Kate's Voice

It’s the day of your presentation. You eat your favorite day-of-talk breakfast.  You warm up your voice and say a prayer.  When you arrive, you shake lots of hands, set up your merchandise at the back of the room, and get yourself motivated to talk.  When they call your name, you tell the obligatory joke about the common mispronunciation.  You step up to the podium, look out at your audience with a smile and start off with that story that works so well.  You ease into the talk and, after awhile, it’s smooth sailing. In the end, you “stick the landing” and leave the audience informed and excited.

Later, as you reflect on your performance, you recognize that you didn’t feel like yourself until you “warmed up.”  You sense that your opening was a little stiff. Even after hundreds of presentations, the worst part is still the first few minutes.

Does this scenario seem familiar? If it does, you are in good company—professional speakers all over experience this problem. The good news is there is a solution and it doesn’t require expensive voice lessons or coaching (though, as a vocal coach, I am always happy to take on new clients).

Let’s consider some important facts: In the first 30 seconds you speak people are assessing your voice rather than listening to what you say. They are determining how your voice aligns with how you look and how you present yourself. If they don’t know you, they’re trying to figure out who you are. If they do know you, they’re trying to figure out what’s going on with you. Many people fail to realize that their speaking voice is just as important to conveying their message as the clothes they are wearing or the words they are saying.  The point is, if you don’t feel like yourself in those first few minutes of speaking, you won’t sound authentic—and if you don’t sound authentic, you’ll undermine your credibility before you even have chance to get to your message.

So the question is, How do you make sure you sound genuine in those early moments of speaking? The answer: Breathe.

Simple.  Everyone breathes.  It’s one of the most natural things we do; however, the problem is when we get nervous or stressed, we forget to breathe.  Breathing is the antidote to stress, and here’s why:  First, breathing relaxes and energizes us all at once. Second, when we breathe deeply, our larynx relaxes and our voice settles into a comfortable, natural sound.  And finally, breathing encourages a good speaking pace that’s not too slow or too fast, allowing time for people to consider what we’re actually saying.

Here are three things you can do to incorporate good breathing into your speech.

1.    Practice proper breathing. Start by breathing in through your nose. Imagine you are a vessel filling up with air like a vase being filled with water.  Fill your abdomen first, then your lower ribs, and then all the way up to your chin.  As you exhale, your lower abs should compress as though you were rolling up a tube of toothpaste.  Repeat, but this time, as you exhale, blow the air out loudly as if you were extinguishing candles on a birthday cake. Repeat three more times, always breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth.

Practice when you have a quiet moment alone at home or the office. You can practice while sitting or standing. You can even practice while exercising at the fitness center. I find it particularly therapeutic to practice proper breathing while driving, especially when another driver unexpectedly pulls out in front of me!

2.    Breathe into your words.  The next time you practice for a presentation, take time to inhale and exhale deeply five times before you start to speak. Then take one more deep breath and breathe into your first words. Stop after every few sentences or ideas, and take another deep breath.  Practice this several times. After a few sessions you’ll be surprised at how much more aware you are of your breathing. More importantly, you’ll immediately be aware of the lack of air when you are not breathing correctly.

3.    Just do it.  Not to steal Nike’s tagline, but the next time you give a talk, use what you have been practicing. Take time to inhale and exhale deeply just before you get up to speak.  Then, as you start to speak, breathe into your first words.  Do this every time you give a presentation. You’ll be more relaxed and you’ll come across as authentic, thus improving your credibility.

Breathe, breathe, breathe and breathe again.  Of course, breathing isn’t everything.  Talent, skill and your message are also important, but if you are short of breath, you’ll be hard pressed to demonstrate those wonderful talents and skills, and you’ll struggle to make your message come to life. And if that doesn’t work, call me. I’m taking new clients.

This article first appeared as Voice Forward, on Craig Senior’s Blog, Public Speaking Fun and Easy.

What if you could step back from the rhetoric of the debates and hear the candidates differently?  What if there were hints about who they are hiding in plain site?  Well, there are.  That’s not to say that I can tell you who is the best candidate, but I can tell you what their vocal delivery might be saying about their character and even their conviction. You might listen differently tomorrow night.

There are at least two dozen aspects of sound that effect our perception of a speaker (or a piece of music!)  They are such sound attributes as pace, pitch, volume, cadence, tone color, and rhythm to name a few. Let’s explore just two aspects of sound:  Pitch and cadence.  First, I’ll explain how these elements create the picture you have of another person. Second, we’ll examine the four Republican candidate’s voices for their use of these elements.

Pitch:  Every vocal sound you make is a pitch, or a tone on the musical scale. People generally speak within a certain pitch range most of the time, with more or less variety of pitch from time to time. There are cultural preferences for the pitch of the speaking voice.  In addition, the area in the voice that people use the most gives us an impression of their character or personality.
Cadence: Cadence is the way a sentence ends.  It is also the inflection of your speech.  There are two basic kinds of vocal cadence: open and closed.  An open cadence goes up in pitch, especially at the end of a sentence, sounding much like a question.  The other kind of cadence, closed, goes down in pitch at the end of a sentence or idea.  To use the two forms of cadence effectively, you mix them up, sounding open when you are friendly or inviting others to join in, and using closed cadence to finish your thoughts or state an opinion.

Mitt Romney:
Pitch:  His voice is low, a bass baritone range.  A low pitch is considered to be a foundation, a stabilizing factor, as in the bass in music.  We also equate low voices with authority.  The fact that he also has a steady pace and a lack of much vocal inflection in his speech might add to a perception of Mitt Romney as an authority who is stable and dependable.

Cadence: Romney uses more closed cadence than open.   Closed cadence indicates that you have opinions and answers.  It is the sound of conviction.  On the flip side, too much closed cadence can sound dogmatic and not open to others’ opinions.

Notice, here where a lack of certainty can change his cadence, however.  Listen to how much open ended cadence he used when he was confronted by an interviewer about releasing his tax info.

Newt Gingrich:  
Pitch: His voice is high and his pace is fast.  A high voice can carry well across a room.  It cuts through other sounds. However, his voice is higher than it needs to be (there is a pitch level for every voice that is optimum for resonance and strength, and his is above that) and he often sounds agitated or whiny.

Cadence: Gingrich uses more variety in his sound than Romney for the most part.  He stresses colorful words and uses more variations of pitch overall.  As I said before,  this implies friendliness. If you combine that with the fact that he uses a lot of open cadence, the impression can be that he is open to others’ ideas and is a nice guy.  However, the down side to so much open ended cadence is that it can also give the impression that the speaker is flaky, unable to commit, and unreliable.  The other problem with too much open ended cadence is that it creates run on sentences.  In Gingrich’s case, run on sentences sometimes get mixed with unfinished ideas and make his statements hard to follow. Listen here for an example.

There is no question that he can make definitive statements with commitment, however, as in this clip where he lit into John King regarding comments made by Gingrich’s ex-wife.

Rick Santorum:
Pitch: Rick Santorum has a sound that is right in between Romney and Gingrich in terms of pitch, more of a baritone/tenor sound.  He does, however, have a bit of a growl in the back of his throat from time to time.  What impression does that give you?

Cadence: Santorum uses more inflection, or vocal variety in his voice than either Newt or Mitt, which can add to a sense that he is friendly and open.  Early on, he overused open cadence in his speech, combined with a great deal of filler words such as “uh” and “um.” This can make a speaker sound unsure, even non-committal.  Here is an example in an interview on FOX.
However, in the January 19th debate, he was vastly improved and he used a lot more closed cadence.

Ron Paul:
Pitch: Ron Paul’s voice is pitched at a good place for resonance and strength. Consequently, he is able to use a lot of inflection because his voice is flexible. Of the four, his speech is the most varied in both pitch and cadence.  On the down side his voice tends to rise very high when he gets emphatic and then it sounds a little edgy.

Cadence: He mixes open and closed cadence so that he sounds convicted and also open. He exhibits energy.   Like Romney, he usually finishes thoughts and ideas before going on to the next idea. He overuses the word “but” as a connector and he stumbles from time to time, but more often than not he is able to avoid filler words completely.   As his energy rises, his articulation can get a little sloppy, making it more difficult to understand his words.  In the end,  I have to wonder if the reason he has gotten this far is because his colorful yet clear vocal image encourages us to listen and, in doing so, hear his ideas.  Listen to some clips here.

Update:  Now that the Arizona debate has happened, you can watch it below and see what you think about my analysis.