Recently, Charlotte Talks, which hosted our own beloved headmaster in October, featured the delightful Jim Dale, known to many of us as the voice of the Harry Potter audiobooks. In addition to creating beautiful voices for our friends at Hogwarts, Dale is an award-winning songwriter, singer, and actor, with several successful careers before he began reading Harry’s adventures to us. (Did you know he wrote “Georgie Girl” ? I certainly didn’t!)

 These were actually his first audiobooks, so  he sort of made up the process as he went, and a fascinating process it is. In this broadcast, in addition to talking about his amusing and exciting performance history, Dale reveals some of his techniques, such as “capturing” the voice for each character. Some of the books have a dizzying number of voices, and Dale makes each distinct, memorable, and appropriate. Thos of us who have read the books with our children know how hard it is to read a chapter in which we have to voice Snape, Voldemort, and Bellatrix in rapid succession! If you love Dale’s readings and want to know more, or if you’ve never experienced his captivating voice, check out this fun interview!