AUDACITY

What I did: Downloaded Audacity Sound Editing software – for Free!

What I’m Learning: How to Edit Sound (and, by extension… how I sound)

A few weeks ago, I had a phone interview with Brooke Allen, founder of No Shortage of Work (http://www.noshortageofwork.com/) about my No MFA Project. A comment Brooke made last spring was actually the inspiration for this project. While discussing education and how overpriced degrees often wind up being a bad deal for the money, he mentioned that it would be interesting to see what someone who set out to get an education could do if they instead invested their money in gaining other real-life valuable experiences. Since I started the No MFA Project a little over a month ago, he has been full of useful suggestions for moving the project forward.

The idea that I edit our rough conversation and post it online as a sort of virtual radio interview was his – and, so far, it has been the most eye-opening mini-project I’ve undertaken within my larger No MFA Project.

To get started, I downloaded Audacity at http://gofree.com/download/Audio/Sounds/audacity.php?gclid=CO_fv9SLqaYCFUS8Kgod-RKgoA. (Word to the wise – this download won’t work for Macs. I had to borrow my fiance’s Toshiba to do this.)

This sound-editing software is incredibly easy to use. While the “help” feature could be more, well, helpful (it just shows you where the term you’ve searched appears on the menu, rather than explaining how to do something), it’s fairly easy to figure things out. Within moments of importing my audio file, I was editing.

An unexpected benefit of doing this has been getting to analyze how I come across in an interview. Even before it played over my headphones, I knew when I was about to say “Uuuummmm” because of the shape of the sound waves on my audio file. (My “umm” looks like a large cup tipped over on its side. I got really sick of seeing that cup.) I also realized that I have a tendency to repeat words while I formulate my thoughts. It was fascinating to dive into my own language, pick it apart, get annoyed with it, and learn how I’d like to change the way I talk.

Another interesting side benefit of this experience was getting to compare what it’s like to edit sound with what it’s like to edit writing. When what I needed to edit was in my ear instead of on a page in front of me, it required a different set of skills – sharper listening, better memory, and a sense of how something would unfold to a listener as opposed to a reader.

This all gave me the feel of being back in school, and of having my abilities stretched to accommodate new techniques. And - for free!

What started as 65 minutes of raw, unpolished talk is now approaching just 30 minutes of tighter, more interesting back-and-forth. It’s still a work in progress, but I’ll be posting the final results within the next few days for your listening pleasure!