Celebrants – Want To Brighten Your Ceremonies?
Are you completely happy with the way you present your ceremonies? No? You’re not alone in this. Unless you’ve been fortunate enough to have had top-class guidance, preferably one on one, it’s not surprising that you may feel there’s something not quite right in the way you’re communicating with your audiences.
After all, the presentation of a ceremony can be thought of as the last hurdle, and if you’re not on top of how you come across to your audience, it can undo all the hard work you’ve put in up to that point!
You might have an idea about what could be missing; or it may be a nagging feeling at the back of your mind. And it’s possible that you’re quite happy with the way your ceremonies are going: but – what if there are things that just haven’t occurred to you? Down the years, there have been ideas and skills which I had no idea that I didn’t know about, or even existed. When they were pointed out to me, the scales fell from my eyes.
You might be getting really good feedback about your ceremonies, which may be well deserved; but who are you being compared with? If audiences (and funeral directors) are used to seeing celebrants who don’t communicate well – and there are a lot of those around – then the bar would be low.
(Recently, I was helping to train a would-be celebrant whose current job was in bereavement services. I was demonstrating a flat, uninteresting read, and apologised for over-exaggerating. She told me that there was no reason to apologise because nine tenths of the celebrants who worked in her crematorium sounded just like I’d demonstrated!)
I get a lot of incredulous reactions from working celebrants that I help. The best example of that has to be a particular testimonial I received from one of them. Here’s a short extract:
Paul, despite being a celebrant for three years, no matter how much care and creativity I’d put into the writing, I felt that my presentation style was missing something. It didn’t engage the listener as much as I’d have liked – or me – in the delivery.
Since working with you, my perspective and scope in relation to celebrancy has totally transformed. You’ve helped me to add a quality to my delivery that I previously had no idea about. I don’t think I’ll even call it delivery anymore.
See the full version here: Testimonials – Paul Robinson Voice Coaching
The human ear likes and expects certain things. A pleasant voice is one of them, but even more important are natural-sounding variations of pace, pitch, pause and volume (the 3Ps +V) in the way your voice is being used. That sounds fairly complicated. It can be! But what I teach is a straightforward, uncomplicated way that enables celebrants to speak their ceremonies with those natural-sounding variations of pace, pitch, pause and volume.
A good test of how natural you sound when presenting is to record yourself reading part of a ceremony. You don’t need much to get an indication – perhaps 15-20 lines.
Did you sound like you were reading? The more you do, the less your audience will tend to stay with you in the long term. Even a good, interesting reader will tend to sound samey as a ceremony goes on. This narrative style of presentation has a limited variety of the 3 Ps + V when compared to what I teach. Yes, my “students” are reading, but they don’t sound like they are. They come across as spontaneous and interesting. There are other facets to my training, which all add to the naturalness and spontaneity.
If you’re wary about what I’m suggesting, I don’t blame you. I would be too if some guy seemed to be offering a magic wand. Well, it’s not magic, but if you’re prepared to work at putting the ideas into practice, it can dramatically improve how your ceremonies come across. You could have increased personal satisfaction, even-happier clients, and the likelihood of more work. If you’re interested in what I’m talking about, I’d be glad to have a phone chat or Zoom (at no charge) to see if you’d like to take things further.
Here I am – paulyrobinson@outlook.com Paul Robinson Voice Coaching – Voice Coaching
07469 957 199
If you’re interested in exceptionally high-quality celebrant training, visit Heart-led Celebrants – Heart-led Celebrants