Measured voice · The showman

Vincent Price

150s segment · male register · 16 benchmarked readings · measured 2026-07-26

Comparisons are based on Resonate's acoustic analysis of publicly available speeches. No endorsement or affiliation is implied.

The read

Three lighthouse keepers, a derelict ship, and an army of starving rats: Three Skeleton Key was radio horror at its peak, and Price carried it as narrator — two and a half minutes of the analysed stretch containing exactly two pauses, because on 1950s network radio, dead air was the one unforgivable sin. Seventy-six years later, the transfer has scraped away plenty: clarity and low-end both read below their bands, the record’s condition rather than the performance. What refuses to age is the placement. Presence-band energy — the range that cuts through a room, or a 1950 valve radio — still reads optimal through the static. The rats are long gone. The projection still lands.

Pitch contour · every voiced frame

1472443410s75s150sHz

Pitch & melody

Average pitch142Hz
in the zoneoptimal 100150 Hz
Pitch variability5.85st
in the zoneoptimal 36.5 st
Pitch range15.2st
above the zoneoptimal 712 st
Pitch dynamism (PDQ)0.39
above the zoneoptimal 0.150.38

Pacing & pauses

Pause ratio0.44%
below the zoneoptimal 1835 %
Average pause length0.33s
below the zoneoptimal 0.41 s
Syllable rate2.97syl/s
below the zoneoptimal 45.5 syl/s

Dynamics

Volume dynamics27.3dB
above the zoneoptimal 818 dB
Loudness variability8.34dB
above the zoneoptimal 3.58 dB

Voice quality

Voice clarity (HNR)6.03dB
below the zoneoptimal 1230 dB
Pitch steadiness (jitter)2.88%
above the zoneoptimal 02.5 %
Volume steadiness (shimmer)13.4%
above the zoneoptimal 09 %
Vocal fry (creak)5.7%
in the zoneoptimal 08 %

Spectral balance

Presence band (2-4 kHz)8.09%
in the zoneoptimal 620 %
Chest band (0-500 Hz)26.1%
below the zoneoptimal 3575 %
Spectral tilt (alpha ratio)-4.55dB
above the zoneoptimal -22-8 dB

Energy by band

Low (0–500 Hz)26.1%Mid (0.5–2 kHz)65.7%Presence (2–4 kHz)8.1%Brilliance (4 kHz+)0.1%

The presence band (2–4 kHz, red) is what carries a voice to the back of a room.

Steal this

forward placement

What the measurements endorse is placement that survives anything — energy set forward in the band that carried radio drama into a nation’s kitchens. Hum “mm-hmm” until the buzz sits unmistakably at your lips, then carry the sentence out of the hum without letting the sound fall back into the throat. If the placement can outlive a 1950 transfer, it can survive your conference call.

From the training library: Find the buzz

Same instrument · same scale

You’ve just read Price’s voice. Now read your own.

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Free · about twenty seconds · no signup. The same six scores on the same scale — and the recording is deleted the moment it’s analysed.