Picture from site production of The Power Within Reading Series, setting up for guests
A technique that we learned from So Say We All was to script out our story before performing it. This would allow for us to complete the work of knowing where to add emotion, speed up, slow down, end our sentences on an up or down, etc. before we actually got up on stage, meaning the day of, we just had to follow our own directions. When I scripted my story, I read each sentence aloud saying it in different tones until I found the one that worked best (this was fairly easy considering that it was my own words and I generally know how I talk). I would then mark it down using different symbols to help remind me of this. My main symbols were:
Italics = slow down Bold = emphasize Up arrow = Add infliction Down arrow = Have my voice go down Small font = quiet Big font = loud Different Colors = Different people talking <action> = action or act out ||| = pause/beat
I would also add notes to help me to remember to breathe.