April 16 is World Voice Day, a global annual event dedicated to the celebration of the human voice. Every year, various organizations all over the world hold events such as workshops, storytelling, and conferences around the respective theme of the celebration.
This year, the theme is “Focus on your voice,” and voice enthusiasts were encouraged to conduct virtual events in lieu of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In the Philippines, voice acting titan Pocholo “The VoiceMaster” Gonzales has been organizing World Voice Day celebrations since 2015. This year, he hosted a free webinar called “The Voice Acting Project,” which aimed to inspire and educate aspiring voice artists on how to start, grow and build their voice acting career at home, even in times of crisis.
The half-day webinar featured speakers who were Pocholo’s students-turned-partners from his voice acting school, the Philippine Center for Voice Acting.
The first speaker was Ada Cuaresma, who gave a presentation about the science of the voice and vocal health. Ada is a graduate of Pocholo’s workshop in 2014, then later on became a voice artist, radio broadcaster and motivational speaker under Pocholo’s mentorship.
The next speaker was Microphone Club President Vet Lauzon, a veteran events host and organizer. Vet discussed the effects of quarantine to the hosting industry and answered the participants questions about how to build and thrive in such business.
Dannes “Kuyapas” Serrano came next with his highly engaging mini-workshop on the basics of voice acting. Dannes discussed some common miscon
ceptions about voice acting and honed in the message of “loving your own voice”. Dannes is the Vice President of Talent Development of the VoiceMaster’s League and the Founder of Jumpstarts Philippines.
Next on the lineup were Kathleen Sone and JV Villasan, who facilitated a Q&A to answer the participants biggest questions about voice the voice acting industry. They shared their own inspiring stories on how they got started as voice artists, from attending the VoiceMaster’s workshop to lending their voices to some of the biggest local and international brands.
Kathleen is the owner of the popular YouTube Channel Voiceover Flowers which currently has over 90,000 subscribers. JV also has a YouTube channel called Dubbers in Palette. Both vlogs are intended to inspire and educate aspiring voice artists about the voice acting industry in the Philippines.
After the Q&A, Microphone Club co-founder JC Garcia came online to share his own experience as an experienced and highly sought-after live voiceover and events host. He also shared his inspiring story of juggling his VO and hosting gigs with his full-time job, and how he has improved his vocal prowess over the years.
The webinar ended with an inspirational talk from none other than the VoiceMaster himself. He invited the participants to become part of the Voice Acting Project online community and jumpstart their voice acting career with the help of their instructors and mentors from the webinar. Recognizing the constraints of the enhanced community quarantine, Pocholo advised the participants to “do something today that your future self will thank you for,” and encouraged them to partake in their future online workshops.
The VoiceMaster is the founder of several companies and organizations such as CreatiVoices Productions, Voice Acting Academy Philippines, Voice Care Philippines, CreativSounds Studios and The Microphone Club. He is the author of the book “Gusto Kong Maging Voice Talent,” which was awarded as Best Book on Professions in the 2017 National Book Awards.
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