Louise: My name is Louise Kerr and I’m a voice coach and I have company called Resonance Voice Training and we deal in presentation skills voice training and giving people confidence.

Martin: We’re getting married in July the 19th next year and we met about 3 years ago at speed dating, strange enough, so I guess when you do get successes from these things, from my point of view I do a lot of presentations at work but I kind of used Powerpoint slides to keep me on track of everything and if I have to do like leaving speeches something like that, I tend to rumble a bit as I’m probably doing now. And I guess what I’d like to do is very well to deliver a speech that it doesn’t sound like it’s a Powerpoint presentation.

Louise: The major points for a wedding speech in particular: a good structure, preparation that you practiced it, some very well told short stories and to enjoy it. Today, I would like to look at Martin’s skills already so I’ll see what he actually can do and how he uses his voice and then go back to foundations, look at how he holds tension in his body, how he breaths, look a little bit at articulation, and also look at the way he engages emotionally with the speech and the range of voice he uses.

Louise: Martin, hello, Louise.

Martin: Nice to meet you.

Louise: Nice to meet you. Well let’s go in and get started shall we?

Martin: Ok, sure.

Louise: This is the studio. I’ll just shut the door behind you and let’s get going. Now go with these exercises handed out before you. And we’re going to start with our place of sounds: Pa-Ta-Ka-Ba-Da-Ga. Pa-Ta-Ka-Ba-Da-Ga.

Martin: Pa-Ta-Ka-Ba-Da-Ga.

Louise: Pa-Ta-Ka-Ba-Da-Ga.

Martin: Pa-Ta-Ka-Ba-Da-Ga.

Louise: And relax your arms. Pataka-Badaga!

Martin: Pataka-Badaga!

Louise: Pataka-Badaga!

Martin: Pataka-Badaga!

Louise: Pataka-Badaga!

Martin: Pataka-Badaga!

Louise: Red leather, yellow leather

Martin: Red leather, yellow leather

Louise: Red lorry, yellow lorry, red leather, yellow leather

Martin: Red lorry, yellow lorry, red leather, yellow leather

Louise: Red lorry, yellow lorry

Martin: Red lorry, yellow lorry

Louise: Red lorry, yellow lorry

Martin: Red lorry, yellow lorry

Louise: And we’re just going to say a line, and I want you to, this line of Shakespeare, speak it to the hand and then I’ll take you through the exercises. So the line is “I left no ring with her.” And I want you to hold your hand n front of your face and imagine the space and then speak to the hand. “I left no ring with her!”

Martin: “I left no ring with her.”

Louise: And then put your foot out and look to your foot, experience the space and then speak the line to the foot.

Martin: “I left no ring with her.”

Louise: Ok, and then to the outside wall.

Martin: “I left no ring with her.”

Louise: And then towards the Stow Central which is right down at the end.

Martin: I’m going to shout.

Louise: That is the exercise. Using the same technique that we’ve been using for the articulation, I’ve just got a few sentences that are about exploring intonation and I just want you to say them in the way I ask, and you can focus so I’m going to, you can focus somewhat comfortable across the space, so you have something to talk to. “Though nature art my goddess.”

Martin: “Though nature art my goddess.”

Louise: And make that 20x bigger. “Though nature art my goddess.”

Martin: “Though nature art my goddess.”

Louise: Now get it bigger.

Martin: Ok. You’re a task master. Ok, “Though nature art my goddess.”

Louise: And bigger.

Martin: “Though nature art my goddess.”

Louise: “Though nature art my goddess.” And bigger, you’ve got a bigger voice than I have.

Martin: Ok. Sounds like shouting to me more than projection.

Louise: It’s not shouting. It’s something that, I think it’s an emotion behind shouting.

Martin: Right.

Louise: But there isn’t, so when you projected you can actually project any emotion.

To sum up Martin, what I would say is practice as much as possible. You can practice putting emotional expression into your work. You know you got time to do that before the wedding. And then when you’re thinking about wedding speech, think about selecting 2 or 3 stories. How long do I want this to be? 10 minutes is a very long time, I would speak for 5 probably. It’s work in progress always. I think everything you don’t like, I don’t know, I’ve been training all my life. And for performance, you can always grow as a performer and think about people feeling wimble. But that’s, really your wedding day is going to be your wimble if you like. So, give it a lot of thought in preparation.

Martin: Yes, and it starts now.