Frank Tavares, NPR Biography
Freelance Funding Credits Announcer
Frank Tavares is the voice of NPR News underwriters. During NPR's Morning Edition, Weekend Edition, All Things Considered, NPR newscasts, and Talk of the Nation, Tavares can be heard reading the names of the national organizations and corporations that fund each program.
Tavares became "the voice" in 1982 when NPR began using funding credits during programs. At the time, Tavares was director of specialized audience programming for NPR and executive producer for a number of programs that came through that service. Although he hosted several different programs, none was considered to be a news show, an important prerequisite for the voice of NPR's funding credits. To listeners, Tavares's was a "neutral" voice.
Tavares faces unique challenges on the job, including the sheer physical demands of recording hundreds of fundraising credits in three- or four-hour recording sessions, developing a particular rhythm and cadence for each individual credit while always hitting the time mark, and clearly enunciating each "w" in all the Web addresses included in the credits.
Besides being one of the voices of NPR, Tavares teaches communication at Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven, and consults and writes about public broadcasting issues. He is a founding editor and active member of the editorial board of The Journal of Radio Studies published by the Broadcast Education Association. Tavares lives in Connecticut where he is working on his third novel manuscript. He is married to an NPR alumna, and has three children, the oldest of whom continues the family tradition of working in the broadcast media.
