Some continued reporting from AMPPR attendees. Valerie Stains is a freelance producer who spent many years at NPR doing a variety of jobs. She reports on two sessions:
FRED CHILD, host of Performance Today (Air Talent Training)
As he has done for past radio conferences, popular PT host Fred Child had sent out a pre-conference call for sample air checks to be critiqued at his session, “Air Talent Training.” When absolutely nothing arrived before the gathering,
I asked some of the attendees at the AMPPR conference in NYC to write reports for this blog. Here is the first of two installments:
From John Pitman, Music Director at All Classical in Portland OR:
While visiting the facilities of WQXR/WNYC, I felt like I was walking the halls of some vast intergalactic public radio space station: multiple floors, corridors, elevators, seemingly uncountable staff… it was most impressive.
Back in 1992, I spent 3 days in Warsaw, not really thinking much about Poland or Chopin, but intent on wrangling a visa to get into Russia. It wasn’t easy at the time. Warsaw was the back door. Those 3 days turned out to be life-changing for me. Yes, Chopin just happened to be my “desert island” composer, but my focus was a quick transit to Moscow to explore joint-venture opportunities in a newly open, former Soviet Union. Don’t ask. In any event, I was completely caught off guard – Warsaw charmed me.
It was too good to be true. One of the local TV stations in Seattle, KING 5 started a local arts show. But it turns out, this is not really a news/feature program, but rather an infomercial paid for by the 5th Avenue Theater to promote its own shows. When the theater doesn’t need the airtime, it “rents” the airtime out to other arts groups. And of course, it’s expensive so the only groups that can afford it are the largest ones. The disclaimer about this being paid advertising is virtually hidden, and the content is treated like feature reporting.