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101 Things To Say Into a Microphone: Take 1 - Eletelephony

Dear Reader,

At one point years ago, back when I was doing a bit of freelance audio, video and film production work, an idea came to me: I should write a book and call it 101 Things To Say Into a Microphone.  The idea was likely brought on by hearing some production assistant or other saying "Check...check 1.... check 1, 2, 3...Can you hear me?...... Check...........check....check....1...2...1.......2...check...3...4..." and so on for a period of time much longer than he wished to repeat it and everyone else wished to hear it.  Why not, I thought, write (or rather, compile) a book of relatively short, funny or interesting poems, quotes, stories, jokes, etc. which can be easily memorized and repeated by production assistants everywhere to the benefit of everyone on set or stage?

This idea came back to me recently when I needed to test the recording quality of a microphone I purchased to record super-interesting-technical-stuff for work.

Let's make this a collective effort.  Let me know what you think should be included and whether or not you like my selections.

Selection 1: Eletelephony by Laura Elizabeth Richards.
Words, here.  Me reading, here.

If there are no comments, I'll assume you can't hear me.
Check....1....check...check....anything....?
~~ LeAn

Comments

  1. One of my all-time favorites is Walt Kelley's "Mr. Middle In The Meadow ...". It's a tad long, but i've used it often when testing stage mics. Usually the rest of the crew ends up listening in rapt amazement.

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  2. In all my years of speaking English as a non-native speaker, I never managed, never, to say "Howe’er" properly. :'-(

    I think it would be a very fine book, especially if you throw in some foreign languages sentences in !

    ReplyDelete
  3. Well, is the book a go or do you need some additional materials? I am, by nature, a great poet!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Somewhere I have an actual list of words and a scale for rating sound quality based on intelligibility; I can't find the link now, but it was a white paper I downloaded years ago connected with the Larson-Davis MLSSA speech intelligibility test. Very similarly a Rhyme test, its little known long established protocol. I will forward it along when I find it.

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