This month instead of reviewing a magic book, I am going to review a book that almost anyone can use if they are remotely engaged in performing. I think that in any performing art, the more dimension you can add to the presentation the more entertaining it is. In my review on children’s magic, I spoke of the Squeak Technique by Jeff McBride. The DVD covers the use of a squeaker to add more interest to the magic. What if you wanted a multitude of sounds in your performance but it does not warrant the time and effort to record them on a MP3 player. Or, perhaps you want something more natural and basic or more spontaneous and pre-recorded sounds would detract from your performance. Or, maybe you just want to enhance a story you are telling your children or grandchildren before they go to bed.

If you want to enhance any performance, why not learn how to make sounds yourself, with your own mouth. Mouth Sounds by Fred Newman is a book on how to produce sounds using your mouth and hands. Fred Newman has created dozens of voices and sounds for movies, television, and radio. His book teaches you how to make over 200 different sounds. The sounds you will learn to create range from various pops, clicks, horns, and honks to animal sounds, instruments, whistles, vehicles and dozens others. In addition to the sounds, there are stories which incorporate sounds as the main vehicle of telling the story. If that is not enough, also included is a DVD of hundreds of sounds, voices, stories and video clips.

Does this sound interesting? Well, here is the best part, I purchased this as a used book on Amazon for about $6 delivered. A small investment for so much potential. Just being able to tell a story with self-made sounds to enhance the delivery is well worth such a small investment. If you perform in any way, whether it is telling jokes to your buddies, stories to children or performing magic, I’m sure Mouth Sounds will help you deliver it with more pizzazz.