Your Public Best - Lillian Brown [87]
Stay within the time allotted to you. Keep your voice lowered when you deliver your speech, knowing that you cannot outshout the commotion on the convention floor. By keeping your voice resonant, you allow the audio person to control the volume, and as a result, everyone will be able to hear you clearly.
Smile and enjoy yourself up there. Try to give the speech of your life, and you may just relish the feeling of being up there for the rest of your life.
GOING ON RADIO
Radio is a personal medium enabling you to talk conversationally to just one listener. On the other hand, the nature of radio is such that it can reach instantly into distant parts of the world.
On radio, time constraints are relaxed. Instead of being confined to a thirty-second sound bite, you will usually be allotted much more time.
The radio studio is designed to produce nearly perfect sound. The walls, ceiling, and floors are specially soundproofed to be as acoustically perfect as possible. The microphones are either fixed to the table or mounted on flexible, adjustable arms.
Once you are in the radio studio, you should be aware of several things. For starters, some tables can act like a drum that resounds to the tap of your fingers. Use the table to hold your notes, which you will usually slide noiselessly across the surface. Otherwise, ignore the table and do not touch it.
Establish a comfortable distance of several inches between your mouth and the mike, maintaining that space throughout the broadcast. In other words, don’t lean into the mike every time you start to speak. If you are in doubt about how far away is optimal, either ask before you go on or copy what your interviewer does.
When you are asked for an audio check, use the same voice you will be employing throughout the show. Speak actual words into the mike during the audio check rather than saying “one, two, three.”
Remember, too, that during an audio check, even though you may not be on the air yet, the mike is live and more people than you realize—including reporters—may be listening in on what you are saying. An audio check is no time to make ethnic jokes, say negative things about someone, or make any other comments that you may regret later.
Also, don’t forget that “your voice is all you have” on radio. The image the listener has of you comes across solely from the way you use your voice. The listener depends on the clarity of your pronunciation and the emphasis you place on the meaning of your material. A well-modulated, resonant voice is wonderful to listen to; a harsh nasal voice is offensive to the ear. And as I said before, too many “uhs,” “you knows,” or similar useless expressions are especially irritating on radio.
Keep your voice in the lower ranges to avoid the distortion of the amplifying device. Clearly articulate the consonants and vowels of the phonetic alphabet; this slows the fast talker and conforms more closely to the listening rate of your audience. You can practice with a tape recorder to determine the sound of your own voice.
Read the chapter entitled “Your Voice” for more detail on how to develop a pleasant speaking voice.
Other tips on speaking on the radio:
• Listen to the sound of your own voice as you speak. If you think you have been speaking in a monotone, add some warmth to your voice and vary your tone.
• If you laugh in response to something said to you, don’t laugh too loudly or in the high ranges.
• Don’t interrupt your host or interviewer. Wait until he or she finishes speaking before you respond. The same is true if you are one of at least three people speaking. Nothing is worse to the radio listener than hearing several people constantly talking over each other. Since the audience lacks the visual clues that TV pictures provide indicating who is speaking, the result on radio is merely babble.
• If there are three or more people on the radio at once, and your voice sounds at all like one of the other’s voices, it doesn’t hurt to use their names, as in “Yes, Bob, that’s what I’ve always thought,” to give the listener verbal