Today we’d like to introduce you to Brad Grochowski.
Hi Brad, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Sure!
After finishing my bachelors degree in theatre performance in Michigan, I bounced around Chicago for a while and felt really lost. Friends had moved to Baltimore for their Masters degrees in electronic music at Peabody. I’d come down to visit them over long weekends and just… fell in love with Baltimore. There was a very vivid, active performance art scene here in Baltimore – this was the end of the 90s – and we rented a floor of the H&H building on Eutaw Street. I was seeing what my friends were doing in music with electronics and computers… and I really wanted to find ways to perform as an actor, digitally.
We did a lot of weird experiments in that building, to say the least. I think we all wanted to be Name June Paik or Yoko Ono from the 60s or whatever. That was a whole scene back then, and I loved it.
I had kind of broken up with traditional theatre by then. The theatre scene in Baltimore was pretty dire at that time. Remember, I’d come from Chicago where there was all kinds of rule-breaking theatre hijinks every where you looked. Not that I was able to insinuate myself into any of it… but in Baltimore, The MICA and UMBC visual art students were filling that gap. They were doing all this amazing stuff with costumes and giant inflatables and sculptural elements, and I started working video projection into their stuff. I was just trying to find ways to “perform” in a digital medium.
So from very early on, I was looking for something other than, you know, doing The Tempest at a community theatre… again.
Fast forward a few years, and the burlesque scene exploded in Baltimore. I took a turn then, from looking for ways to perform digitally to… the opposite. I started studying and researching traditional Vaudeville era performers. You know, baggy-pants performers and what not.
I had created a little busking bit called Piotre Zinzlowski’s Trunk Show Spectacularum – where I did stories, sketches and clowning bits, pulling props from a trunk that I’d set up as a little stage, and grabbing people from the audience. I had a bit where I made two strangers marry each other. That was a lot of fun.
Then I started to work with a partner, and we created a comedy musical duo, Hot and Bothered. I was Stanley Bothered, and he we Oliver Hot. We played out a lot in the burlesque scene. And then I went out on my own as just The Stanley Bothered Band, and with some friends as Stanley Bothered and the Very Serious Band.
So, really, all of that to explain that I had this very sort of bizarre, super diverse background in all sorts of performance milieux… when COVID hit, and, shut everything down. Well, anything that you couldn’t do online.
And then I stumbled on a voice over podcast – and that was it. I knew what everything I had done would add up to. I finally had my assignment. I started trying things out with the gear that I had, got cast in some audio dramas, booked a couple audiobooks, and then just started building out from there.
It took a few years to build up my current studio with all pro-level equipment, get the coaching I needed and really set the foundations for what my business is now. I worked my day job for about three years while I built all of that in the evenings and on weekends. About two and a half years ago I was able to step away from the tech support job, and start to work full-time as a voice actor.
And now I’m keeping busy with client work, but also providing coaching, speaking at voice over conferences… it’s been a pretty great ride!
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
You see a lot of online ads that promise you, “Just talk into a mic and earn 6 figures! It’s easy!”
I can tell you, it’s not like that. It’s not easy. Voice acting is such a technical, intimate, and personal type of acting… I don’t care who you are or what your background is, it’s going to be a challenge.
And that’s just learning the craft. Then figuring out how to get work? How to run a business? Keep your books straight, pay your taxes?
If I had to start over knowing everything I know now, about how challenging this field is… I probably wouldn’t have the will to do it all over again. Okay, maybe I’d find a way. But it would be daunting.
Fortunately, we rarely understand how tall a hill is before we start climbing. It’s the utility of naïveté and all that.
So, it’s been challenging, but it’s been a pretty straight run for me. Stay focused, stay on target, work super hard, care a lot, juggle a thousand balls, have some luck, network and make a lot connections, learn everything you can, every day, be kind to everyone, treat yourself well… and you know, if you can do those little things, it’s easy!
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I do a lot or eLearning narration, a lot of audiobooks, and a lot of children’s audiobooks. I love getting video game work, and animation – those are always fun. But the narration is definitely my meat and potatoes.
In addition to all the client work I do, I love doing my own fully-produced projects. I had a podcast, The Gentleman SpaceMan’s Atomic Hideout, were I narrated classic scifi stories, then a YouTube channel under the same name, where I did more sound design and production under the narration.
And a new project I’m really excited about that I’ve been working on with a writer friend, Malcolm T North – we’ll see where it goes. It’s a pulp fantasy audio dramatized series, called Oona The Unvaquishable. It’s about a female barbarian who roams across a wasteland getting into lots of trouble. I’m using a lot of background music, sound effects and post-production voice alteration so I can do all of the characters myself. It’s been a wonderful challenge so far, and the stories are really fun. You can find it on YouTube if you’re interested.
But in the end, I really love that I’ve found a line of work that scratches all of my creative itches, is very fulfilling, and at the end of the day, or the month, pays the bills. It’s very satisfying, for sure.
What do you like and dislike about the city?
Oh, I love Baltimore so much!
I moved here in 1998, so I’ve been here for over half of my live now. I’m 54, There’s just so much vibrancy here, so much kitschiness and quirkiness. I look back at when I was younger here, and I feel like I was really plugged into all that youthful energy that was just radiating out of MICA, Maryland Art Place, The Creative Alliance, Fluid Movement – all of these things that are institutions now. And all the performance groups that were just doing all this stuff.
I know every city has a scene and a vibe – but I feel like Baltimore is special.
I mean this is a city that is immensely proud to have birthed John Waters, Frank Zappa, David Burn and David Hasselhoff. Were I think a lot of other cities might be a little embarrassed of their fringe or counterculture icons, Baltimore holds them up high and says THESE ARE OUR FOLK!
And we celebrate that Poe had a death here that was a strange and weird as his life and his writing. So, we just don’t hide from the weird, here – good or bad.
All of that is accomplished while still keeping strong ties to our place in the history of our country – again, the good and the bad. And also maintaining a connection to the important blue-collar roots of our city, and the contributions of (and hurt we’ve done to) people of color. Baltimore doesn’t hide it’s scars. It circles them with lipstick, creates a fabulous ensemble that highlights them and marches with them in a parade.
There are problems here too, for sure. Everyone outside of Baltimore thinks it’s just rats and gangs and crooked cops running around shooting at each and that’s just not… oh wait, no… it’s that too. But darn it we’re just as proud as all of that, as well!
Like I said, we don’t hide – or hide from – our scars here.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://thevoiceofbrad.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thevoiceofbrad
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bradgrochowskivo
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brad-grochowski-pro-voice-talen
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@gentlemanspaceman
