Sunday, August 16, 2009

XOXO, Gossip Girl

I'm doing a radio course at the moment, at SYN in Melbourne. While print media will always be my favourite medium and I can see myself writing for print and online my entire career, I'm also keen to try a bit of radio and maybe some television too. Anyone who knows me knows how crazy I am about music, so I love the idea of having my own radio show. I get to play the tunes I like and force them on listeners, hopefully they will like what I play too, and maybe discover a new band to love in the process. 

I'm not very confident about speaking on air yet, but I hope that practice will help me overcome that and I can pretend that I'm not shy. 

At the end of our four-week course, we're encouraged to put together a demo as an audition to have our own radio show for ten weeks. I already have an idea about what kind of music I want to play and what topics I want to discuss, but I don't have a name for it and I think I need a catchy sign-off too. All my favourite journalists have one. I need a signature phrase, or maybe I'll have a theme and do something like having the last song from my show always being from a certain year, or country. Or maybe I could just end it by saying my name over and over again, in various vocoder tones. Yeah, that'd be real cool. 

Walter Cronkite Desk
Walter Cronkite "And that's the way it is."

good_night2
Edward R. Murrow (As portrayed by David Strathairn in Good night and Good Luck) "Good night, and good luck."

anchorman_kobal-8189
Ron Burgundy, "You stay classy San Diego."

I'm currently listening to Tame Impala's live set on Triple J. It sounds lovely, I can't wait to see them in October! I love the way they're blending their songs into one another, going from Forty-One Mosquitoes Flying in Formation directly into Half Glass Full of Wine. It's like one long jam sesh. I'm sure there is a technical term for it, but clearly, I know nothing about music. 

5 comments:

susie said...

I did radio training at SYN last year. I keep forgetting to sign up to be a member so I can get a show.. but as part of my course I get to do stuff for triple R so that's enough for me..

Emma Sharp is really nice though. Everyone at SYN is actually =)

Radio is heaps good experience though. Speaking gets easier, especially if you have like a cohost. And in my experience, most panels are preeeettty much the same, no matter the station.. so the skills you'll learn there will be pretty much transferable to anywhere you do radio in the future.

also! the SYN studios are TOTALLY at my uni!!

Ellen said...

Cool! I was thinking of maybe signing up to volunteer at triple R, just gotta find the time though.
Hehe, oh yes RMIT looks so flash. I am mega jelly, I want to go there!

Ellen said...

Oops, meant to ask, what kind of work do you do with Triple R?

susie said...

Well as part of my course we get an hour show on triple R every week.. so there's a roster & we're in groups and have to produce a whole show.. It's kinda cool I guess. We have to swap roles so I've done panelling, producing and presenting.

but I've been thinking lately that I never get much of a say what kind of music my group plays. there's this massively controlling girl in my group who is lovely but she'll always just bring along a triple j hottest 100 and play Josh Pyke pretty much every time.. which isn't very exciting or interesting. That disappoints me because usually triple R play so much nice music!

Ellen said...

That's really cool.
Yeah the biggest reason why I want to do a show on my own is so I have complete control of the music I play haha, though I know I would be much less nervous if I was doing it with someone else.