Archives for April 2020

Have you ever heard of a family that sings together and has a voice over business? In episode 3 of the La Pizarra podcast, I had the pleasure of interviewing bilingual vocalist and voice over artist Rosi Amador from the Latin music group Sol y Canto, and Amador Bilingual Voice Overs.

Rosi and her husband Brian formed the group in 1994, and their mission is to celebrate their Latin roots through playful, poetic and honest songs. They have always been part of social change movements and they are passionate about using their voices for special causes, like the concert they did recently to raise funds for Puerto Rico after hurricane Maria and more recently a series of earthquakes that have hit the island. Rosi herself was born and raised in Puerto Rico and many of her close friends live there.

Having their children on stage with them has been a blessing, they first sang with their parents when they were four years old and later, they were also featured in one of their records which featured bilingual music for children.

The Amadors took their children on tour with them for a few years until it became harder to accomplish because of their school education, their daughter Alyssa remained interested in music, while their son veered to other interests.

Alyssa is a very talented singer who started writing songs at fifteen and she is now making a name for herself, though she is happy to be part of Sol y Canto, Rosi feels she will soon take off on her own. You can hear their beautiful harmonies here .

A completely bilingual family

Rosi and Brian made sure their children grew up speaking both languages, just like they did.  Singing in Spanish was a fun way for the children to absorb their Hispanic heritage and learn the language, as well as Spanish lessons at home with a group of children from other Hispanic families that Rosi organized.

Rosi’s mother was from Puerto Rico but grew up in New York, her father was from Argentina and didn’t speak any English so Spanish was the main language at home, though later on her mother started to speak more in English to Rosi and her sister and they also went to an American school which would prepare them for college and a life in the US.

Rosi is a graduate of Bryn Mawr College and later moved to Boston. Brian was born and raised in New Mexico with an American father and Mexican mother, they met through a cultural exchange which sent them to South America to perform Latin music and soon after they became a couple and upon their return to the US, they  formed their first group which started performing at churches, community centers and universities.

Rosi and Brian started doing voice over work at the request of people who knew their music, like a fan of theirs that started an education method using CDs to teach Spanish with lessons that included music, Rosi was the narrator and she also recorded the songs. That job led to more voice over work for her and Brian, who was also asked to translate songs into Spanish for the Scholastic programs.

Touring was still very much part of their lives for 27 years and their main source of income, but Rosi wanted to stay close to her teenage children who at the time were not touring with their parents anymore. They would perform 180 shows a year and it was starting to take a toll, they decided to reduce the number of performances and make use of their home studio for voice over as well as music.

A welcoming community of Voice Over artists

Rosi wanted to find out everything she could about voice over work, so she stared looking for webinars and going to industry related conferences where she found a warm welcome.

It’s no secret that the voice over community is a very generous one, in that there are so many genres that voice actors are not threatened by competition, instead, they are open to giving and receiving peer advice on everything from the best coaches to marketing and business tips.

Rosi quickly felt at home in the community and the more she learned about it and trained with great coaches, the more she loved to work in the voice over business.

She organized a mastermind group of voice actors, which is still meeting today with different levels of expertise , so she could learn from them and also offer advice from her experience as a talent manager and a singer who was used to promoting her work and the work of others. A second group meets once a week, where they exchange tips and updates about the business, and she has become good friends with all of them.

Rosi recommends taking time to find the right coach, in her experience, she had worked with a few different people until she found a coach with a teaching style that helped to bring out the best in her, in terms of tone and emotions. It’s important to have continued training to sharpen your skills as a voice actor.

Her favorite genre is children’s audio books, she has narrated many of them and won several awards from The American Library Association. The latest audiobook is called “Mango, Abuela y yo” a beautiful story where Rosi played the grandmother and the mother, Alyssa played the young daughter and Brian played the father, it was recognized as the Best Book of the Year.

Rosi also enjoys using her voice for social causes that are close to her heart, like public service announcements, protecting the rights of immigrants and anything that celebrates and informs the Latin culture.

She looks forward to remote sessions for TV and radio commercials where she’s eager to take direction and get instant feedback on her performance.

Museum audio tours are another favorite genre, having recorded several of them including one for the Smithsonian Institute.

Rosy has a very positive attitude towards life, even with the demands of working as a freelancer. In addition to her peer groups Rosi  has established a schedule that allows her to also have time for herself and keep the balance between her work and her personal life ,which includes Yoga and working out at the gym three or four times a week. For Rosi expressing gratitude is a priority, she keeps a journal in which she writes the things she’s thankful for every day, even on the days when things don’t go according to plan.

She has also outsourced certain aspects of the business, which has freed up time that she can spend with her family and friends and also to work on creative projects.

Rosi won an award for Outstanding Commercial Demo at the Voice arts Awards in 2018.

You can learn more about Amador Bilingual Voice Overs here . And you can find out about Sol y Canto by visiting their website

Nicky Mondellini is the host of the La PIzarra podcast, she is a bilingual actress and voice over talent with more than thirty years of experience in television, film and theater. To request a quote and listen to her demos visit http://www.nickymondelini.com

You can listen to the whole interview in Spanish in Episode 3 of the La Pizarra podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Play.

Rona Fletcher is the guest on the second episode of the La Pizarra podcast, I’d like to share a few highlights of the interview as it relates to actors and voice over artists. Rona is an award-winning dubbing actor and voice over talent from Mexico City, she has been a speaker at several conferences including Voice Over Atlanta, One Voice in London, The International Voice Conference in Mexico City and the Congreso Iberoamericano de la Voz, Viva Voz in Bogota, Colombia.

She is also the owner of Gravy for the Brain LATAM, a franchise of the British platform Gravy for the Brain, which promotes the education and training of voice over artists worldwide.

Rona ‘s dubbing credits include Lynette Scavo in Desperate Housewives, played by Felicity Hoffman , the narrator in Good Omens, played by Frances McDormand, Velma in Chicago, played by Catherine Zeta-Jones and Captain Amelia in Treasure Planet, played by Emma Thompson, among many others.

In addition to her dubbing work for film and television, Rona has also been a TV and Radio host and her voice over experience includes commercials and radio imaging, and promos for HBO Mundi.

Rona didn’t have a childhood dream of being a performer, her father was an American actor and voice over artist who worked in film and theatre and her mother was a painter and poet.

When she was very young, her father started taking her with him to the voice over training sessions he used to teach and she wasn’t particularly interested in the subject, and she reluctantly attended acting and voice training sessions.

Later she started hosting radio shows for Station Rock 101 in Mexico City, while completing her college degree in Communications with a minor in Marketing.

Rona was fascinated with production and behind the scenes work , being on camera was not in her plans, but one day she was asked to conduct an on camera interview for a morning show and suddenly all her acting and voice training kicked-in, she remained the host of that show for nineteen years.

Her transition into voice over happened naturally, part of her work in hosting the morning show was to talk about the sponsors, which ended up being very much like commercials and that led to several opportunities in voice over for radio and TV spots, it was then that she discovered she really enjoyed that genre and has continued working in it ever since.

Rona and I spoke about how the style of commercial voice over has transformed over the years, going from the big announcer voice to a more natural tone, often called conversational.

Brand names used to be highlighted in an almost exaggerated way and now a days they are mentioned in a much more subdued way, and sometimes they are even understated like in the case of the millennial read, which is a relaxed style that is almost reflective, like thoughts that are being shared in a natural voice.

Advertisers have the challenging task of finding creative ways of selling in a different way since people don’t want to be annoyed by publicity, instead they tend to pay attention and remember more friendly or funny commercials.

The job of a voice actor is to understand what the copywriter is trying to communicate, we turn the script into a believable message that needs to be told with the right set of emotions, while conveying the importance of the brand in a natural way, and that is where preparation comes in; it takes years of training in voice over and breathing techniques to be able to turn any script into a memorable message.

Rona found opportunities as a dubbing actor from peer recommendations, her voice and personality seemed to go very well with certain characters and her dubbing career started building from there.

She discovered that dubbing actors are expertly trained just like on camera and theater actors, and some of them bring their skills into commercial voice over, whereas others who choose to do only dubbing remain the unsung heroes of animated movies, dubbed films and TV episodic series, and their names are largely kept out of the end rolling credits.

The work that they do requires special concentration and an instant response, especially since they are not given the script beforehand and there is only time for one rehearsal. Working with a dubbing director requires special attention, they are the ones who have the big picture and know the whole story, they are in the studio all day with different actors for each scene and actors need to follow and trust the specifications for the character they will be playing, while matching the onscreen actor’s lip movements, everything is carried out at the quickest rhythm and there is no time for mistakes.

The physical aspect is also taken in consideration when casting the right voice actor for a role, the vocal range, tone, height and weight of the actor can work very well for specific characters. Often casting directors think of celebrities that have similar a physical structure of characters in animated films but other times they would rather trust dubbing actors with years of experience and have the right technique for the job. Film and TV actors use their whole body to express and communicate feelings and it can be challenging to restrict their movements when they’re in a dubbing session.

Rona is the Gravy for The Brain franchise owner of the Latin American branch, through which she provides mentoring sessions that are full of advice on every aspect of the voice over business. She is an avid supporter of the voice over community and promotes the unity of voice over artists of every genre as well as dubbing actors.

You can find out more about Rona here

The voice over education and training information is available here

Nicky Mondellini is the host of La PIzarra podcast, she is an actress and voice over talent with more than thirty years of experience, to request a quote and listen to her demos visit http://www.nickymondelini.com

You can listen to the whole interview in Spanish in Episode 2 of the La Pizarra podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Play.

I’d like to share the view of Johanna Sabido, she is the director of Channel 43 Multimedios Houston, a Hispanic TV station, and the guest of the first episode of my podcast La Pizarra (The Slate). Johanna is a self-made entrepreneur who started out her career in her native Colombia, where she worked on camera for a television station and later moved to the US where she started working for Radio Unica in Houston.

As a young mother she preferred to work on the production side and she was put in charge of the sales department at the radio station, which was very challenging for her at the time, since she felt the pressure of having to earn a commission. Later on, she was offered the opportunity to work for Multimedios and with the support of her husband she felt more confident to knock on many doors and attend meetings, she started to enjoy the networking opportunities and everything that involved getting to know her clients interests and developing strong working relationships.

One of the things that really helped her make an important shift in her career was being persistent and not feeling discouraged , she says that “ I received hundreds of Nos before I got a Yes , and that day I kept on knocking on more doors because I felt the excitement of closing a deal, so I continued to look for more favorable responses” . Getting to know her clients and what they could teach her by learning about their way of conducting business, is something that makes her consider every encounter as a learning opportunity.

One of the most important things about making a sale is that you must believe in what you’re selling, otherwise you will not get good results. She learned the most valuable lesson about being a great salesperson from one of her clients at a car dealership , after she did a thorough presentation of the package she was selling he said ”I have no idea what your TV station is, but I believe in you”.

Johanna believes that at the end of the day your authenticity is your strongest asset, not so much the product your selling, but earning the client’s trust. Channel 43 is part of the Multimedios business conglomerate that has been around for more than 100 years, it includes real estate, vineyards and a newspaper company among other ventures.

Another challenge has been in convincing certain clients to buy air time for cycles of at least thirteen weeks, many of them think that a onetime deal can bring good results, when the truth is that we all have to see a TV commercial several times before we actually buy the product or we recommend it to someone else.

Johanna recommends including all types of publicity in addition to TV and Radio spots, they need to use social media and digital ads, and even billboards, and be aware that publicity works very well but not instantaneously, it needs time to build a brand that people can remember.

One of the worse things that a salesperson can do is talk badly about their competition, this will inevitably work against you, since you might end up working for that company one day and the fact that you said bad things about that company in the past can make you lose your client’s trust.

Johanna also talks about the fine line between perseverance and being too persistent, if you start bothering your clients to much you will become the person they want to avoid.

This doesn’t mean that you should stop at one phone call, keeping in touch is important but it needs to be done in a way that clients will be open to and they will even thank you for staying top of mind. Many times is you hear a NO it doesn’t mean your product isn’t good, it might just mean it just wasn’t the right time for them or they had invested their funds somewhere else for the time being but later on things will work out.

Following up with your clients are letting them know you’re there to support them when things go wrong is necessary to keep building that trust. Some of Johanna’s clients have stayed with her for many years.

Although most clients prefer to have their commercials sponsor the news programs, Johanna recommends they get on a daily rotation of different time slots to get a varied viewership. Not everyone will watch the news every day, they might prefer Prime Time shows or morning talk shows, if you limit your publicity to one demographic you will miss many other potential buyers.

When asked about the type of commercials that go well with the Hispanic population, Johanna mentioned the importance of creating commercials that are geared toward Latin American viewership since they will have a stronger impact than those created for the general market. She strongly advices clients against acting in their own commercials because it can work against them and discourage consumers from trusting that brand. A well-trained professional actor will sell the product on camera much more effectively.

Johanna keeps a balance between her work and family life by being totally honest with both sides, her bosses know she needs to be available to her family when they need her and they are very understanding , her husband and her daughter and son know she loves her work and will continue to fulfill her professional life. It hasn’t been easy, and she’s had to miss a few volleyball games, but she continues to keep the balance as best she can by cooking dinner every night and going out on the weekends.

Johanna and I also spoke about the importance of self -motivation, when times are tough it’s important for her to keep a positive mind by believing in herself and doing daily affirmations to pull through.

When things don’t go according to plan she believes in looking for a way to solve them instead of giving in to desperation or waiting for things to change, if a miracle is what we need we need to do our part to make it happen. Miracles can happen every day, you just need to be present and be ready to find them.

You can listen to the La Pizarra podcast with Nicky Mondellini on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Google Play.