MySpace has pages for people, places, and now things. Composer Peter Traub has started ItSpace, a participatory sound project. “ItSpace pages feature everyday household objects. Each page has a photo of the object, a description, and most importantly, a 1-minute piece of music composed of recordings of the object being struck and resonated in various.” A story by Jesse Dukes on NPR Day to Day, “Objects Sing at Itspace” (5:04) mp3):
Hearing Voices from NPR®:
002 Visiting Hours— In Hospital
Host— Ceil Muller of KQED Public Radio
Airs week of— 2009-03-11 (Originally: 2008-03-12)
Visiting Hours (52:00 mp3):
“The Kiss and the Dying” is host Ceil Muller’s (of KQED) etiquette list for those who may be dying, and for the soon-to-be survivors.
“Fire and Ice Cream” is from Brent Runyan’s book “The Burn Journals,” and Jay Allison’s Life Stories radio series. Brent’s nurse in the burn unit asks the 14-year-old out for ice cream… and a date?
In “Our Father” Brian Brophy documents his dad’s passing, with recordings of his family, the chaplain, the hospital and hospice staff, and the wake.
Carmen Delzell helps heal her “Grandmother’s Hip.”
And Nancy Updike watches patients pass the time with TV in “Channeling Health.”
Music by Pete Fountain, Brave Old World, Peter Ostroushko, Jimmy Smith, and Rotterdam Ska Jazz Foundation.
NPR is back into radio drama, at least for a couple minutes. Today’s NPR Day to Day premieres the ZBS series, 2 Minute Film Noir. An American private eye falls in love with a French woman who is more than mysterious, she’s ethereal, in “Chez Tootsie” (3:26 mp3):
PRI’s Fair Game asked Andrew W. K. to write a rocker based on words from TV’s shout-fest The McLaughlin Group, “The McLaughlin Groove” (0:47 mp3):
“The next man on the moon will be Chinese.” Who know the pundit was a poet?
Gotta say, tho, Msr. W.K. has fallen mightily in subject-matter, reduced to covering shlock like TV’s punditocracy; especially considering his previous high-culture accomplishments, not least of which is Jackass’s “We Want Fun:”
via Current.
Hearing Voices from NPR®:
001 Street Map— The People Next Door
Host— Katie Davis of Neighborhood Stories
Airs week of— 2009-03-04 (Originally: 2008-03-05)
“Street Map” (52:00 mp3):
A walk around the block:
Scott Carrier walks around the Salt Lake City blocks, talking to people in “The Neighborhood.”
Host Katie Davis, of Neighborhood Stories, contemplates changes at the “Corner Store” on the DC street where she grew up and still lives.
Larry Massett helps his friend bid “Goodbye, Batumi” to his hometown in the Republic of Georgia.
And a modern day Romeo and Juliet is staged, amidst a growing number of homicides, in “Oakland Scenes: Snapshots of a Community” by Youth Radio and poet Ise Lyfe.
Music by Eva Cassidy, James Brown, and Parazitii.
Hearing Voices is now a new weekly hour series. We’re calling it The Best of Public Radio; a sixty-minute stream of “driveway moments†all connected by a weekly theme. We listen to broadcasts and podcasts; we dig through audio archives; and we scour the web to find the best stories, sound-portraits, slam poets, docs, radio dramas, features, and found-sound.
Each week a new Guest Host steers the show home. About 15 stations all already on board — broadcast schedules coming soon. Here’s a sample from our very first hour, airing next weekend, and hosted by Katie Davis of Neighborhood Stories; it’s called “Street Map” (9:24 mp3):
Good news: Last week we signed a deal w/ NPR®. They take care of our distribution and podcast. We take listeners for wild weekly radio rides. Good deal, huh? Reminds us of Car Talk’s disclaimers, “And even tho Robert Siegal spills his soy cappuccino over his Opera Divas Disrobed calendar every time he hears us say it, this is NPR, National Public Radio.”
So we ask you a simple question; which you, in turn, might pose to your local station: “Are your Hearing Voices?”
HV Series Promo 1 (0:30 mp3):
HV Series Promo 2 (0:30 mp3):
Day 1 of the Iditarod is tomorrow. One of the qualifying races was held a few weeks ago, is the John Beargrease Sled Dog Marathon, named for the son of a Chippewa chief who delivered mail by dog sled along Lake Superior’s rugged North Shore in the late 19th century. Launched in 1981, the Beargrease draws world-class sled dog teams from around the globe. The Beargrease is the longest, and most challenging, of sled dog events in the lower 48: almost 400 miles and 4000 spectators, starting in Duluth, Minnesota on the last weekend of January. Field-recordist Curt Olson gathered the sounds of the dogs, the mushers and the fans, “Beargrease Sled Dog Marathon” (7:00 mp3):
Curt has more sounds at Track Seventeen. And a shorter version ran on Weekend America with a photo gallery. 
(Photo: © Kit Larson) Keith Ali on the trail on the second day of the 2006 Beargrease Sled Dog Race.
Marvin Granger:
• formerly of MPR stations (he gave a young GarrisonK his first radio job);
• first GM of Spokane Public Radio;
• former GM of WBFO-Buffalo (where Terry Gross got her start);
• former GM of WDET-Detrioit;
• for two decades GM of Yellowstone Public Radio, whose signal now saturates more territory than any other pubradio net in the nation.
Yes, that Marvin Granger tells me his last day in public radio is this Friday, the day of his call-in show Your Opinion, Please — Friday Feb 29 6:30-7:00 pm MT (which streams so anyone anywhere can listen & call 800.441.2941… hint, hint.)
Marvin recently received the 2007 Montana Governor’s Humanities Award. Hear the “Homeground” interview (30:00 mp3):
A couple excerpted quotes from Marvin’s career; about pubradio, he told Spokane Magazine:
“We can play music which is ‘culturally important but commercially weak’ in nature, such as chamber music and contemporary experimental music. It’s one of the few places creative people gain exposure.â€
And his early participation in the debate over the value of Arbitron is discussed in the report (pdf) “Guys in Suits with Charts: Audience Research in U.S. Public Radio.” His opinion: PDs’ concerns for radio ratings “collided with the art of programming commercial radio.”
MG has been a boon to our broadcast buddy Chrysti the Wordsmith; a friend to our little local college station KGLT — even tho we share the same dial as his station; and an adviser to us at HV (he won’t be entirely off-air: later this year he’ll be hosting HV’s Winter Solstice hour).
Marvin, we all wave you a hearty and appreciative aloha. If just half of us in this biz contribute half as much as you did, pubradio will soar.
YPR stations
The New York Times profiles Jersey City’s WFMU in “Put the Radio On”.”
“Hands down, WFMU is the greatest radio station on the planet.†–Jim Jarmusch
“This is the kind of place that shouldn’t exist but somehow does.†–WFMU DJ Tom Scharpling
There’s some priceless airchecks (left column of the NYT article), including “How to Be a WFMU Disc Jockey,” “Death-Defying Radio Stunts: Harassing Toll Booth Attendants” and this many Louie-Louie mashup from “Music to Spazz by” (5:32 mp3):
The Public Radio Exchange has long been an audio indie’s direct conduit to station airwaves. Hundreds of stations have bought thousands of pieces for local broadcast. Now PRX provides the same possibility, for national distributors like Audible and us, Hearing Voices: “New Ways To Distribute Your Work on PRX.”
HV has already purchased about a dozen pieces from producers via PRX’s new distro deal. If you’re a producer who wants us to hear your work: join PRX, upload audio, and send us your URL.
ZBS Productions new series is 2 Minute Film Noir, “stories about gangsters, bimbos, cons, cops, lovers, losers, platinum blondes, mink coats, high heels, and neon signs reflecting on rain-slicked streets.”
It’s radio dramedy at its finest, and they’ve allowed us to sneak prevu the series right here. So, ladies and gentleman, butter your popcorn, grab your dates, and head into the audio theatre. It’s time for the 2MFN world premiere, with “You’re In For It Now, Pal” (1:30):
And here’s the gorgeous series poster (illustration by Jaye Oliver):
StoryCorps cuts yet another devastating slice of real-life this week, “Hector Black remembers the murder of his daughter, Patricia Nuckles, by an intruder in her home.” (3:00):
Another stellar StoryCorps, sisters Janaki Symon and Melissa Wilbur discuss their hate-to-love relationship. “I never particularly liked you…†(1:52):
NPR webseries, Biking the Iditarod:
“Jill Homer, of Juneau, Alaska, is training to ride her bicycle in the Iditarod Trail Invitational — 350 miles of wintry pedaling over tough terrain. It’s the same course used by the famous sledding race.”
Her blog: Up in Alaska- Jill’s Subarctic Journal:
“Jill is an Alaska journalist who likes to bicycle in horrendous conditions and eat goldfish crackers and Pepsi for breakfast. Jill records her daily adventures in pictures and words.”
Jill encounters a Juneau native: NPR: Wolf Versus Pug.
Happy Birthday to radio’s Some Assembly Required on their 9th year of ops and 200th broadcast. Since 1999 sound artist Jon Nelson (of Escape Mechanism) has hosted the series, which “features work by a variety of artists and groups who work with bits and pieces of their media environments, giving something back to the cultural landscape from which they so enthusiastically appropriate.”
The SAR blog has many interviews with mash- & cut-up, and other audio artists.
Some online J-school tools…
Visual Edge is a premiere multi-media workshop for photojournalists it provides a list of lessons (pdf) for media journalists:
- Sound in the story: Balancing the tools in new-media journalism
“More and more journalists are working with audio these days and learning from radio reporters. This is a fabulous guide for journalists about using sound and audio clips in their journalism. It’s a 21-page PDF with lots of good advice about story development, writing, and gathering sound. The best part of this guide is the extensive advice about interviewing. The guide was prepared by J.Carl Ganter and Eileen E. Ganter for the Poynter Institute for Media Studies. They give credit for some of the content to David Candow, a well-known broadcast trainer for CBC.”
- Microphones: Two main types
Poynter Online hosts an online resource list of informational links on anything imaginable in field media journalism.
The Canadian Journalism Project is a collection of all things journalism. There’s advice and articles on social nets, web-searching, and beat-specific tools, along with an award-winning journalism database, ethical resources and links for teaching.
The International Women’s Media Foundation’s Online Training has these “Tips & Guides: Writing Broadcast,” of which educator Mary McGuire says, “There are countless guides to writing broadcast copy online. This is one of the better ones. It’s a clear list of 10 rules with good examples as illustrations.”:
Did I write in my own voice or did I use the words of a wire service or officials?
Did I eliminate unnecessary information?
Did I leave any unanswered questions?
Translate the jargon. Make the words your own.
Hi, my name is Max Darham. I am at present the Hearing Voices intern. I am 18 years old and from Bozeman, Montana. I am a freshman at Bennington College and currently participating in the college’s annual Field Work Term. The point is to intregrate your academic learning with real life work experience. In my case it’s working for Barrett and Hearing Voices. I grew up in Bozeman MT skiing, hiking and having fun. I will be producing an audio-slideshow movie, designing photo-journalism web-pages, archiving HV’s online audio collection, and writing several blog-posts over the next few weeks.
Frazer Lake, Summer 2007
Chesty Calls Dog Breath Boat People, Episode Seven of Chesty Morgan’s Forbidden Love! (7:50 mp3):
David Goren of Shortwaveology produced this “series of [shortwave radio] sound chunks” as part of a sound art workshop at Harvestworks studio. From May 2007, “Mercy, So Much Noise” (5:37 mp3):
Chesty Covers Up– Afghan Style, Episode Six of Chesty Morgan’s Forbidden Love! (8:50 mp3):