Inside Madeleine Wild’s Springs recording studio

Wild met a still-unknown budding actor/comedian, Robin Williams, and the two began working together on her show. Williams came up with voices, such as Swami Sackabananas, Jazz Baby and Mother Nature.|

Musicians might recognize the front doors of a few famous recording studios. Some are unmistakably nondescript, like the plain wooden door in the brick store front that is Muscle Shoals in Alabama. Then there’s the whimsical, carved door of the Record Plant in Sausalito. And what serious musician would not recognize the wide stairs leading to the oversized double wooden doors of Abbey Road Studios in London.

Right here in the Valley, in the Springs, is a tall weathered wooden gate that opens to a shady pathway. It leads to an understated, soft purple door with a silver heart. This is the door to Madeleine Wild’s recording studio known as “Radio Magic.”

Pass through it, and you enter a world of surprise, laughter, tension and wonder. You see, Madeleine Wild is a voice-over producer and director. The myriad emotions inside the studio are created by the voices of the people at the microphones.

Madeleine’s passion is working with people young and old, helping them to find the power of their voices. As Wild puts it, “Voice-over is an experience in discovering who you are.”

Local man about town and Gen. Vallejo impersonator George Webber is an alumnus of Wild’s.

“Madeleine regularly captures lighting in a bottle while teaching her voice-over technique,” said Webber when reached by email. “I couldn’t do the things I do today without her training.”

Wild grew up in Roslyn, New York.

“It has a clock tower and a duck pond, and reminds me of Sonoma,” she said. Her immediate and extended family was particularly verbal and literate, and authors abound. “I am one among a family of high achievers,” Wild remarked. Her late 97-year-old father also imbued in Wild a love of song, with an emphasis on jazz, theater and Broadway.

Wild attended Queens College where she studied education and theater. Living in Greenwich Village in the late 1960s, she studied by day and explored the night life after hours. A new neighbor became a close friend, and her friend’s father, Prof. Irwin Corey, introduced Wild to New York theater, as well as Johnny Carson and other comedians and stage and screen stars.

After graduation, she relocated to Sausalito. She taught preschool and designed sandals on the side. But the appropriately named Wild “wanted to be different.” With her education and entertainment background, she began to write a kid’s radio show called “Hot Air.”

Wild met a still-unknown budding actor/comedian, Robin Williams, and the two began working together on her show. Williams came up with voices, such as Swami Sackabananas, Jazz Baby and Mother Nature. (Later, this voice sounded a lot like his Mrs. Doubtfire voice).

After moving to Los Angeles, Wild became a successful literary and talent agent. At one point, her father felt he needed to ask, “Mad, have you gone Hollywood?” Her only reply was, “I am afraid I have.”

Wild returned to Marin County, where she met musician and future husband Roy Blumenfeld. The two married in 1984, and in 1985 moved to Sonoma. Blumenfeld built a soundproof studio for his drumming, and Wild used the space to start teaching voice-over acting.

Since 1991, Wild has become one of the preeminent voice-over directors in the North Bay.

In her book, “How to be a Voice-Over Success,” Wild outlines what she considers are the keys to voice-over; attitude, style, personality and point of view. Stressing the importance of working at one’s craft, she included this old Vaudeville joke: “How do you get to Carnegie Hall? Practice. Practice. Practice.”

A tour of the Radio Magic studios was filled with fascinating and marvelous sounds. She played several “demos” her students had made. The students, all hopeful amateurs, read from scripts written by themselves and Wild. All the demos sounded like the professional commercials heard on the radio or TV, some even better.

The husband and wife team, Wild and Blumenfeld, co-produce the demos. Wild writes and directs, Blumenfeld handles the digital editing and post-production work.

All demos had amazingly, crystal clear sound, tasteful music, and complimentary sounds in the background.

One very touching recording Wild played was not a demo at all, but her father, Walter Wild, telling about the early days of his relationship with his soon-to-be wife, and Madeleine’s mother. Beautiful to listen to and charming to hear, the recording of Mr. Wild had soft background sounds of rain, then piano, then vibraphone.

Other demos sampled showed the full range of emotions need to get the lucrative work that is possible these days doing voice-overs for video games, interactive voice response (think Siri, but human), radio and TV commercials and audio books.

Wild and Blumenfeld have produced demos for several high-profile clients, including John Krasinski (“The Office”), Jim Piddock (“Winnie The Pooh”), and work for the BBC and the Smithsonian Museum.

Wild has produced commercials for Santa Rosa’s TV50, and provided voices for “Where in the World is Carmen San Diego,” voices and casting for the CD-Rom “Star Trek,” and for Living Books, “The Cat in the Hat.”

Wild teaches her students how to write and read with expression. Several are now actively doing voice-overs, and all are using the skills they learned at Radio Magic.

A few local clients include Webber, and local authors Catherine Sevenau and Esther Trevino. Local actor Monica McKee voiced retired Prestwood School teacher Gary Griffith’s book “The Captain’s Chest”.

Other locals who have experienced Radio Magic first hand are Kari Wishingrad, Abbey Lee, Sam Coturri, Cat Smith and Kerry Daly.

Wild has also worked with the Grateful Dead’s Rex Foundation and the Sonoma Valley Education Foundation to provide local students with recording equipment for their classrooms. Local teachers have used the “Radio Magic” cart to record their students while they read and perform written works.

Wild provides voice-over classes for small groups, as well as private lessons. Coaching, reading and recording written scripts are all part of the sessions.

Next time you are driving down Highway 12 with the radio on, you may hear a commercial about buying a car.

When the announcer starts to speak way faster than you are driving about interest rates and payments, think to yourself, “That dude needs Radio Magic.” And Madeleine Wild.

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