With over 40 years of narrating Talking Books at the American Printing House for the Blind (APH), Ray Foushee is still turning the pages.

Full Transcript

Podcast Summary:

Joining us on Blind Abilities is the owner of a voice that many of us will recognize from reading our favorite Talking Book selections from BARD or other NLS platforms: none other than Ray Foushee. Ray has been a Talking Book narrator at the American Printing House for the Blind (APH), for almost forty years and has read more than 1000 titles in virtually every genre, ranging from True Crime and Mystery to Romance, Science Fiction thrillers and even nonfiction.

Yes, that deep and gruff sounding voice has read romance novels! In fact, Ray shares his story of the steamy romantic fiction novel he was assigned many years ago, and we share a brief clip from his narration which reveals the character’s voice he used to narrate the first-person perspective of the 16 year-old protagonist.

Ray delves deeply into his long history as a narrator with APH, beginning with how he got his start while working at a Louisville, KY TV station in the early 80’s and his progression through that almost forty-year career, reading virtually every genre under the sun. He shares his likes and dislikes for particular titles, authors and genres, his techniques for how he creates his voices for each character in the book as well as other details regarding his studio and recording processes. Jeff and Pete pose such questions as:

How did you get into audio book narration?
What is your favorite genre and book?
Do you pre-read the book before recording?
How do you create your character voices?
Is there a particular word or phrase that is hard to say while recording?
Do you put yourself into a celebrity’s mindset when arriving at a specific character’s voice or inflection to use?

Of course there is much much more in this fascinating chat with one of the most popular and enduring Narrators of Talking Books who has carved his way into the fabric of so many of our lives.

You can find out more about APH and what they can do for you, on the web at https://www.aph.org.

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