Let me tell your story…whatever it is. Whether it's a product, service, cause, or event—a company, organization, small business, or just li'l ol' you—everything and everyone has a story that can be communicated and shared. And what better way than by using the most common and versatile of tools: the human voice?
Mine has its own story. I'm half-Japanese, half-Chinese and live with my lovely wife and house cat in Oakland, CA, but I was born and raised in Hilo on the Big Island where "talk story" is a part of life and aloha spirit informs your life. I like to think my natural voice embodies the joy and warmth, the friendliness and invitation of aloha, and I also think it embodies what my idol, Bruce Lee, said is the most important quality to have in martial arts and life: adaptability. I'm not saying I can do everything, but listen to my demos for a sense of my range and abilities, give me a go, and I'll do my damnedest to adapt myself to your needs. Silly or serious, easygoing or over-the-top, everyman or authority, I will be, as Lee said, like water. Or is that WA-TAAAAH?
Seriously, movies and TV were my connection to the world outside of Hawaii as a kid and kindled a love of accents, characters, and impressions that served me well in local radio commercials, and in radio drama here in the Bay Area. In fact, my college dream was to be a voice artist, but once I started honing my acting skills through theatre—BOOM—I found myself with an acting certificate and a decade of classical and children's theatre under my belt, which segued into over two decades of science plays, festivals, and assemblies mainly for a university science museum.
So, really, the heart of what I do comes from school outreach, where I had to adapt to any venue and groups of all sizes, ages, and backgrounds; build relationships with staff and parents; deal with a host of onsite issues and requests. All so I could generate…a feeling. An excited, positive, attitude-changing feeling that would linger and grow and make people say long after I'd left: "We want MORE!" I called it planting seeds.
We could do that together. It would be cool as heck and an honor to have my voice plant the seeds of change in every person who hears your story. That would be fun. And getting to know each other in the process? That would be, as we say in the islands, "good fun." 'Cause, ey, why you tink we do talk story in da firs' place?
MY TOOLS OF THE TRADE