Pitch
A second quality of speech is its pitch. This simply means its place in the musical scale. Speaking voices are high, medium, or low. Unfortunate tendencies of Americans seem to be for women to pitch their voices too high, with resultant strain and unpleasantness, and for men to pitch their voices too low, with resultant growls and gruffness. The voices of young children should be carefully guarded in this respect; so should the changing voices of growing boys.
To secure a good pitch for the speaking voice the normal natural pitch of usual conversation should be found. Speech in that same pitch should be developed for larger audiences. Frequently a better pitch can be secured by slightly lowering the voice. If the natural pitch be too low for clearness or agreeableness it should be slightly raised—never more than is absolutely necessary.
No connected group of words should be delivered in a monotonously level pitch. The voice must rise and fall. These changes must answer intelligently to the meaning of the material. Such variations are called inflections. The most disagreeable violations of required inflections are raising the voice where it should fall—as at the completion of an idea, and letting it drop where it should remain up—as before the completion of an idea, frequently answering to a comma. Other variations of pitch depend upon emphasis.