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The Hobsons Prize
The Hobsons Prize
Throughout its history Hobson’s has been proud to represent some of the most successful and recognisable voice artists in the industry and believes the skills of a voice-over should be acknowledged and applauded.
We were therefore delighted to learn that a number of Drama schools had begun to recognise the importance of voice work as part of an actor’s skill set. In addition to the long established teaching for radio drama, many are now introducing voice-over and microphone technique as part of the syllabus.
In recognition of this significant step, to encourage its development and discover new young talent we created The Hobsons Prize.
- To discover new actors with a natural, distinctive voice quality and an aptitude for voice-over work.
- To encourage actors to learn and appreciate the skills involved in all areas of voice-over work.
- To further promote the introduction of microphone and voice-over technique as part of an actor’s study.
- To promote voice-over work as a creative skill.
The Prize is only open to graduating students from full-time education at accredited Drama schools, where microphone technique training for commercial and narrative recordings is included in the syllabus. A maximum of four entries may be submitted from each school.
Four finalists will be short-listed from the submitted recordings. They will then be invited to perform in the Final at a London sound studio. This will simulate a typical, professional voice-over session, with the panel of judges acting as clients. With their conduct throughout just as significant as their vocal performance, each candidate will be expected to approach the session with this in mind.
They will be asked to record two commercial scripts. As is customary, the commercials will be sight unseen.
The Finalist who best performs at this simulated session and displays the attributes sought by the judges will be declared the winner.
- A natural vocal quality.
- A sense of timing and a feel for working within industry standard commercial time lengths.
- The ability to make quick, creative responses to a variety of script types.
- A clear understanding of how a script is constructed and what it requires to be delivered effectively. Specifically, this will include elements such as the use of pace, pause, vocal modulation, appropriate inflections, emphasis and the observation of punctuation marks.
- The skill to understand and apply direction given by the client.
- A professional attitude throughout the session.
The judging panel will be named nearer to the closing date for entries, but will comprise:
- The Chairman of Judges
- A Hobson’s Voice agent
- An Advertising Agency or Production Company producer
- A Hobson’s Voice artist
- A Recording Engineer
The Prize itself is representation for a minimum of one year by Hobson’s Voices, together with a bespoke showreel, a dedicated page on this web site and an opportunity to ‘shadow’ one of our established voices.
The Winner will be announced at a presentation in London at the beginning of October.