As a professional voice actor, I can be a conversational hip mom, nurturing self-help guru, or lively children’s storyteller. I have subtly persuaded people to eat Cheerios, treat their hair with Physique shampoo and conditioner, wash dishes with Cascade, drive a Volkswagen and watch programs on Country Music Television and Oxygen. I am a member of SAG and AFTRA, and am represented commercially by Don Buchwald Associates.

When I first came to New York after graduating from the University of Vermont, I worked as a publicist in book publishing, first at Hyperion and then at Viking Penguin. Indisputably, the highlight of those four years was accompanying RuPaul, the drag queen entertainer (and author) on a four city book tour to promote his tome, Lettin It All Hang Out.

While working in publishing, I also promoted audiobooks, which is how I became interested in the skill and technique of reading written material out loud. I started narrating books on tape for the New York Public Library’s Division for the Blind, which eventually led me to the commercial side of voice-over work.

Along the way, I developed an interest in writing and producing feature pieces and audio documentaries for public radio. I have contributed feature pieces to Public Radio International/WNYC's Studio 360, a hip and sophisticated show exploring the high and low brows of arts and culture, as well as to the NPR News Program "Weekend Edition Saturday."  You can check out these show's sites and listen to recent or achived shows here: www.studio360.org and www.npr.org -- click on Weekend Edition Saturday.

When people inevitably ask “what is an audio documentary?” the easiest answer is to refer them to the work on “This American Life,” a radio show produced by WBEZ/Chicago Public Radio and hosted by Ira Glass. This show is very special. Funny, thoughtful, moving, and extremely inspiring to me. If you’ve never heard it, go NOW to the website, pick any random show and listen. (Archived shows are free at www.thislife.org).

Also, check out these masters of the craft:

• The Third Coast International Audio Festival, a conference/contest/broadcast devoted to the craft of radio storytelling, awards annual prizes to a variety of producers, from the accomplished to the amatuer. You can hear samples of this year’s winners on the site (www.thirdcoastfestival.org).
• The Kitchen Sisters and their work on the Lost and Found Sound series, (www.npr.org/programs/lnfsound/)
  
• Jay Allison (his site www.transom.org is a great resource for making your own radio)
  
• Joe Richman’s Radio Diaries Series (www.radiodiaries.org)
  
• David Isay and Sound Portraits Productions (www.soundportraits.org), and a satellite program called Storycorps (www.storycorps.net), which invites people to step into public sound booths and interview one another.

My own radio pieces so far have varied in length and style, but their subject matter is usually connected in some way to art and/or popular culture. I’m most attracted to stories that share an elusive combination of humor and earnestness -- that’s what drew me toward radio in the first place. Other inspirations include the now defunct “What They Were Thinking” in The New York Times Magazine, any fiction written by Michael Chabon, Lorrie Moore, T.C. Boyle, Russell Banks and Paul Auster and living shoulder to shoulder with my fellow New Yorkers.

It’s great to be able to talk and to listen for a living.