Narrators

Lewis found her way to narrating through complete serendipity. She was living and working in Berlin, Germany, as an international newscaster when she took a holiday in Los Angeles. While there, she was contacted by a European client who needed a recording, so she phoned around to find a studio.

At the time, the legendary audiobook company, Deyan Audio, was actively seeking narrators. “Hi, my name is Christa Lewis . . .” was all she could say before cofounder Debra Deyan shouted, “Do you do audiobooks?” Debra wouldn’t listen to Lewis’s queries about studio prices, but interrupted--“You need to contact my husband right away!” Finally, Christa agreed to call Bob Deyan, who interviewed her within days and put her on their roster immediately as a narrator.

Later, Lewis decided to embark upon recording in a studio in her home--as many narrators do today. Learning how to work as narrator and director and recording engineer was a whole new challenge. “As a newscaster,” she remembers, “I had the best engineers in the world making me sound like a million bucks every time I went on the air, but I had never recorded myself.” She spent the next 18 months teaching herself how to record, edit, and master. “I practiced, I failed, I wept, I cursed. I’m a perfectionist, and I had been spoiled.”

It’s been years since Lewis graduated from Boston University’s with a degree in theater, for which she focused on acting. “Since then I’ve done a million things with my voice. Only lately am I finally feeling that I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing. Audiobooks are the fulfillment of whatever pushed me into acting school 30 years ago.”--Susie Wilde

[FEBRUARY/MARCH 2016]

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