Hello there. Let me introduce myself. You might know me as Bob Kingsley through my work as a UK radio presenter and voice-over artist. You might even have arrived here after a web search, thinking — mistakenly — that I’m the other Bob Kingsley who resides in the USA, but here in cyberspace I like to be known as ‘Somerset’ Bob, a voice-over man and writer. If our paths are crossing for the first time, it’s good to meet you. If we already know one another — hey, I’m so pleased you’ve dropped by.

I started building this site on Tuesday 17th April 2007, the day I discovered WordPress. It’s a great bit of kit. I thought all I’d be creating was a blog, but it turned out to be an entire web site. The layout changed as I learned how to add more widgets and I admit I do still shift the furniture around the place from time to time, but it’s pretty much settled down now.

If you don’t know anything about me, here’s a potted history: my love of radio began way back in my teenage years and I’ve been professionally associated with the UK radio business in one way or another all my adult life, including working as a radio show presenter at various commercial stations in my younger days, but I’m probably best known around the industry now as being a voice-over artist for over 30 years. You’ll find some demo MP3s posted under the Work category.

If you’re here primarily because you’re thinking of offering me voice work, thanks very much. Here’s the deal: I take on ISDN and MP3 engagements from UK commercial radio stations and UK production houses making radio and/or TV commercials, corporate videos and internet presentations. I’m not actively seeking any jobs from overseas clients, but will consider them if the deal’s right and you’re willing to pay up front (PayPal preferred) until we establish a working relationship.

I very rarely travel to sessions — unless, say, you’re close to Weston-super-Mare in Somerset, have a particularly intriguing project, are offering money to cover travelling expenses and strike me as being really nice people to work with. Truth is: these days I prefer to do all my voice work at home working live using ISDN and my Prima LT (Musicam) codec with you producing me at the other end.

If you don’t have ISDN, I can provide reads as MP3 (or various other formats) sent as e-mail attachments, FTP’d to your web site, or (preferably) stored here at my own site for you to collect — but I don’t have the facility for you to listen down a phone line while I’m recording scripts in this way. However, I’m good at interpreting producers’ wishes, as the above video shows. I recorded and edited my voice at this end and provided an MP3 for the agency who then mixed it over the images and music to great effect. They never heard me record it, and I didn’t see the pictures until after it was finished.

Here’s another one, made in the same way, for Animal Defenders International. It’s a campaigning documentary called Save The Primates, released in February 2009 after a showing to MEPs at the European Parliament, where 55% already support Written Declaration 40 proposing more action to phase out the use of primates in laboratory experiments across Europe. I managed this 18-minute read in one take, pausing only for page-turns. It’s unusual for me to get something that long in the first take, but the script was so compelling I soon found myself ‘in the zone’, even though I didn’t have the pictures to look at. Now the whole thing’s complete, I think it’s a powerful piece of work.

I’m happy to do bits of scripts again for free where I’ve got something like timing or pronunciation wrong but I charge extra for retakes caused by rewrites or other matters beyond my control. I’ve been an Equity member for over 25 years and I adhere to all their rates and usage fees for UK commercial radio and TV work. I invoice at the end of each month and give you 30 days to pay. Please don’t make me want to send the boys round. If you prove to be a late payment merchant, I very much doubt I’ll agree to work for you again. If I do, you’ll have to pay up front and in full using PayPal or some other form of prepayment.

Having said that, my friends will tell you I’m a reasonable man in many other ways, so if you’ve listened to my demo MP3s and you like what you heard, let’s talk. E-mail me and I’ll get back to you. (You can also find these details listed at the UK’s premier VO directory, voiceovers.co.uk.)

But this site isn’t just for marketing my voice. That’s been an unexpected bonus of WordPress‘s flexibility. I really set it up to give myself an outlet for my lifelong wish to be a writer. Now I’m no longer constantly dashing hither and yon pursuing work in a mad, youthful frenzy, I want to spend more time honing my skills in this noble art, flexing my creative muscles. I’m hoping to write a novel one day — look for posts about that in the Writing category. I’ve also created an online archive of most of my earlier attempts at creative writing. Even if they’re only ever read by a handful of others, I’ll be pleased. They’ve been filed away on my computer or hidden away in desk drawers for years — putting them up on the web is just another way of storing them, except now anyone will be able to read them if they wish. I always wanted people to read my stuff. Isn’t that what any writer wants?

Of course, there are always distractions that keep a writer from getting down to the intended work — in my case it’s social networking, which I adore. You can follow me on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn; I sometimes make simple videos with my iPhone which I post on YouTube and I regularly post photos on Flickr and TwitPic; I also post comments on other people’s blogs and in bulletin boards when I’ve the time. There’s a lot of writing being done, though I admit it’s not writing the novel. Not yet. But I like to feel it’s preparing the ground.

Though I haven’t added to it for some time, I’ve also written some stuff about climate change. You can follow my posts on this subject in chronological order by using the Climate Change Log tab at the top of each page.

I hope you’ll find enough of interest here to consider adding me to your RSS feed or bookmarking me in your browser.

Thanks for your time.

Be seeing you.

‘Somerset’ Bob Kingsley

Updated 26th August 2010