Producing Talk Shows for Radio

It's time we abandon our fatigued approach to talk radio in the Caribbean, with its open-phones: ever-swirling vortices of ignorance, prejudice and cynicism, with banality at the core. Move away from lazy open-phone shows, avoid "today we'll talk about..." or "our topic for today is..." BANNED. Don't even mention the word 'topic' or 'subject' on air.... From now on the issue/event/personality is actually a question and is posed in the form of a question. It's what any reporter starts with; you could do worse.

Listen also to the talk radio shows I've highlighted.
Web sites: Jeremy Vine, BBC Radio 2 and LBC 97.3 FM/London.

The concept: POSE QUESTIONS as headlines for a segment as opposed to "next, we talk about diabetes." RATHER: "What would you do if you doctor says you have diabetes?" OR "Are you controlling your diabetes?" OR "Why is Diabetes killing so many Antiguans?" QUESTIONS based around the facts or seeking the truth from guests are provocative and pull listeners in; topic sentences turn listeners off.

Clicking on this PowerPoint presentation
Visit my all-time favourite current affairs shows on radio: and CBC Canada's As it Happens and BBC Radio 4's Today

Remembering a Radio Craftsman: Trevor C. Hollingsworth

Balance and Control: Trevor "Holly" Hollingsworth, mastering CANARadio CricketPlus, during a live transmission at Kensington Oval, Bridgetown (BARBADOS NATION) On February 11, 2018, I lost one of my closest friends for almost 25 years, and a 'gentle giant' of a technical producer, Trevor C. Hollingsworth - a 45-year veteran of Barbadian and Caribbean radio. A week later, the veteran Trinidadian cricket broadcaster and writer Fazeer Mohammed, in his weekly column on cricket for the Sun, offered his reminiscences of the co-founder of CANARadio (later CMC ) CricketPlus , the international cricket commentary broadcasts from the Caribbean - our very West Indian answer to the Beeb's Test Match Special. Faz's tribute also follows .

Year 30, Day One: On Giants' Shoulders...

"Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin." I've spent this July 4th marking 30 years in my vocation, thanking the Almighty and the giants on whose shoulders I stand, the people without whose direct action I would not still be standing after 30 years: * Julian Rogers (who did better than hire by lighting a fire) * Tony Cumming (who actually did hire me first) * Claude Graham (who put me on the announcer's roster and my programmes on the schedule) * Clairmonte Taitt (who first opened the CBC microphone to me in my Bajanised reading of a VS Naipaul short story) * Leslie Seon (who gave me my first Outside Broadcast anchor shot in his own patch of perfection, Remembrance Day, 1985) * Milton Gibbs and * Sharon Marshall who shaped me into a television journalist) * Jim Brown (for almost everything good in Washington DC) * Harold Hoyte and * John Wickham of The Nation *CANA's Trevor Simpson , * Ulric Hetsberger , * Reudon Eversley , and * Wendy Thomps...

COMMENT: Blogging in Barbados, or Making It Up As You Go Along

When Samuel Morse perfected the electric telegraph in 1844, he sent a message using his brand new code of dots and dashes: "What God Hath Wrought". So began the whirlwind of modern telecommunications that has swept continent and island so remorselessly ever since. Too often in these heady days of technological change and complexity I am left staggering with the same plaintive cry, "what God hath wrought". I am not in awe but in woe. I cannot know precisely what Morse's motives were in sending those words. He did not attach a footnote. We can surmise somewhat safely that it was the humble oblation of a God-fearing man to his original inventor, the Man Upstairs. I do wonder, though, if Morse, finger ready at the single key, became at once struck by the likely implications and impact of his machines and the wires that connected them. Just maybe, he peered into the crystal ball and saw an abyss - more messages to stir up a phony war than those to catch a murde...

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