Great Speaking Voices

[AuntyKezia]

Bill Morris - I really enjoyed his series on Work

[Madame Suggia]

Richard Murdoch on the moomins.

[Zucchini]

Janet (or was it Janice?) "Oil geev it foive"
...and Bill McClaren

[antongould]

Michael Horden

[Petrushka]

Janet (or was it Janice?) "Oil geev it foive"

Janis (Janice) Nicholls I think, Zucchini.

Another vote for Sir Alec Guinness from me. Anyone else heard the voice of Sally Boazman who used to do/still does the traffic reports on Radio 2? My brother used to have his car radio tuned to R2 on the way back from work several years ago and I used to long for the traffic news to come on just to hear that voice.

[slarty]

this being the Radio 3 forum, I surprised no one has already mentioned one of the greatest radio voices ever. from the third programme to radio 3, she was there. wonderful voice.

Patricia Hughes !

Another vote for Alec Guinness.

[Keraulophone]

Cormac Rigby - particularly when welcoming in the new year on R3
Richard Griffiths - unforgettable as The Good Soldier Svejk (R4)
Johnny Morris - animal personification
Robert Philip - on BaL/Record Review
Edward Greenfield - ditto, with adverbial enthusiasm

[jean]

Alan Rickman
Robert Stephens

[Stillhomewardbound]

Thank you, indeed, Aeolium, for commencing this thread.

The spoken word, both in terms of my mother (an interpreter) and my father (an actor), was a notion, hardly of deification, but certainly something be revered and admired. Like the sound of the most unified and balance string quartert, a distinctive voice of pleasing timbre, diction and emphasis was a thing that added to the common day.

I suppose, that notion has waned now because we live in such a visual age. Be that as it may, I, personally, am left with a form of debilitating legacy, in as far as I struggle to accept that a form, style, or an aspect, if you like, has gone mute.

For some reason, this seems to be most noticeable in female voices. Being able to process speech much more swiftly, they are less troubled by notions of pace and emphasis, and there seems to be no culture now in the training of broadcasters of nurturing the essence and the direct sense of the script.

I well recall a one-to-one session I had with Len Jackson when he gave to me a passage to read. When I finished, he said ... 'Excellent. Now read the passage again, but this time ... at half the speed'.

Males do it also, it has to be said. At the next weather forecast notice how the talking weather-cock tramples all over the sense of the English language, so that the intention eg. 'rain throughout and spreading eastwards till the early hours' is rendered as 'rain THROUGHOUT and spreading EASTWARDS till the early HOURS'.

I wish today's broadcasters were taught to recognise that while we have this fast-moving, media, techno-info-burst world, so much of it is based on, or supported by visual communication, and the brain processes visuals very quickly, but not so the human ear.

Bronowski was the perfect example of how to speak to an audience and render difficult concepts in accessible terms. It was, if I can demonstrate, a technique ... born ... of lecturing to large groups ... of students ... in ... echoy halls.

Rather like the analogy of the incredibly dexterous and young magician who could tear through twenty, dazzling tricks in his set and depart the stage to admiring applause, only to be followed by the has-been prestidigitateur in his dusty and worn dinner jacket who'd perform just three tricks and leave the stage to an ovation.

The good speaker sets the pace at the beginning and then holds to it, that's why Bronowski drew the viewer ... in ... so successfully. He literally could have people hanging on his every word. As a public speaker he signalled to the audience 'not on your terms, but my terms' and he was spell-binding in that regard.

The facility of language and how it is rendered can be an exceptional thing, but there is so little regard for it now; and yet, once in a while, along comes a Morgan Freeman (mentioned a number of times here already) and the world falls in love with him. Sadly, though, while they greatly admire his voice, no one seems to say ... 'why don't people speak like that anymore?'.

His voice is rich and sonorous, but, as with James Earl Jones before him, the special quality is in the pace. Neither actor ever gabbled through a text or narration, they ... took ... their ... time.

A singer, say of lieder, will have the same approach. They will hover over a note, hold back, press forward and apply as much nuance and expression without being arch, or artificial.

I can still hear in my mind many Letters from America. You could 'see' every clause, sub-clause and qualification of each paragraph that ... Alastair ... Cooke ... ... uttered.

I've more to say, but for now (it being 3am - again!), I'll close with the marks for the Blackheath jury, based on past and present (but there are too many I've left out :( ):

PAST:


Broadcasters:

James Cameron
Prof. Bronowski
Jack Brymer
Seamus Heaney
Roger Gough
Tony Harrison
Robin Lustig
Nick Clarke


Actors:

Michael Hordern
Sian Phillips
Paul Daneman
Peter Copley
Jim Carter
Dad (but I would say that!)
Hugh Burden
Geoffrey Chater
Richard Pearson
Colin Jeavons
Anna Massey
Tim Piggot Smith
Michael Pennington
Ian McIlhinney
Bob Peck






Paul Mason

[amateur51]

Claude Rains, Trevor Howard, Jack Hawkins, Ronald Colman and Roger Livesey.

Great list Stanley Stewart - and from The League of Gentlemen film with Jack Hawkins, I'd suggest Nigel Patrick ('old love').

I'd add Noel Coward, Maggie Smith, Dame Edith, Glenda Jackson, Roger Allam, Dame Judi, Tom Baker - ooooh lots

[amateur51]

Yes. Jonathan Swain does have an excellent voice too although I usually catch him at the end of TTN while I am performing my ablutions before going to work!

He mentioned that you were leaving with soap behind your ear this morninh, pg

[amateur51]

Dylan Thomas wasn't bad either

Two others I like very much are Charles Gray and Coral Browne (both incidentally in An Englishman Abroad). And Peter Sellers must have been the most versatile.

Top votes there aeolium - Mr Bennett himself, Robert Stephens, Irene Handl, Alex Jennings, Athene Seyler

[amateur51]

Not forgetting Charlotte Green, sadly lost to CFM

She's back doing the football results

[amateur51]

The name Robert sprang to mind several times when gardening this afternoon. Robert Speight - probably a case of 'a voice beautiful'; Robert Edison, sweet dulcet tones and a command of language; Robert Harris, I worked with him on a TV hearts and flowers drama, early 70s and 'Bobby' had wonderful reminiscences about his life as a young actor in the
20s! Finally, Robert Donat. Saw him in "Murder in the Cathedral" at the Old Vic, 1953. Perhaps the most magnetic presence and voice of them all, only later rivalled by Paul Scofield. Good to see him as British cinema pioneer, Wm Friese - Greene in "The Magic Box" on BBC 2, a few weeks ago. The film was released during the Festival of Britain, 1951.

Have we had Robert Hardy yet?

[amateur51]

Nikolai Drozdov.
Realms of the Russian Bear chap.

amazed that nobody has mentioned Juliet "Voiceover" Stevenson , or indeed Alan Rickman.

Barbara "if Juliet isn't available" Flynn also.

Richard Wilson