The end of a busy day, home at last and a boot full of recording equipment. I gave up my day job role of radio producing a couple of years ago due to a spot of ill health. Nothing serious, but I had a shock and it made me re-think what I do and for the most part, while my working life is busy, it is now office based and routine. But at the end of October, due to a transmission deadline and literally no available producers to make programmes I was asked if I'd make an Open Country for Radio 4 for delivery before Christmas. It's two and a half years since I last produced a programme on location. I said yes as the Department was desperate, but on the condition it could be local to me as I get stressed driving these days. That agreed, today arrived, the day of recording. I have to admit I'd got quite anxious in the run up to the recording. That has always been my problem, possibly due to not being a natural programme maker, having fallen into it accidentally at a later age - I was 45 when I made my first Living World (on orchards). I love sound recording, and I love being on location. But the process of getting there is for me like pushing against a closed door. I can make programmes but I'm not driven to do so. There's a huge difference there.
But that said and despite no proper sleep for three days worrying about had I got the right mix of people to interview, I felt quite alive and headed off to pick up the presenter at 08.30 am. First stop Thatchers cider in Sandford, then Winscome Millennium Green, drive over to Yatton and the Strawberry Cafe, Congresbury next for a piece on the wildlife group YACWAG and finally back to Sandford to look around the astonishing Cheddar Valley Heritage Museum. It was local, but there's a lot of driving in-between recordings. It was also a blustery day, a very blustery day and with driving rain at one point, but we, the presenter Chris Sperring and I got there at the end and I managed to get home for 5pm. Quite a short day recording wise. First thing was to check the recording has been saved and then download it to a drive. So the audio is now in two places, it's checked, time to relax.
Many has been the time I've finished recording at 4 or 5pm, said goodbye to the contributor and the presenter then I had a 3 hour drive home, having had a three hour drive there often on the same day. Media producing is a young person game, not that I don't enjoy a large part of it, but now I'm in my mid fifties, tempest fugit is no longer on my side of driving the length and breadth of the country, or having to re-juggle problems at the last minute. Coupled with the masses of planning beforehand of what and whom to record and logistic planning, all for what a producer who has recently resigned her job said to me, will be a 24 minute programme forgotten as soon as it airs. From the outside radio producing looks like a lovely easy way to make a living. It is a good, but for today's programme I have 7 days to get that 24 minutes on air, in my case those 7 days have to be squeezed around my day job I still have to keep on top of. Radio budgets are minute and so there is no time to stop and think about what we're making. Most producers now work 7 day weeks, as weekend have become thinking and script writing time. It's fast and furious. It isn't stressful in the big scheme of things, I'm not saving lives, or dealing with emergencies, but I think today confirmed this will definitely be the last programme I will produce on location. The end of an era. A decade in fact. I'll miss meeting interesting people, and having access to places not normally open to the public, but time to let the next generation have that enjoyment.
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