Posted by Cori on March 1st, 2008 — Posted in My Recordings
I really hope the audio below works, because it’s been so long since I recorded this poem, that I can’t actually remember how it goes. Something about a river, and some nymphs? Checking back in the thread — David and I duetted this last May!
If you think our voices go well together, this is Good, because we’re currently working on a book of Elegiac Sonnets, alternating in similar style. Actually, that’s prolly not a bad thing to do with my afternoon — I can’t record, being the snuffle-nosed monster from Planet Snot … but I do have some old recordings which await a good editing.
Obviously not so boring I won’t blog about it. But, in common with all my podcasts, there’s more of other people’s voices than my own, so it’s prolly not that bad. And I edited out all the more alarming noises that are consequent on my having a low-level sniffle. Somehow, despite being thrown together on a shoestring and a number of begging letters — it’s longer than last week’s.
I can’t imagine anyone’ll listen to it, though, not with Stephen Fry entering the podcasting fray just yesterday. Well, his are podgrams, of course. I’m just listening to him now. LibriWhat … ?
My editions of the LibriVox Community Podcast are getting shorter. This week’s is 11min, 11secs, and I didn’t even do that deliberately. That’s just how it came out once I’d slapped a bit of Tchaichovsky’s Romeo & Juliet around a bunch of great contributions from kind volunteers and people I mugged as they wandered through the forums.
From my posting here, it might seem like all I’ve been doing is podcasts recently (and I’m down for next week, too) but I have been working on my two sekrit solo books, and of course, thinking about other possibilities. This is helped by the fact that I think my reading’s improved in the last week or so. The last file I sent off to Mandarine for editing, came back with only a few rereads needed (compared to the usual hefty list) — and the unedited file was some minutes shorter than the previous chapter’s, even though they had about the same number of words.
I don’t think that’s down to me reading faster … but the opposite! I’m reading slower and making fewer mistakes as a result. The source of this wonder? Watching Scott Brick read. Apparently I am such a visual learner that I can pick up something of audio technique by watching someone else’s lips move. A more simply-written text, that I audio-edited myself, showed the same improvement … slower & more thoughtful where appropriate, and YAY fewer mistakes! I’m down from a 1:7 production ratio (7hrs of work to give 1hr of audio) to mebbe 1:6 and it might even get to 1:5 if I prepare the text properly first (aka. read it.) Whoooosh!
So, when I said, never again, not that LibriVox community podcast, for lo, it doth take bloomin’ hours to put together … I guess I meant, never again for at least three months.
This week’s LV podcast is a wonder of brevity, being under 14 minutes long … somehow into that time I’ve fitted twelve different voices, two pieces of music and a sound effect, which go to make up adverts for five new projects, one new forum thread and a newly-released project. The brevity didn’t extend to the production process, of course, but it IS actually rather a lot of fun pillaging archive.org for suitable bits and bobs which are in the public domain and therefore fair game for my use.
Something which I’m thrilled about but no-one else will care a jot — I put this entire podcast online by myself. Okay, it’s true I followed great instructions. To the letter. But still, in jargon terms, I had ownership of the entire process from inception to aural completion. Pretty cool. And I still don’t own an iPod.
Now, this was an odd thing to read. I don’t think I’ve ever recorded something so thoroughly studied by other folks. It was very interesting to read the actual words and none of the arguments/disputes/definitions/redefinitions, for once.
It’s less than 4 minutes, and I’m sure there’s an entertaining discussion to be had about which of us readers has an accent most like that of its primary author, James Madison.
Posted by Cori on January 26th, 2008 — Posted in My Recordings
A little poetry to celebrate the New Year … but only three people braved the terrors of quirky verse-structure and poetic voice Rossetti-style. I rather like it, though.
Posted by Cori on January 14th, 2008 — Posted in My Recordings
Ah, it’s lovely to have archive.org behaving again … all sorts of long-ago recordings of mine are finding their way home, finally. Like my contribution to A Child’s History of England by Charles Dickens … I read the chapters England Under Richard the Second and England Under Henry the Fourth, Called Bolingbroke last June. Most of it is fairly straightforward prose, but Dickens does have occasional really splendid turns of phrase which remind me of the Horrible History books now … such as here, on greeting an unwanted visitor:
‘Fair cousin of Lancaster,’ said the King, ‘you are very welcome’ (very welcome, no doubt; but he would have been more so, in chains or without a head).
Posted by Cori on January 13th, 2008 — Posted in My Recordings
So, Mystery Story Collection Vol. 1 is now catalogued, and ready for the world’s listening pleasure, and my contribution to it is the rather long short-story, A Jury of her Peers by Susan Glaspell. It is, apparently, a ‘cosy/cozy’ mystery for those who discriminate, and for those who don’t, I can tell you that the lead characters are female and the action takes place in a kitchen. A man is strangled in his own bed, but whodunnit — and why?
I *LOVED* recording this story. It’s been on my To Do list for months, ever since the first time I read it — and cried too, it packed a punch for me. When Gesine invented the Mystery Collection, it was a natural fit, and so, I link here:
Posted by Cori on January 12th, 2008 — Posted in My Recordings
Hooray — finally, archive.org is behaving itself again, and my next solo is complete. Nine Unlikely Tales for Children by E. Nesbit is a 1901 book I found in the library a while back … and there isn’t an online version of the text, so I thought it would be jolly to scoop a reading of it. Nesbit is a pure joy to read aloud: the stories go along at a great pace for the kids, and there’re enough nods to an adult sense of humour to make an entertaining listen no matter how old one is. Now, that said, folks have to cope with me Doing Voices, which isn’t to everyone’s liking. But, I don’t believe in fairy tales without them, just wouldn’t seem quite right in my listening world. And how, exactly, would YOU voice a bouncible ball, anyway..?