There is an emotional investment in each book…these books get reviewed on Audible and Amazon and the reviewers are a nasty bunch…they seem to like kicking the narrator in the ribs to the extent that the writing itself is often blamed on the narrator…BUT…you have to put that away and when you listen to your finished product…YOU must be proud of it…if you are not…scrap it and start again. In a way it is rather like directing yourself in a one-man play…but you do really have to DIRECT yourself, you have to listen and still be able to step away from listening to make the character real…you have to keep the audio quality excellent, the pacing correct…you may even have to engineer and master the book yourself. I’ve narrated books that I thought should never be for sale, hardcore sex scenes for gratuitous reasons of ‘sales’ and some that were just downright bad…but I HAD to find a connection with the story and the characters…I have to spend hours and hours in a black box with those people…I have to like them. Underperform…no-one will want to listen to you…it’ll be boring.īad audio quality…they’ll return the book.īut you still have to make it interesting…make it real, make the listener WANT to listen…make the listener want to hear more. Over perform and no-one will want to listen to you…it’ll be too much like hard work. It’s not acting, it’s not voiceover…it’s reading a book so that people WANT to listen to you for hours and hours and… Having recorded nearly 50 books I think I am now beginning to learn what I am doing wrong and will probably take another 50 to get it right so that I don’t have to think about it all the time. Well I am here to tell you that it just is not that easy. Whenever I talk to other actors about my audiobooks it seems to be an assumption that ‘anyone’ can do it.
I studied the Bee Audio Home Studio Course so that I: Apart from when the builders are about it’s all done at home. Early mornings, late nights…lunchtime…oh you get it…anytime. So, builders meant that if I didn’t want to lose the job I would have to hire a studio…it cost a lot, but it was worth it…I have been recording for Bee Audio ever since…I have managed to build my own vocal booth in my loft and I have recorded nearly 50 books in the last year and a half whilst still managing to direct four fringe plays and appear in two productions at the National Theatre…it’s a wonderful job to have, I can do it whenever I want. Up until then I had been recording the very few bits of work that I had got in my daughters wardrobe (yes…literally…I pushed myself inside, pulled the door closed with a chord wrapped around my wrist to keep it from opening again and recorded in a cupboard about 18 inches wide.) Of course that was the weekend the builders next door moved in. I had my first offer of a fantasy trilogy early 2014…about thirty hours of finished recording. Late 2013 I auditioned for a company called Bee Audio (advert was in The Stage) when they decided to find some British based British narrators. In the meantime I continue to record and produce Audiobooks. I have learned so much from Guy and his course and hope that it has given me the knowledge to further pursue Voiceover work.
#Audio book narrator jobs full
Well I suppose the fact that I have been taking part in the Voiceover Kickstart course over the last few weeks, despite being a full time audiobook narrator and producer, will tell you that it is very different. Guy has asked that I write a piece about recording audiobooks and how it differs from other VO work.
(Hear Matthew being interviewed by Guy Michaels in the VOICEOVER PODCAST) Experienced actor and director, Matthew Lloyd Davies writes about his first couple of years as an Audiobook Narrator.
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