malepoliticalvoice.com

My father was a regional executive with the Boy Scouts of America, which meant we were a scouting family, to say the least. Part of my father’s job involved being a camp director at scout camps each summer. Our entire family lived at these camps for three months every year from the time I was two years old until I departed for college at the age of 17.

So I didn’t experience the summers that most kids have: the pickup ball games, mowing lawns, cruising Main Street when you got a little older. What I did experience was living in tent frames and A-frame cabins, daily access to canoes and rowboats, the handicraft lodge, the archery range, hiking and fishing, and meeting slightly older staff members who served as important role models, some of whom are friends 60 years later. (Oh yeah, and it was easy to stack up merit badges when you had all summer, so I became an Eagle Scout at 15; sort of pre-ordained in a way.)

I grew to love the peacefulness of a forest and gained an appreciation of wildlife. It’s probably no surprise that my wife and I today live in a small log cabin in a narrow valley in northwestern Montana, sandwiched between two wilderness areas. And yep, my fully equipped professional audio studio occupies an even smaller cabin right next to the main house.

The scouting ethos of assisting people spread to other areas of my life. I was twice president of a Rotary Club I helped charter, served for two years as the “collection driver” for a battered women’s shelter, helped build a camp for kids suffering from cancer, and today am a third-term president of our local AARP chapter. In the early 2000s, my partner and I traveled the country for three years pulling a restored 1972 Airstream trailer, volunteering our time and skills at wildlife refuges and national parks.

Our family lived in a number of towns in the Pacific Northwest before moving to Montana, where I spent my high school and college years. I earned a dual degree in Journalism and Radio-TV production, but my anticipated career in broadcast journalism took a “hard swerve” when I became the publications director for a fledgling bicycle touring organization. That led to a 25-year career as executive director of an international cycling organization, a 6-year stint with a DC-based bicycle-pedestrian organization, and 10 years with the National Park Service’s transportation division, where I had the opportunity to continue a push for more bicycling and pedestrian facilities in our national parks.

So what does all this have to do with voice over? After all, you’re probably on this page because you’re in need of a voice for your next project. Well, it’s this: I’ve had the opportunity to work in a variety of situations, in a lot of different locations, and with groups of outstanding individuals. Those experiences are reflected in my voice, which has been described as mature, thoughtful, and resonant.

I’ve brought that voice to a number of different projects in the past 15 years. I’ve recorded political spots, commercials for mom-and-pop stores, voiced dozens of sessions for Japanese ESL students, and recorded and produced more than 70 audio books. In fact, at the age of 73, I’m still the voice of two teenage brothers, The Hardy Boys, my best-selling series on Audible.

When I’m not voicing projects, we enjoy hiking, hunting for huckleberries, mountain biking, and flying our classic Cessna 175. But I’d be happy to break away from all that, take a look at what you’re working on, and send you a custom sample of your script free of charge, so you can get an idea of how my voice could fit your project.

—Gary MacFadden