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Ray Porter
 With several impressive film and television credits to his name, Ray Porter is equally at home lending his stately voice to audiobooks. Since he’s an avowed aficionado of blues legends like Robert Johnson and has appeared in a number of movies with a rock-and-roll theme--including “Almost Famous” and “The Runaways”--it’s no surprise he recently tackled Greil Marcus’s THE DOORS: A LIFETIME OF LISTENING TO FIVE MEAN YEARS, a highly analytical memoir about the legendary band.
Porter says, “The thing that struck me the most about the book is that it’s very personal. It’s as if Marcus takes us into a concert of the Doors and gently explains to us while we’re listening to the music what’s going on. I like that approach. It’s a listener’s view of the Doors. It’s not just a history--although it’s that as well.” Read More...
Bianca Amato
 Bianca Amato says “it’s an absolute joy” being an audiobook narrator. The winner of five AudioFile Earphones Awards and Audies for her performances of LISTENING FOR LIONS and THE SECRET DIARIES OF CHARLOTTE BRONTË says she “stumbled” upon the profession when fellow actor Richard Poe suggested she audition for his wife--Claudia Howard, studio director of Recorded Books. “I was a journeyman actor in New York City, struggling along, and this just kind of fell into my lap. It’s a real blessing. It’s such a wonderful addition to my acting repertoire. In some ways it’s taking over my life more than my stage work, and I do a lot of stage work.”
Amato is currently playing the Queen of Sparta in an off-Broadway production of John Ford’s seventeenth-century tragicomedy “The Broken Heart.” She tells us, “Audiobooks have become very important to me.” In them her lovely voice and impressive performances transport listeners to other eras, other worlds. From British queens to Yorkshire housemaids to nineteenth-century novelists, she is completely invested in the characters she creates. “You can’t do this halfheartedly. You have to be there, in that moment. I think it’s really about creating a world with your voice, and that means that you have to go there.” Read More...
Kevin R. Free
 When Kevin Free talks about his career, one word comes up again and again: lucky. “I’m one of the lucky actors who gets to do a whole lot of different artistic things,” he says. “And I see myself as a storyteller, in general, in all the work I do.” That storytelling takes many forms: He recently performed “A Christmas Carol” at Virginia Stage Company; he presented the first ten minutes of his own play, “The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual,” as part The Fire This Time Festival; and in February, he’s sharing a story live on The Moth Mainstage in New York. “I just can’t believe that I’m actually doing it--2012 already feels like a success.”
When he’s narrating audiobooks, especially the ones for younger audiences, such as Rick Riordan’s Kane Chronicles series and Walter Dean Myers’s THE CRUISERS and CHECKMATE, Free has learned to not be afraid of going too far. “I really characterize and really use my voice to go the full distance. I think it’s easier to see those characters if they’re fully formed voices.” Read More...
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