Legendary Announcer Gary Owens Shows How to Make "Millions" with Your Voice in Best-selling Book

Los Angeles, CA — His irreverent, compelling baritone voice is heard millions of times everyday in some form throughout the world—on radio, on television, in commercials, in animated cartoons, even on slot machines.

One minute he’s convincingly intoning, “What would you do with your own private island?” on TV’s outrageously funny Capital One commercials. The next he’s cavorting with cartoon zanies Ren and Stimpy as the cult superhero Powdered Toast Man. After that, playing it “straight,” he’s recording a new CD with comedy legend Jonathan Winters. Then he’s creating laughs again with his original “Laugh-In” cast members signing copies of their new “best of” DVD at a Los Angeles bookstore for their legions of devoted fans.

One man and one voice—known as the “hardest working voice in show business”—is behind them all…Gary Owens.

Now Owens as a voice who has experienced it all, with the help of his co-author and pop culture maven Jeff Lenburg, is sharing all in his new book, “How to Make a Million Dollars With Your Voice (Or Lose Your Tonsils Trying)” (McGraw-Hill, $14.95; foreword by Jonathan Winters), available in bookstores.

Entertaining and engagingly written, Owens, drawing on his four decades of experience, says he wrote the book to show others how they can follow in his footsteps (“without their feet squarely in their mouths”)—as a disc jockey, newscaster, announcer, commercial, or cartoon voice—and make millions in the process.

“People are always asking me how to break into the business,” Owens says in his trademark booming voice, “especially college graduates, up-and-coming actors, disc jockeys, and radio and television announcers—-wanting to be widely successful with their voice."

Owens says the book—“part autobiography and part how-to”—is peppered with practical advice and priceless anecdotes from himself, plus many well-known actors, producers and agents, to inspire and motivate others pursuing the profession and help them avoid some of the obstacles that he encountered. According to Owens, it offers everything voice wannabes everything they need to zero in on and promote their vocal talents, develop realistic career goals, produce a demo that sells, ace interviews and auditions, and find an agent.

“Believing in yourself is the most important thing,” says Owens. “As in any competitive business, not everyone may recognize that you have the talent to succeed. But through perseverance and having the outer skin of an armadillo, anything is possible so long as you never give up.”

Owens says he understands the difficulties of starting in the business. He remembers when he broke into radio as a news announcer at a South Dakota station, he never planned on becoming a disc jockey. But one day the opportunity arose when suddenly the station’s most popular deejay had a run in with the station owner, and was fired. A young surprised Owens stepped in, not knowing a thing about running a turntable, working the control board, or being a deejay.

“I goosed everything. I was awful at first,” he says grinning. “I think listeners tuned in just to see how bad I was. But I improved so did my confidence.”

Since inducted into not one but three Halls of Fame for radio and television, Owens estimates since moving to the Hollywood in the 1960s and becoming a top-rated Los Angeles disc jockey, he has hosted some 12,000 local and national radio shows. For 20 years on radio, he was the top afternoon deejay at Los Angeles’ KMPC, originally owned by former cowboy movie star Gene Autry.

Today, he is still delivering laughs and his unusual brand of zaniness afternoons on 570 KLAC, as well as hosting the long-running, nationally syndicated radio series, “The Music of Your Life.”

“Radio has been awfully good to me,” says Owens, who created the world-famous phrase “Beautiful Downtown Burbank” on Los Angeles radio long before his success on TVs “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In.” “Because of the beauty of this medium, which I still love so much, I’ve been able to spin off my talent in so many other ends of the business.”

Owens has lent his voice to more than 40,000 radio and television commercials and has appeared on thousands of network television shows and specials, not to mention voicing more than 3,000 animated cartoons—from “Space Ghost” to “Buzz Lightyear” and everything else in between.

Besides working in radio, film, and television, during his career Owens has recorded 15 albums that have been nominated for six Grammy awards, the latest being “Jonathan Winters and Gary Owens: Live at the Improv.” He also has voiced countless audiobooks, appeared on dozens of videos and DVDs, and served as a master of ceremonies and hosted thousands of Hollywood events, from major movie premieres and charity events.

“I love doing something creative every single day, and that’s what I enjoy most about what I do,” Owens says. “Each day offers something new and exciting.”