0093 – Hydration-related Mouth Clicks

0093 – Hydration-related Mouth Clicks1.      Hydration-related mouth clicksWe’ve all been in a situation in a studio, where we’ve needed some water for vocal lubrication. Indeed, it’s literally called ‘drying up’, when your mouth is as dry as the Sahara, your cheeks are like sandpaper and you’ve a tongue like a Ryvita crispbread. Pops, clicks and smacks are the usually the result of poor hydration and lubrication, and the effect of thick and sticky saliva on the tongue and teeth as you speak. The mucus is sticker and stringier than it should be – a bit like the stretchy strands of mozzarella when you slice a pizza. Another food analogy: some say it’s like speaking with peanut butter in your mouth. It feels horrid in your mouth, and sounds horrid to you in your own headphones, and to a producer or studio director and the listener at home, in the same way as it’s unpleasant to hear someone chew their food. In short, it’s very embarrassing and usually entirely avoidable.Through these under-5-minute episodes, you can build your confidence and competence with advice on breathing and reading, inflection and projection, the roles played by better scripting and better sitting, mic techniques and voice care tips... with exercises and anecdotes from a career spent in TV and radio studios.And as themes develop over the weeks (that is, they are not random topics day-by-day), this is a free, course to help you GET A BETTER BROADCAST, PODCAST AND VIDEO VOICE.Look out for more details of the book during 2021.Contacts: https://linktr.ee/Peter_Stewart Peter has been around voice and audio all his working life and has trained hundreds of broadcasters in all styles of radio from pop music stations such as Capital FM and BBC Radio 1 to Heart FM, the classical music station BBC Radio 3 and regional BBC stations. He’s trained news presenters on regional TV, the BBC News Channel and on flagship programmes such as the BBC’s Panorama. Other trainees have been music presenters, breakfast show hosts, travel news presenters and voice-over artists.He has written a number of books on audio and video presentation and production (“Essential Radio Journalism”, “JournoLists”, two editions of “Essential Radio Skills” and three editions of “Broadcast Journalism”) and has written on voice and presentation skills in the BBC’s in-house newspaper “Ariel”.Peter has presented hundreds of radio shows (you may have heard him on BBC Radio 2, BBC Radio 4, Virgin Radio or Kiss, as well as BBC regional radio) with formats as diverse as music-presentation, interview shows, ‘special’ programmes for elections and budgets, live outside broadcasts and commentaries and even the occasional sports, gardening and dedication programmes. He has read several thousand news bulletins, and hosted nearly 2,000 podcast episodes, and is a vocal image consultant advising in all aspects of voice and speech training for presenters on radio and TV, podcasts and YouTube, voiceovers and videocalls.The podcast title refers to those who may wish to change their speaking voice in some way. It is not a suggestion that anyone should, or be pressured into needing to. We love accents and dialects, and are well aware that how we speak changes over time. The key is: is your voice successfully communicating your message, so it is being understood (and potentially being acted upon) by your target audience?This podcast is London-based and examples are spoken in the RP (Received Pronunciation) / standard-English / BBC English pronunciation, although invariably applicable to other languages, accents and dialects.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.