Emmy Award winning Producer/Director Martin Zied was only 8 years old, when an event at school made him cry. But it wasn’t bullying or being disciplined by an angry teacher that made his tears flow. It was a song and its singer. “This upperclassman was on stage singing “Without a Song,” Zied recalls. “He sang in a high tenor voice that was both powerful and tender. I was with my mom, so I tried to hide my emotions…but I couldn’t! It wasn’t until years later that I realized that it was his voice that brought me to tears.”
Zied says that early experience and subsequent revelation were the first times he realized how the human voice could have such a powerful effect. Now, Zied is using those nascent moments as a lynchpin for his Documentary, “Voice Messages.” The film takes an entertaining, biological, sociological and historical journey into how we use our voices. “Voice Messages” examines how our voices change in our everyday lives depending on how we’re using them at any given moment. “Think about how different you sound when you’re speaking to your children, with your parents, your friends, your co-workers. And then there are the voices we use for seduction, discipline, authority and playfulness. Performance Artist Laurie Anderson claims we can have as many as 50 different voices!”
Zied also takes on many facets of singing, including his favorite kind, Acapella vocal harmony, with 10 time Grammy winners, Take 6. And he explores voice health, even voice loss, with Rock icon Linda Ronstadt, who’s sadly losing her voice to Parkinson’s Disease.
Voice Messages is around 40% shot, Zied says. To get to the finish line with even more fascinating stories to tell, he’s undertaken a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo. www.fundvoicemessages.com
“It’s the only way to get this film finished,” Zied says. “We’ve raised over 50% of our goal, with 2 weeks left in the campaign. I hope the crowd feels as strongly about their voices as I do.”
