When I last provided an entry in this blog about radio and my past experiences, I wrote about being “back on the air,” even though I wasn’t. The opportunity came to provide a local internet radio station with a weekly half-hour program, and rather than wasting many hours each week to produce something new, I figured we may as well fill the slot with something I had done 20 years ago.
We’d use those reruns to test the waters…er, the air…OK, the cyberspace, and see if anyone was actually “out there” listening. Months have gone by, and we (the Presbytery of Geneva and I) still don’t know.
But here’s something I’ve learned through this experience. One’s voice changes. It’s almost as pronounced as the voice change that comes with male adolescence. But it comes gradually this time, so slowly that no one notices, especially the owner of the voice.
I came to that conclusion as I edited the original “tag” from the old shows, and added one that credited the new “owners.” Instead of giving a now-defunct mailing address for listeners to respond to (and there was some mail response when the programs first aired), my little job each week is to use Audacity to clip off the old ending and add a new voice-over that asks listeners — or the listener…who knows? — to click on the sponsoring Presbytery’s web site and “find out more.”
So the 40-something Jeff Kellam concludes the show’s content, and the 60-something Jeff Kellam takes over. And, my gosh, what a difference! I honestly had no idea.
That once warm, friendly, easy-going guy who voiced the “Spirit of Jazz” shows we are editing now sounds so…well, mature. And stuffy. Not as in haughty, but as in congested. If listeners (let’s pretend) haven’t caught onto the scam yet, they must assume that Jeff Kellam’s father is doing each Sunday night’s outro.
I guess I could do something about it. I could hire another voice to close the show. Something like, “Here’s your local announcer with some closing words.” Except I wouldn’t say that because I’d still have to use my old guy voice. Besides, we have only a handful of programs left. May as well keep doing it the way my two voices have done it since December.
You know, maybe it’s this little nook of a studio where I record these new outros. Maybe there’s some mold around here that makes me sound allergic to something…kind of filled up.
Or, maybe I’m just really 20 years older?
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