Art Of Great Speaking

Following on from my last post on using variety in public speaking, how much “force” do you have in your voice.

Observe this statement: “The policeman stopped me and said, ‘Pull over to the curb, Junior!’” When stating this a speaker could boost the force when he or she quotes the policeman, and thereby get variation in the force of his speaking. Some speakers, however, will make a daunting policeman appear as if he were a floor-walker in a trendy department shop.
In public speaking, when relating conversations, use direct quotations – use the exact words each character said, as opposed to to expressing indirectly what was said.
For example, a speaker could say, “Bill said that he had a toothache.” But using these words would not give the opportunity to put variety in vocal tones nearly so well as if the speaker had said, “Bill yelled, Oh-h-h, Oh-h-h-h! This tooth is killin’ me!”
A speaker doesn’t need to be an actor to do this. All he or she has to do would be to make each character speak in his or her own words and manner, to alter his voice naturally and as well as he can to mimic each character. This often gives one a chance to get variety in force, rate and pitch. It also allows an audience a restful chance to hear several words spoken in a tone which is somewhat different than the one typically.used by the speaker. A speaker who is fairly good at mimicking characters may use this skill to add fascinating variety to his speaking.
For practice, say this, “We stopped at a cabin. A feeble old man came to the door and said, ‘Good morning, strangers. What can I do for you?’ ”
As you speak the old man’s words, “Good morning, strangers. What can I do for you?” is your voice slow, rather high-pitched, and without much force?
Now say, somewhat as a rough sailor would speak, “My name is Barney O’Day, and I can wipe up the deck with any man, I can!”
Does this seaman speak faster, deeper, with much more force compared to feeble old man?
Imagining those two characters sounding alike is difficult, yet some speakers would make them sound exactly alike. Of course all speaking will not consist of such vivid contrasts as just indicated, although every speech will offer you possibilities to vary vocal rate, pitch, or force.
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Variety in your voice helps to keep your public speaking interesting. No-one likes listening to a dull monotone voice.

Thoroughly feeling a talk puts interesting natural variety in a speaker’s tones. And how refreshing variety is! Change, change, CHANGE. Appropriate variety holds interest, stimulates thinking, and revives an audience’s spirits.
Using variety is not a new idea. About two hundred years ago, William Cowper, a poet, said, “Variety’s the very spice of life.” And although this truth is time worn, some speakers still do not realize its value or surely they wouldn’t continue torturing audiences with monotony.
Variety’s The Very Spice of Life. Keep this truth handy and use it when you select and arrange materials for a speech. Also, when you practice, make that speech “live” through vocal in¬flection, variation of force, rate, and bodily action.
Get variety in your speaking by coloring your vocal tones with feeling to match your ideas.
Say, “The knife was sharp,” and as you speak, feel a sharp, bright blade cutting your finger.
Now say, “The old ax was dull.” And picture yourself sweating while trying to chop a tough green log with a rusty, ragged-edged ax. Feel the hopelessness of ever chopping that green log with a dull ax. When a speaker can mix a generous portion of feeling with his thoughts, his words will surely be expressive. Usually a dull, monotonous speaker is one who gives little thought and no feeling to the ideas he expresses.

If you think about what you are going to say it will help to variety to your voice. By caring what you are saying will help you be more expressive in your public speaking. It you want to find out more on confident public speaking please enter your details on the right and receive a 7 day course on confident public speaking plus hints and tips.

My previous post on public speaking voice was about don’t be boring. In this post here is tip to help put more feeling into your public speaking voice.

Speakers can put restful variety into their speaking by thoroughly feeling the ideas they express, and by willingly letting this feeling show freely in their tones.
Seeing mental pictures of expressed ideas will help a speaker put expressive color in his tones. For practice, say, as you toss an imaginary handful of feathers into the air, “Light as feathers.” Mentally see the light feathers fluttering in the air. Feel and show the lightness in your tones and speaking manner.
Now say, “Heavy as lead,” as you mentally see yourself seriously struggling to lift a big- bag of lead. Suit your bodily action to the thought as you say the words. Do this several times. As you say these words is your vocal tone different than it was when you said, “Light as feathers?”
Say “smooth” and make it sound smooth. Say “rough” and and notice the difference.
A speaker once told about the wash rag his mother used on him when he was a child. He paused and then said, “ROUGH,” as if a garden rake was being pulled over his face. Although this was only a simple thought, the speaker’s manner of expressing it gave variety to. his tones. It was very effective.
The tragic fact is that some speakers show no variation of feeling in their tones. They say everything alike. We are all too familiar with that type of talking.
Lively tones spring from a lively interest in life. So many effective speaking habits stem from that basic principle of being deeply interested in what we say and having an eager desire to share this interest. Will a speaker who is highly enthusiastic and excited about his subject ever speak in monotones? How could he?

To help you:- take an interest in life and practice using your voice to reflect what you are saying you will have a more interesting public speaking voice without thinking when in front of an audience.

Continuing on my theme of your public speaking voice.  Speak up and out to be heard by all your audience. Get your public speaking voice heard.

Move your lips as you talk. Few people have lazy lips in the moonlight, but speaking seems to be different! Speak up and out — probably about twice as loudly as you would in a personal conversation. When you speak in public, some of your listeners will be further away from you than a friend in s. personal conversation would be. They must hear every word you say.

Prevent Your Public Speaking Voice Sounding The Same

In addition to having sufficient force or volume a speaker’s tones should vary in pitch and inflection to correspond naturally with the thoughts and feelings he expresses. Sameness of tone induces monotony. In fact sameness of almost anything may be¬come boring.
For instance, a motorist, after driving .for several days over mountain roads, exclaimed, “I hope I never see another mountain!” But later, after traveling many scorchy miles through deserts, the same motorist sighed, “Oh, how I’d like to feel a cool mountain breeze again.”
Similarly, audiences like for speakers to put some “hills and Valleys” in their speaking. When speakers say everything at about the same pitch level, without shifting vocal gears, their voices become monotonous and tiresome.
Imagine a song being sung on one note only — la — la— la — la.” Would it ever make the hit parade?
Picture a speaker then, going la —la —la —la for an hour, or even half an hour. Could anyone blame people in his audience for silently screaming for some “hills and valleys?”

In summary, the two public speaking voice tips presented here are make sure you can be heard and don’t speak in a boring monotone voice.

Here are a couple of quick tips on how to manage the fear of public speaking:
Another cause of fear is the feeling that a speech may be criticized either secretly or openly by a listener or a speech teacher. A helpful teacher offers no adverse criticism until a student speaker has gained enough self-confidence to control his fear.
The speaker’s attitude should be, “I’m giving them my best. I hope that’s good enough. At this point I couldn’t do better. And if someone is unhappy with my speech, so what? Without worrying a second about any speech I’ve already delivered I’m going to put all my energy into the next speech.”
Tenseness may come when a speaker starts thinking about re-sults, or when he mentally compares himself unfavorably with other speakers. But this condition can be avoided when the speak¬er mentally plays down the importance of his speech. Who is going to remember it a hundred years later anyway? Nobody remem¬bers the score long. Ask a dozen people to tell you the exact score of a last year’s basketball game. How many could do it?
Then too, a speaker may become afraid when he thinks he could twist his tongue or mispronounce a word — when all those brilliant people are out there listening, maybe hoping he’ll fum¬ble. If a speaker could learn to grin at an audience and go right
on speaking when he makes a mistake, people would forget the mistake and remember the grin. A mistake always looks much bigger in the mind of the person who made it than in anyone else’s thinking because he is so near it. Other people are so busy thinking about themselves (and their own mistakes) they won’t remember someone else’s error long.

So, do your best, be prepared and people are already pre-occupied to be to worried about any mistake you may make. Thinking this way will will help to reduce the stress and fear of public speaking.