263. How to avoid Monotone Town
All aboard… but not the Tangent Train to Monotone Town (where boredom hangs heavy and audiences drift off to sleep 🥱).
In this episode, we’re talking about how to avoid sending your listeners there — and instead hop on the Expression Express!
I’ll break down the Three P’s of vocal variety — Pitch, Pace, Power — and how to use them.
💡 By the end of this episode, you’ll know how to create dynamic, authentic expression so your audience feels like you’re speaking to their soul — not reading them a bedtime story.
Transcript
Hello how would you like to board the Tangent Train on a one-way ticket to Monotone Town, where boredom hangs and the locals have that unmistakeable look of wanting to fall asleep.
No, you don’t want to board that train, why would you? Sounds like a special kind of hell, right, so why would we want to send our audience there? Because we all know speakers who are obsessed with monotone tone. Maybe that person comes to mind, maybe they’re so forgettable they don’t.
In today’s episode I’m going to give you the playbook on how to avoid Monotone Town.
By the end of today you’ll be boarding the expression express… but there is a price of entry today my beautiful podcast listeners. And that is that you pre order my book VOICEPRINT. That is where you’ll get the literal playbook on what to to do. And as you might suspect from my socials at the moment @sallyprosservoice you’ll see I have just landed from my big 40th birthday celebrations in Sweden, and my Speak Up for Your Business workshop in London – the next one is in Brisbane by the way, October 31st then Perth November 21… so yes this has been recorded before I left… and at this time of recording there are not many tickets left for the big book launch party in Brisbane on Dec 7th, as a listener of That Voice Podcast I really want you there, so I have popped the link in the shownotes… normally you cannot get this link without pre ordering the book, but I trust you will pre order the book and yeh just jump in and grab tickets while they last.
Here's a little excerpt from Voiceprint, which is about today’s topic:
Cue the yawn and let’s take a painful trip to Monotone Town. Where everyone speaks on the same note. No matter what they say. And your challenge is to stay awake, otherwise you’ll get stranded in that boring borough where expression goes to die. Monotone Town sounds like a pretty dismal destination. You don’t want to be posted there permanently!
If you speak on a single note, it’s like pounding the same xylophone bar over and over and over – it does your head in! But when you explore your full vocal range, you create an engaging, dynamic, and captivating performance – and you’d definitely get kicked off the Monotone Town payroll!
So How do you avoid it?
It’s about the three P’s, not the 3 P’s I talked about when I was spokesperson for a sewerage company, that’s the only three p’s you should flush, pee poo and paper.
Our three P’s today are much more palatable: Pitch, Pace and Power.
Starting off strong with pitch. The definition of being monotone, is everything on the one pitch. It’s like a nightmare of a lullaby, and it is a struggle to keep the baby blues with that sound.
So let’s work on our range a bit here.
The good news is you don’t need to be able to sing ‘Do-Re-Mi’ like Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music, you just need to be able to go UP and DOWN. Say this out loud with me: I can speak HIGH! I can speak lowww. Feel the difference?
So when do you do and up and when do you go down? Let the words be your guide.
Think about some words and phrases that lend themselves to a higher pitch, like - Big picture, imagine, increase, tall, high, sun, vision, out of the box.
And then what words lend themselves to a lower pitch, like: Dragging your feet, Rock bottom, Mother Earth, grounded, low, foundations, let’s dive into the details.
It’s so simple when you let the words be your guide – they tell you what pitch to use! And when in doubt – start low, so you have somewhere to go.
Amazing, next we have PACE:
One of the biggest speaking myths is that slow speech is good speech. You know the voice I’m talking about. Think school assembly or awards night. Where everything. Is nice. And clear. But it sounds. Like a metronome. Lulling you into a trance of boredom. So variation is the key.
There are three ways you can change the pace of your voice:
1. Elongate or truncate the vowel sounds in the words. Think of making the words big and fat or short and sharp.
2. Take more frequent pauses.
3. Take longer pauses.
And again look to match the words and intention if you’re on a deadline and wanting action faster is better, if you’re wanting to elicit reflection or share quite dense detailed information, slower is better. And the number one culprit of killing engaging pace…. Is READING.
When you’re reading, it’s like some invisible metronome leaps in between the words and your voice and everything comes out at the same pace. So you can either practise and make sure you don’t fall prey to the metronome or better still, trust yourself and ditch the script. Speak from your heart, trust you know the content and if things come out a little different to how you rehearsed, that’s to be expected! That’s called rising to the emotion of the moment, that’s called prepping in the masculine and delivering in the feminine. So don’t freak out and think you have to not use notes, but just be aware of how much you actually need to rely on them.. because reading from notes often sends out a call for people to start moving to Monotone Town.
Ok finally POWER.
Varying your volume.
Now of course it’s essential people can hear you.
“Can you hear me up the back?”
Most speaking coaches will tell you this is a terrible way to start a speech. And sure, it’s not the most riveting opening, but here’s the thing: the most riveting opening won’t have any impact if people can’t hear you.
That’s why I always suggest using a microphone if one is available. Resisting a microphone isn’t about toughness – it’s about prioritising your audience. Take the focus off you and your self-diagnosed loud voice and think of audience members who might be hard of hearing. In my experience, speakers grossly overestimate their audibility, especially in rooms with poor acoustics. Even trained actors can’t compete with bad acoustics. Plus, using a microphone allows you to employ the under-rated technique of decreasing your volume.
The volume of your voice is controlled by the intensity of air flow, which increases the intensity of vibrations.
So practise I can raise my voice and I can lower the volume, like I’m sharing a secret… it’s a really great way to get rapport with the audience.
So go for it, vary your pitch, your pace your power and you will get a lifetime expulsion from Monotone Town and you can settle in on the expression express where your audience will be with you, your voice is engaging and aligned with the words you’re saying and the intention of the message you’re sharing. Because that’s what it’s all about. Not doing vocal gymnastics for the sake of it, rather using the instrument of your voice to do justice to the words you’re sharing to deliver that message with impact and authenticity in a way that makes people forget they’re listening to a speech and feel like someone is speaking to their soul.. and those calls of all aboard for the Tangent Train for Monotone Town fade into the background, because they are too invested and in the moment to even consider being bored.