Tonight we take a trip down noir lane with Downstairs Entertainment and DaveyBoy Production’s Rex Rivetter: Private Eye and the Case of the Poisoned Parakeet. David and Jack reminisce about some of their favourite English detective tales. What are yours?
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Students in the Lighting Design class work to hang lights for the upcoming production of “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” in the Salisbury Theatre.
This great OnStage article was shared on Facebook by our amigo, Jeff Billard a grand thaumaturge in both the audio and stage dramatic varieties. It suggests that all actors should spend some time behind the scenes understanding what goes on from the purposes of stage managing.
As usual, we ask the question. Should all audio actors take a turn audio editing as well? Would there be some great value for actors to understand the challenges in isolating the clearest sound?
Similarly, how valuable would it be for all audio editors to take some time behind the microphone and see the challenges in clean delivery?
What do you think? Would that kind of experience make both roles in an audio drama production better?
Recently there’s been a lot of hay made about the #audiodramasunday hashtag weekly on Twitter. We think it’s a fantastic way to get the word out for those who haven’t yet got on the Audio Drama Trolley (we’ve got multiple cars give us a try!) But for those of us who already listen to audio drama the rest of the week, how can we help out?
Perhaps you can make Sunday your review day. Most shows RSS Feeds can be found through i-tunes and lately we at the Sonic Society have made Sundays our day to attempt to systematically write i-tune reviews for all our favourite shows. Because that would take an inordinate amount of time, we’re keeping our list to three shows a week. How about you?
Try the three reviews a week Sunday challenge!
Honestly, it’s not easy to go write reviews in the first place, but here’s a couple of methods:
- First, if you’re like us old schoolers, Hubspot has an article to show you how to write a review in itunes on Windows or Mac computers.
- Secondly, if you prefer to operate with the podcast app on your phone, iMore has a great article on how to write a review using your iphone or ipad.
Lastly, if you’re a producer, you can sign up and check your reviews from all around the world monthly with a free account at MyPodcastReviews.com
So what are you waiting for? Go out there and get more folks on i-tunes checking out how hot radio drama is….
And hey, what better way to start than writing one for the Sonic Society? You hit EVERYONE then! Happy Reviewing!
The Bill Hollweg Memorial Sonic Summer series is set! With gratitude to the folks at Audio Drama/Radio Drama Lovers Facebook Group, and to the big wigs at Broken Sea Audio for their kind permission, Sonic Summer will have two features a week. Our regular Sonic Summerstock Playhouse on Tuesdays (a favourite of Bill’s) and in honour of the Thursday releases at BSA, a retrospective of some of the very best of Bill Hollweg’s audio drama life and work. Please join us as each week we’ll assemble a panel of roundtable guests to talk about the feature and share their memories before we play our episode(s) for the night.
Join us, won’t you?
One of the great elements of audio drama, is its nature to be portable. Runtastic has discovered the value of a good story on the go as well it seems. Check out this article at Wired:
Fitness app company Runtastic has launched Story Running, a range of downloadable stories written with the specific aim of motivating people to run.
Runtastic has recruited script writers and musicians to create a series of 40-minute stories with a narrative arc that allows for interval training. The stories — which can be downloaded through the Runtastic app — fall under categories such as adventure and fantasy, and are accompanied by music with different beats per minute to encourage different running speeds — starting slowly and then increasing in speed as the tension in the story rises, before slowing down as the runner draws to the end of their route.
The idea came about in Runtastic’s kitchen, with CEO Florian Gschwandtner telling Creative Director Chris Thaler, “We should do story runs.” Thaler thought it wounded awesome, but wasn’t entirely clear on what a story run was. Gschwandtner simply replied: “We tell them stories while they are running.”
Check out the rest of the Wired story, and consider how Runtastic apps may provide brand new audio drama in the community!
Tonight we continue the family friendly adventure series Coral Island Adventures with part three of “Destination Unknown” and the Adventure Alley Productions episode, “A Desert Journey”. It’s Audio Drama Time!
Edge Studios website made a rather curious pronouncement recently.
” The heyday of radio drama gave way to television drama, but the genre never entirely died. It survived here and there — on radio, records, on-stage and the Internet – till now it has been coming back, in a big way.”
It looks like more and more folk are taking notice that the modern audio drama movement (MADaM if you will) has begun to take off. In this blog post from Edge Studios they name off the following popular shows:
“The Truth” is an early anthology series that debuted in 2012. The acting is naturalistic, but recent storyline is rather surreal.
“Welcome to Night Vale” is another early entry. It features a narrator rather than dialog, in what’s been called a “bizarre storytelling form.”
“Limetown” launched in 2015. It’s about a fictional reporter with (equally fictional?) American Public Radio, but it’s a podcast, not a radio program. Reviews have compared it to The Message, and Limetown has been similarly popular at iTunes.
“LifeAfter” the second series produced by Panoply and GE Podcast Theater, which they launched late in 2016.
“The Message” is kin to “General Electric Theater” in the golden days of television. Will this someday be referred to as the “golden days of podcasting”? If so, what will have changed or emerged by then?
“Alice Isn’t Dead” emerged to haunt 2015. Fantastical, but definitely not a comedy.
“The Orbiting Human Circus (of the Air)” features a multi-person cast, and well-known guest stars Tim Robbins and Mandy Patinkin.
“A Night Called Tomorrow,” available only through Howl, a collection of content for $4.99 a month.
“Fruit” is also on Howl, but previews and at least some episodes are available elsewhere.
“Homecoming” is a “psychological thriller” cast with A-list actors. Now you know what voice actors like Oscar Isaac, Catherine Keener, David Schwimmer, David Cross, and Amy Sedaris have been doing lately.
“Serendipity” is called “a preview of audio drama’s future” by the New York Times. It presents audio fiction gathered worldwide.
Some of these shows you’re recognize as podficts, and some of these are behind pay walls. Go read the original article and remind them, that we’ve been here watching the slow boom of our beloved medium for a while now.
Welcome to the MADaM!
From the incredible family friendly adventure series Coral Island Adventures we have parts one and two from Destination Unknown. It’s Audio Drama Time!
Frederick Greenhalgh and Final Rune Productions brings us a special release of their new turn of terror “Dark Tome” written by Joe R Lansdale and Kasey Lansdale.
Tonight we play the tenth year anniversary Sounding Board episode “Kapocalypse” from Broken Sea Audio, with the last performance of Bill Hollweg. The additional shorts of Rare Meat complete the episode.