Evelyn Thorne Media Management 5/22/13 Case Study Essay Some

Evelyn Thorne

Media Management

5/22/13

Case Study Essay

Some refer to it as documentary radio, others reality radio, I like to call it storytelling radio. Though regardless of what you call it, radio storytelling has had a resurgence in popularity with shows like This American Life and Radiolab captivating an audience of millions. Some refer to this phenomenon as “the golden age of radio documentary” (Samuel G. Freedman, as cited in Biewen & Dilworth, 2010, p.3) and surely with the advent of podcasts, storytelling radio has become even more prolific. Though, it is not easy to create a high quality radio documentary.

These projects take time, money and commitment, not to mention interviewing and editing skills.

And thus, I turn to the experts in Reality Radio: Telling True Stories in Sound (Biewen &

Dilworth, 2010) to learn how one crafts a story through sound.

As an alternative for March Madness this year, KPCC public radio held a bracket competition between 32 NPR radio shows to see which one is the audience favorite (Roe, 2013).

Out of all 32, the top 8 shows involve some element of storytelling whether through news or documentary. The top two were the aforementioned Radiolab and This American Life, with This

American Life winning the championship. This competition demonstrates how popular storytelling radio has become. This American Life is the quintessential storytelling radio show with producers creating stories about every-day life and people to fit a theme. Many other shows have copied this format such as Snap Judgment or Love + Radio while others are holding storytelling events that are then broadcast over the radio like The Moth, Story Collider and

Porchlight. Radio documentary even has its own festival: the Third Coast International Audio

Festival (Biewen & Dilworth, 2010, p.4). All of this is to validate the claim that we are living in

“the golden age of radio documentary”. And that perhaps radio has added a new twist to documentaries: “Here is the twenty-first century, the word ‘documentary,’ at least to public radio listeners, has come to evoke something other than sonic brussels sprouts. It’s come to stand for something almost cool” (Biewen & Dilworth, 2010, p.3). Thus, it is no wonder that shows like

This American Life win over the audience. Producers like Ira Glass have learned how to “use sound to tell true stories artfully” (2010) and this is no easy task (Biewen & Dilworth, p.5).

The opening chapter to Reality Radio: Telling True Stories in Sound (Biewen &

Dilworth, 2010) is written by Chris Brookes on the radio feature he created about the first transatlantic radio transmission. Most people know that this transmission was the work of

Marconi, but Brookes feature uses story to delve deeper into the truth. Brookes explains why

Marconi couldn’t have actually heard that radio transmission in 1901, but that it doesn’t matter:

“Does it give him the information? No. It engages his imagination so powerfully that he imagines the information. To me, this illustrates that radio excels not by delivering information but by evoking imagination” (Brookes, 2010, p.17). In Brookes estimation, Marconi wanted to hear the radio signal so badly that he imagined it. Brookes then helps the listener to understand this by repeating this desire for clarity in his feature. Here is a clip of the opening (2010):

BROOKES [in the piazza]: Can you hear me?

MARCONI [archival clip]: Can you hear anything?

BROOKES [in the piazza]: I can hear you.

SOUND: Distant women’s reply recorded in the piazza.

VOICE: Receive.

BROOKES [in the piazza]: What happens if we whisper? [whispering:] Can you hear me

now?

VOICE: “s” (p. 19).

Brookes is playing with the audience to confuse them with different sounds and sources, so that when the voice whispers “s” they are unsure if they heard it, just like Marconi did. This effect proves Brookes point that the magic of radio is in the imagination. It is the job of the radio producer to “use sound as enticement rather than as simple illustration” (Brookes, 2010, p.18), thus perpetuating the mystery radio has been encircled in since the beginning. Brookes feature story is a perfect example of how radio has been shifting the meaning of documentary and using the art of sound to build a new audience.

But how does one entice instead of illustrate? According to Reality Radio: Telling True

Stories in Sound (Biewen & Dilworth, 2010) there is no unified way: “…I decided there were no rules other than to tell the truth. It was wrong to think there was only one way to do it” (Carrier, p.29). Though, even truth means something different for different people. To Katie Davis, it means getting to know her neighborhood and using her skills to spread awareness of their stories:

“I capture the stories and keep them in trust for my community. And I retell them, and yes, sometimes I shape them” (2010, p.75). For Natalie Ketscher, she feels that the fictional elements of a story get to the heart of the matter: “I just often found that it was easier for me to create characters than to find them. They told listeners things that I was sure the real interviewees believed or felt but wouldn’t talk about” (2010, p.109). Or to Dmae Roberts, truth was found in the poetry and rhythm of words: “…beneath it all is the poetry that gets us closer to that elusive heartbeat we call truth” (Roberts, 2010, p.127). Thus, truth is a hard subject to cover in documentary work, especially when storytelling is involved. Story twists and turns the meaning

3 of truth in order to entice the listener. This is why storytelling radio has changed the meaning of documentary: it isn’t about the facts, but the feeling. This is far different than news radio, which has dominated the airwaves for most of radio’s history. Storytelling radio is a new kind of media more akin to creative writing than journalism, though every radio producer would say they are trying to get to the truth of the matter regardless of approach.

There is one element that all radio has in common: time. Regardless of method, the process and time necessary for creating storytelling radio is invariable. First, one must find a good story: “…nobody tells you how much of your time you’ll be spending simply hunting for something worth writing about” (Glass, p.65). This is the same difficulty any writer or journalist faces, but finding the story is just the first step. Then a radio producer must capture the story: “In documentaries, the key to getting lucky is time; spending enough time for people to trust you with their stories, hanging out enough so that you’re there when things happen” (Richman, 2010, p.130). The famous Kitchen Sisters spend hours on one interview in the hopes of catching that perfect moment: “Good radio often takes more time than you think it should” (Nelson & Silva,

2010, pp.39-40). Then once the story is recorded, it must be edited. According to a behind-the- scenes Radiolab video (2013), they spend about 45 minutes of editing for each 20 second of sound. That is a huge investment of time that requires a lot of man power and funding. Though even after all that work, the length of a documentary work becomes a hindrance to distribution:

“…even when there is money to underwrite the time required to find the great characters, scenes and stories, who puts long-form work on the air?” (Tolan, 2010, p.155). There has been a surge of popularity in storytelling radio, but the market is still dominated by NPR giants. How does the amateur radio producer get a piece of the airwaves? Can anyone create documentary or do you need professional training? How have podcasts affected accessibility to production? Keeping the

4 large time commitment in mind, the resources available for amateur producers may be limited, but that hasn’t stopped people from trying.

In essence, Reality Radio: Telling True Stories in Sound (Biewen & Dilworth, 2010) is written for people interested in learning how to craft documentary radio. Each producer is giving his or her advice based on their experience on how to get started in the field. Though as Ira Glass explains, “…for anyone starting off in any kind of creative work,…the most daunting thing about it [is] this period when you’re lost, not very skilled, and you have no idea if you’ll ever get the skills you’re hoping for” (2010, p.55). Again perfecting those skills take time. For Ira, it took 8 years. This is somewhat encouraging to know that the most popular storytelling radio producer today took so long to perfect his craft, though this also speaks to how difficult it can be to create quality radio work. So, how does anyone learn how to produce storytelling radio well? Many of the producers in Reality Radio stumbled into this work, but this was an earlier generation when these shows were first starting and weren’t so vastly popular. As Jenkins and scholars point out in Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century

(2006), there seems to be a lack of mentorship within an institutional setting for media work.

From my observations at the What is Radio? Conference this year, I would agree that this is also true within the radio field. With heightened popularity comes increased competition so that now even unpaid internships are hard to get with storytelling radio organizations (I know because I applied to many). Thus, one must ask: who gets to produce radio stories and how do new voices join the conversation? Perhaps this question is best answered by looking at the media landscape at large and comparing it to my experience at the What is Radio? Conference.

According to Markia Luders, there has been a break in the dichotomy between mass and interpersonal media (2009). This is largely reflected in the radio field. Radio used to be solely a

5 mass media broadcast over transmission. Now podcasts and internet radio have broken up that hierarchy and made it possible for users to become producers. There was a definite fear of podcasts and internet radio discussed among the older generation at the What is Radio?

Conference, because these media mean increased competition, loss of terrestrial localized radio and the collective simultaneous public ear. The keynote speaker, John Durham Peters, spoke of the loneliness of listening to Pandora because it's speaking to just an audience of one, while broadcast radio creates a sense of belonging to a community. This fear of new media is reflected in many of our class discussions on the inter-generational digital divide, the constant pace of upgrade culture and staying relevant through environmental changes. Unfortunately, many of the professionals at the conference saw podcasts and internet radio as an affront to the older broadcast form. They even held a lecture on the lost art of static, thus proving McLuhan’s point that new forms of media turn the old ones into an art form (1967). It seems that the radio field may be holding onto its established media forms regardless of changing environments. The only presentation I observed at the conference that even discussed collaboration was presented by a group of young students from Washington State University on their internet radio project. There was one panel on radio education which mostly focused on creating professional environments in classroom settings for news reporting. In fact, throughout the entire conference I only heard storytelling radio shows mentioned twice, even though they seem to be the most popular programming today. I felt as though bringing up shows like This American Life or Radiolab at the conference was almost a taboo because of their popularity. Perhaps this is related to the high/low art divide Suzanne Buchan describes in her essay on curating animation (2007). It seems that many professionals in the radio field believe that radio’s higher purpose is to journalism, while storytelling programming is seen as a lower art. This leaves little room or

6 opportunity for amateur producers to learn how to make documentary radio. The only advice that

I can find for amateur producers is to just create radio pieces until luck clicks in: “If you want to get hit by lightning, you have to wander in the rain for a while” (Glass, 2010, p.65). Yet, this advice seems in-genuine when the field is not ready to embrace new producers working with new mediums. Perhaps it’s time that radio professionals re-examine their audience and create pathways of access for the next generation of radio producers.

If creating a radio documentary takes so much time and effort that very few people have the resources to be able to complete a quality product, why does anyone try? This is a question that I found many answers for in Reality Radio: Telling True Stories in Sound (Biewen &

Dilworth, 2010). The Kitchen Sisters believe that “most people are sitting on at least one amazing tale” (2010, p.39). Jay Allison lauds the power of people’s voices: “When we let the other voices speak for themselves, we hear a public radio as astonishing as the world itself”

(2010, p.194). Stephen Smith understands the influence of listening: “These voices have the power to alter the stories we tell about ourselves, and to change us” (2010, p.146). And to add my own personal reason for listening, it is to gain greater cultural competency, awareness and connection through the stories of others. All of these are strong arguments for why storytelling radio is an important medium and why amateur radio producers are still driven to create this work despite an unsupportive atmosphere. Though perhaps the successful producers in Reality

Radio: Telling True Stories in Sound (Biewen & Dilworth, 2010) can serve as inspiration for the next generation of radio enthusiasts who could bring yet another golden age of storytelling radio.

References

Allison, J. (2010). Afterword. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Brookes, C. (2010). Are we on the air? In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Buchan, S. (2007). Oscillating at the ‘high/low’ art divide: Curating and exhibiting animation. Issues in Curating Contemporary Art and Performance. (pp. 131-145). Chicago: Intellect. Carrier, S. (2010). That Jackie Kennedy moment. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Davis, K. (2010). Covering home. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Glass, I. (2010). Harnessing luck as an industrial product. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Ketscher, N. (2010). Unreality radio. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Jenkins, H., Purushotma, R., Clinton, K., Weigel, M., & Robison, A.J. (2006). Confronting the challenges of participatory culture: Media education for the 21st century. MacArthur Foundation. McLuhan, M. (1967). The invisible environment: The future of an erosion. MIT Press, 11, 163- 167. Luders, Marika. (2008). Conceptualizing personal media. New Media Society, 10, 683-702. Nelson, D. & Silva, N. (2010). Talking to strangers. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

Radiolab. (2013, May 20). Radiolab behind the scenes [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.radiolab.org/blogs/radiolab-blog/2013/may/20/video-radiolab-behind-scenes/ Richman, J. (2010). Diaries and detritus: One perfectionist’s search for imperfection. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Roe, M. (2013, April 12). The winner of public radio bracket madness: This american life. Retrieved from http://www.scpr.org/news/2013/04/12/36733/the-winner-of-public-radio- bracket-madness-this-am/ Roberts, D. (2010). Finding the poetry. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Smith, S. (2010). Living history. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Tolan, S. (2010). The voice and the place. In Biewen, J., & Dilworth, A. (Eds). (2010). Reality radio: Telling true stories in sound. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.