LaFontaine, we also see the payoff that comes when you can make your sound convey so much more that words alone do.

This movie shines a spotlight on the little known, but very important corner of the world inhabited by unseen, ubiquitous voice artists. As the Big Producer played by Geena Davis says to our heroine Carol Soloman (also played brilliantly by Ms. Bell), what these people do is important, because "voice is power."

I won't spoil the movie for you by giving away the ending, but as I walked out of the theatre minutes ago I felt tremendously validated. It shows people who make their living from making sound as they ply their craft--doing so much more than just reading what is in front of them. Most people are unaware, but it takes work to get your sound "in shape." Vocal exercises are just a part of what I do with clients and students, but they are a foundational building block. Speaking is a physical activity, and your speaking technique depends on your ability to have a powerful voice. This, in turn, is made by discovering and strengthening your own powerful sound. And that sound depends on a variety of factors, only some of which you can control. So you better believe you need to exercise control over the ones you can!

Most of my clients come to me because they have realized that to get from where they are to where they want to be they need to step up their vocal and speaking game. And that means learning new skills, and yes, making funny faces and silly sounds. But it is all worth it, because in the end they have new techniques to integrate into their everyday speaking. And a more powerful sound.

But don't take my word for it: go see Lake Bell's very funny movie! And be thankful you are not trying to make a living in the hyper-competitive world of movie trailer voice-overs.

When Faith speaks...

I was thrilled to hear Susan Stamberg's interview on NPR yesterday morning with artist Faith Ringgold. I have long admired Ringgold's art. One of my kid's favorite childhood books was Tar Beach , based on her famous story quilt of the same name. I have successfully used that book, with its

Faith Ringgold, portrait by Grace Matthews

magical story and gorgeous illustrations, as a jumping-off point for many elementary school drama workshops over the years. Every child wants to fly over the city like Cassie Louise--doing it in the classroom, though, takes some imagination!

Ringgold tells Stamberg that she started out as a landscape painter in the '60's, but was persuaded by a gallery owner to use her art to reflect the social upheaval and violence of that time. (Her work from the late 1960's is on exhibit now at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C.) But her canvasses showed "Too damn much," she says. When she finally started putting her art on quilts, and adding narrative structure, she hit on something special that audiences responded to, and it was not just their comfort level with the medium. "I think it had a lot to do that it was a familiar medium and people liked stories. They like them. Yes. I think I had struck on a combination of imagery and politics that worked and people said OK."

It is true that we understand the world through story--I even blogged about it, see The Power of Story. And story can also be a balm. In Rx Storytelling I discuss the importance of connectional narrative.

But Ringgold relates story to scope and organization. Her paintings were more abstract, open to interpretation, showing us what the artist saw and felt, but not letting the viewer discover the truth for her/himself. "And I think that it had something to do with the fact that paintings people really don't understand. They don't understand how big - they don't really get paintings-" Ringgold reached some big conclusions in her paintings, and her audience didn't always get there with her, because they were coming in at the end of the story. In her quilts, she can make statements that are every bit as bold and provocative, but the viewer/audience has joined on the journey, and so understands.

I think this is a useful image for us to keep in mind whenever we speak. Because we always have a greater chance of reaching understanding when we make sure our conversation partners have heard the whole narrative arc. We do forget, though. But thinking of Ringgold and her "quilt epiphany" might help each of us remember that no one can read our mind: we must express ourselves, however imperfectly, with the tools we have at hand.

What I learned on Mr. Jefferson's mountain

Last week I took a trip back in time and visited Thomas Jefferson's magnificent mountaintop home, Monticello. During a lovely tour of the house I become viscerally aware of Jefferson's great appetite for learning as I passed through his collection of books, art and artifacts. Here lived a man who adapted the best of everything he ever saw to his "retirement" home in Virginia. The downstairs "dependencies" --which would be out-buildings at other plantations--demonstrate, perhaps even more clearly, his genius at synthesizing what he learned in his travels. The multi-burner cooktop that his cooks used to make a variety of French sauces was amazing!

But one other thing that jumped out at me: in all the signage around Monticello, in the stories told by all three of our tour guides (in the house, on the grounds and gardens, around the plantation community) "slaves" were referred to as ''enslaved persons." A quick look at the Monticello website, as well as that of the website accompanying the Smithsonian exhibit "Slavery at Jefferson's Monticello: Paradox of Liberty" shows few remaining references to "slaves." That demeaning term has mostly been replaced with the more accurate "enslaved men, women and children," or "the enslaved butler," etc.

And just like that there is a perceptual shift. The words change and something in our minds changes. We become more aware of the fact that these were people--fundamentally like all of us touring the grounds on a 93 degree day in July, 2013. But when they were forced into slavery, they became enslaved people. An adjective, not a noun.

Thomas Jefferson would have appreciated this, I think. He knew the power of words. Indeed, he requested that his gravestone refer not to what offices he held, what territories he purchased, even to what state capitols he designed. He wanted to be remembered as a writer and a lifelong learner:

Here was buried
Thomas Jefferson
Author of the Declaration of American Independence
of the Statute of Virginia for religious freedom
Father of the University of Virginia

Words--what they teach us, where they lead us--can shift our perspective and change the world. We would do well to respect their power.

What's in a name?

I am sure by now you have heard of KTVU anchorwoman who read false names of the Asiana Flight 214 crew that crashed in San Francisco. In case you haven't, here is a complete retelling of the story thus far, complete with video. I was forewarned when I first saw the video on Friday night, as my Twitter feed indicated the names were "phonetically offensive." Who wouldn't be curious to see what that meant? The names are definitely offensive. As we now know, they were confirmed by an NTSB intern. It is unclear where they originated.

After I saw the video and picked my jaw up off the floor, I made a mental note to remind all my clients how important it is to practice all the words you will be saying in a speech event, but especially foreign names. Usually this is because they might be hard to pronounce, but it is also a good idea (as it would have been here) to make sure you are not saying something you shouldn't.  I have read that the anchorwoman in this case did not have time to read the names over beforehand because it was breaking news, and the names just appeared on her teleprompter. But whoever got the names and put them on the prompter should have had a clue that the station was being pranked. And now KTVU may be facing legal action. If only someone somewhere had read them out loud (which you would think is de rigueur for a medium that transmits content by reading it out loud) all this could have been avoided. I am imagining the "Really?!... with Seth and Amy" sketch now.

This incident reminded me of a story told to me by a client long ago. She was slated to give welcoming remarks at a charity event celebrating many generous donors, of whom a disproportionate number were aging male business leaders accompanied by glittering younger women. Though she meant to compliment them on their philanthropy, I believe she said it was good to "see so many philanderers here tonight." Oops!

The lesson is that if you know you are going to be saying a word you do not normally say, that may be a bit of a stretch -- like "philanthropy"-- you need to say it overandoverandover so that it slides off the tongue anytime you begin a word with "philan...." Anything less than thorough preparation can leave you saying something you most definitely do not want to say.  Just knowing the word in your head is not enough. You have to get it in your muscle memory, so that when you are in the spotlight, you don't slip into something that might come more naturally (but less appropriately).

And if you are ever on air reading up-to-the-minute-breaking news, make sure whoever puts the words up on your teleprompter has actually said them, for cryin' out loud!

Do the write thing

After posting my blog last week hailing the "news" that studying humanities is important to individual development and national well-being, I read this article on a friend's Facebook page. In "Why MBA-bound Johnny Can't Write," columnist and Financial Times editor Michael Skapinker takes on the seeming epidemic of bad writing in classrooms and on campus. He questions whether deterioration of writing skills is, as many assert, a new phenomenon -- one led by reliance on the shorthand of Twitter and texting. He says the origins of this diminution in skill is beside the point: "Whether poor writing is new or old, it is odd that it persists at a time when parents are vying to provide their children with any possible advantage, exposing them to the paintings of Paul Klee at the age of four, as the New York Times recently reported, and teaching them to sing 'Heads, shoulders, knees and toes' in Mandarin."

I agree. In a highly competitive world, I find it amazing that ambitious and gifted young people do not take their use of language--spoken or written--seriously. I have been teaching gifted students this summer. Many of them have taken Honors or AP English. After a while I stopped pointing out noun-verb agreement mistakes, tense shifts, the awful substitution of "less" for "fewer." They did not ask, as student have before, "what does grammar have to do with public speaking?" So I give them credit for perhaps knowing that they should know this stuff. And maybe I should cut them some slack because, well, it is summer! I do wonder, though, if parents who are so eager to provide the enrichment of a great summer program in communications have also invested in the basics of good grammar.

Clear thinking and good writing are essential to living a fully-realized life. I truly believe that, but  may not be able to convince everyone. So let's shift our focus and look at the matter more "practically." Good writing and speaking --"excellent written and verbal communications"-- will continue to be a requirement for most jobs sought by college graduates. Why not give students that training when they are younger? Then they will have a lifetime to develop these skills, and will be that much more attractive to employers.  As Skapinker says,"There’s a gap in the market and the smarter parents and students should get on to it. Good writing is far easier to master than Mandarin."

Xie xie.

English majors are people, too: The Academy report

Margaret Clapp Library, Wellesley College

You may have heard that this week the American Academy of Arts and Sciences released The Heart of the Matter,  a report on the crucial role payed by arts, humanities and social sciences to our nation. This report was requested by members of the Senate in 2011, in response to a spate of reports, symposia, conferences, etc., on the importance of investing in STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) education.

I have not yet read the full Academy report (it's 92 pages long!), but did peruse the report brief. I especially enjoyed the Executive Summary which states that non-science curriculum is essential to our global competitiveness as well as national security: "A fully balanced curriculum—including the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences—provides opportunities for integrative thinking and imagination, for creativity and discovery, and for good citizenship. The humanities and social sciences are not merely elective, nor are they elite or elitist. They go beyond the immediate and instrumental to help us understand the past and the future. They are critical to a democratic society and they require our support." (If you don't have time to read the report, watch several Commissioners--including John Lithgow, Ken Burns, Sandra Day O'Connor--lay out its core argument on this video.)

I cheer this report with a resounding "hurrah!" Concentrating on courses within the vast subject area known as Humanities is most definitely not elitist! But those of use who spent most of our educational lives in those departments are frequently written off. How many times I have heard it? "Arts and literature are frills, not essentials!" I was thinking of several recent examples to cite here (e.g., using "cite" not "site"), but they all seemed rather trivial and--well, if you must know, stupid--when typed into a blog. That is part of the insidiousness of the problem.

I agree with Verlyn Klinkenborn commenting on The Heart of the Matter report in today's New York Times: "What many undergraduates do not know. . .  is how valuable the most fundamental gift of the humanities will turn out to be. That gift is clear thinking, clear writing and a lifelong engagement with literature." As I tell my students and clients, you can't communicate clearly unless you can write clearly. No one will "get" what you mean if you cannot express it succinctly to yourself. No amount of dancing around a subject and "waxing eloquent" will hide the fact that your thinking is imprecise.

So, those of you who think we are being snooty or elitist when we wave our Humanities flags, realize that we, too, occupy an important place in the world. And now class, the lecture is over. I'm off to enjoy the rest of the afternoon immersed in Joyce Carol Oates' latest exercise in brilliant writing, The Accursed.

Storyteller gets scoop!

Laura Poitras, filmmaker and MacArthur genius, might seem like an unlikely person to break such a big news story as the one about NSA data-mining. But Edward Snowden thought she was exactly the right person for the job. She describes how he approached her and how she got the "scoop" in an interview in yesterday's Salon. There are many fascinating aspects to this story -- but I am sure you don't need to read one more blog about the relative merits of Snowden's actions, one more blog that places him somewhere on a continuum between traitor and hero. What I think is so interesting is the fact that Poitras was contacted by Snowden in January.

That means months went by before the story actually broke. What was happening during all that time? Poitras won't say, yet. She does say the identity of her source was not known to her "until very, very recently." So there was obviously some work being done to investigate the source, to see if what he was saying sounded credible. By February she was discussing the possibility of going forward on the story with The Washington Post's Bart Gellman. 

But that was February. The story broke in June. In the Salon interview, Poitras offered this response to the unasked question about the time lag, and about her reluctance to disclose how she was investigating: "I’ll tell my story, you know, about my reporting. I don’t need reporters reporting on my reporting. So maybe that stuff contributed to different timelines. But. . . I don’t want to tell the whole story now, I don’t think it’s the right time. And I want to tell it in my own words. I’m a storyteller. I’ll tell it when I’m ready to tell it, in detail."

Poitras knows that even in the news business, you need to take time to get it right. Even when the story screams out to be told now. If you are an investigative reporter, you need to actually investigate. The difficulty in finding out the truth about any action taken by the NSA makes this a mystery that deepens almost hourly. But Poitras & Co. felt they had enough substance to bring the story to the people. And even after the story has broken, the story behind that story cannot be told in a rush. An Academy Award nominee in 2006 for her documentary My Country, My Country, she knows that each story has its own rhythm, and needs time to unfold. And so this new story will be told in good time. As Ben Franklin so eloquently put it: "Great haste makes great waste." I shudder to think what would have become of Snowden's revelations if the reporters had been careless and sloppy in a rush to publish.

So, three cheers for story-tellers who take the time to get the story right!

Most of us will never, ever be called by anonymous sources who say they have secret info that will rock our world. But if we pass on information we do not know to be accurate, or fill in the blanks with details of our own devising, we may find ourselves quite far from the success we are rushing to achieve. And in our haste, we can waste some pretty great opportunities.