We were lucky to catch up with Gwen Steel recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Gwen, great to have you with us today and excited to have you share your wisdom with our readers. Over the years, after speaking with countless do-ers, makers, builders, entrepreneurs, artists and more we’ve noticed that the ability to take risks is central to almost all stories of triumph and so we’re really interested in hearing about your journey with risk and how you developed your risk-taking ability.
I am not an inherent risk taker. I first started working with a voice acting coach in 2002, and knew that it was something I’d love to pursue. But I put things on ice because I was afraid to make the jump. Being an actor and entrepreneur was risky. What if I put all this effort into it, and it didn’t go anywhere? What if I…failed?
I spent a few years racing bicycles at the local velodrome in my mid to late twenties. I wasn’t inherently sporty, and didn’t have major aspirations in the sport; but it was fun, and I enjoyed pushing myself to see what I was capable of. It was through track racing that I came to appreciate the importance of taking calculated risks. In contrast to road races, which can last a matter of hours, track races last a matter of minutes. Seconds matter. The dynamics of the race are constantly changing, and every moment of the race you are calculating and re-calculating your strategy. I was never the fastest rider, so it really came down to strategy. If I simply waited for someone else to make the first move, I was not likely to be able to match their speed. And a half-hearted attempt to break away was simply wasted energy. I learned that it was better to make a decisive move and commit to it. Sometimes I would blow up and end up off the back of the field, but other times I would manage to be the first person across the line. Either way, it animated the race for the other riders and the crowd. It taught me to stop thinking of failure as a dirty word.
This quote from Samuel Beckett is something of a mantra for me: “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” Taking calculated risks and making bold choices–and committing to them–in bike racing, in voiceover, and in life is surely a better strategy than simply waiting for things to happen.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
I am a voice actor and narrator specializing in corporate voiceover and nonfiction narration. I love to learn, and I love to share that enthusiasm by voicing things like e-learning courses, public service announcements (PSAs), nonfiction audiobooks, and political ads. Building trust and connection with the listener is at the core of what I do.
The best part of what I do is getting to satiate my curiosity while teaching and entertaining others. I may not be an expert on aerospace engineering, data analytics, or foreign intelligence; but I get to play one in front of the mic! I love that I get to learn new vocabulary, phrases in French or Latin, or new accents.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Developing my listening skills, making the most of the opportunities in my path, and building my business skills have all served me well.
You might think that all a voice actor does is talk–and we do talk a lot!–but careful listening may be just as important as the talking part. Voice acting isn’t really about having a nice voice or a fancy microphone; it’s about being able to connect with and move the listener. I’m always listening for the nuances in everyday spoken communication. Sometimes my poor spouse just wants to watch a YouTube video or listen to a podcast, and here I am, ruining it by analyzing the voiceover–or demanding that the commercials NOT be muted. I spend a lot of time hearing my own voice on playback, listening objectively and then making incremental adjustments to my performance. As voice actors are not on camera, there is so much we have to be able to communicate using only our voices.
Additionally, I am so grateful for everything I was able to learn and experience at my college radio station. Shout out to Radio K at the University of Minnesota! Truth be told, I joined the radio station because I was a huge music fan, and I loved being in the know about new artists and getting to play my favorites on the air. But I also got my first taste of voiceover by recording station IDs, underwriting spots, and various projects for the university. That was my “oh wow….people get paid to do this for a living?!” moment with voiceover. Plus, I gained insight and appreciation for everything else that goes on behind the scenes to make the experience great for the listener: learning to use software to record and produce spots and interviews, marketing, underwriting, having the perfect music to complement the voiceover, and so on. There was a time when voice actors got most of their work through agents, then went into a studio to record with a director and engineer; and after recording, the engineer would clean up the track and send it to the client. But today–especially since the pandemic–it’s much more common that you do it all yourself from your home studio, from marketing to self-directing to engineering. That’s really made me so thankful for getting a little introduction to all of these skills from my time at the station.
Finally, I have gained so much appreciation for all the skills that go into running a small business–and this makes me all the more excited and honored to be able to work with small business clients! Call me naive, but when I started down the road of coaching and acting classes, I thought I would just need to get an agent and it would only be a matter of time before I had a national commercial. Ha! The reality is that as a solopreneur, you are your own marketing, finance, contracts, and IT department. Having good habits, processes, and business skills are just as necessary as the performance stuff.
How can folks who want to work with you connect?
If you have never thought about creating an audio version of your book, let’s talk! It’s a great way to expand your readership. I particularly love to narrate non-fiction because–nerd alert–I love to learn, and to use my voice to bring others on the learning journey.
I work with small businesses, large corporations, non-profits, higher education, and government agencies on anything that needs a voice and a human connection. This includes on hold messages and answering services, social media or landing page voiceovers, real estate videos, product or company explainers, and of course commercial advertising for TV and radio! I am also able to help small businesses with copywriting and mixing/mastering audio.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://gwensteel.us
- Instagram: gwen_steel
Image Credits
professional photos by Anna Poisson/Imperfekt Studio
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