Today I filled in for Lia’s show, ‘Sewn to the Sky’ – it was a particularly important show to fill in on because 2ser is currently in the middle of their annual subscriber drive!

This is my third year as a volunteer at 2ser but I haven’t yet hosted a subscriber drive show (I started just after 2009′s and was sick though out last year) so it felt really good to finally be a part of it.  Subscribing to alternative media is such an important thing, the benefits 2ser give the community are so broad and far reaching.  There’s still time to subscribe, starting at $35 you can jump on board the band wagon, feel good about yourself and join the 2ser family, just ring 9514 9500 (there’s also some cool prizes going all the time and it makes you eligible to win the feature CD each week).

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For the program I travelled to Wagga and Hay and spent a week talking to anyone and everyone about the shearing game.  In Hay I stayed with shearing contractor, Lional ‘Keeno’ Garner in his big Queenslander home with about 20 other shearers.

The program is my first full length 360 and has turned out really different to how I imagined but I’m pretty sure I’m happy with it… in a couple of weeks when I let the dust settle I’ll know for sure if it’s any good (fingers crossed..) but in any event I’ve learnt so much about the shearing industry, country towns and of course those who live it.  If anything I hope the piece will be an eye opener and insight for city dwellers.  The city/country divide is huge.

I’m mixing with the award winning Phillip Ulman for the first time and the process has been very different to other docos I’ve made, Phillip has a distinct way of working which has taken a little while to adjust to but I think I’ve worked it out.

This piece turned into a real production in the end.  The idea I had for the narration involved a bit of acting – it would be set in a chiropractor’s office and I would be telling the story to a chiropractor (having obviously just returned from helping out in a shearing shed).  A lot of thought has gone in to trying to make it engaging, sound good and not be too naff, cliche or cheesey.  Hopefully listeners aren’t freaked out by this element.

Another thing which was different in the production involved a binaural recording.  Binaural recording is when get two small microphones and insert them in your ears (or a dummy head’s ears).  By doing this you are trying to capture (record) the exact sound someone would hear if they were there themselves.  Maybe I haven’t explained that well… I’ll just explain what we did.  We put special earbuds that were microphones in our volunteer, Phillip’s head then Claudia shaved his head.  We were trying to get the sound of having a hair cut so we could make a surreal bit when a shearer explains how he shears a sheep.  When the listener listens to that section (with headphones on) they should feel like they are getting a haircut!

Still confused?  Put some headphones into your computer and listen to what I’m talking about…(here’s the raw audio of how we did it)

Two photos in the studio (256).  Steven Tilley (who plays the chiropractor in the doco) and Phillip Ulman trying to get some generator buzz out of an interview I did with a shearer in his caravan.

When you think of music and Parkes you probably think of their annual Elvis festival but all that may change this weekend.  Opera at the Dish – from Bellini to Broadway has been organised to celebrate 50 years since the telescope was built and help raise money for the McGrath foundation.

In the excitement of this momentous occasion I went to Parkes and spoke with local opera singer Dallas Watts who will be performing on the night.

Broadcast on The Music Show, ABC Radio National 8th October 2011

That night I did a live cross with Robbie Buck on his show Evenings on 702 Sydney, syndicated around NSW and ACT.

]]> http://mikewilliams.com.au/2011/10/08/opera-at-the-dish/feed/ 0 Sound Adventurer Dallas Watts Ken Keith, Mayor of Parkes Bill Chambers, Vice President of Parkes under the Stars Dallas and Ken http://mikewilliams.com.au/2011/09/24/itd-3-wrap-up/ http://mikewilliams.com.au/2011/09/24/itd-3-wrap-up/#comments Sat, 24 Sep 2011 13:46:46 +0000 Mike http://mikewilliams.com.au/?p=490 Continue reading →]]> The second In the Dark at St Stephens church in Newtown turned out to be a really great night with around 50 – 60 people wondering down to the cemetery on a very cold and drizzly night.

 Wine, beer and muffins were sold by donation and the sound (engineered by Steven Tilley himself) was magnificent.

Jesse Cox curated the first half the night which featured selected stories from FBi’s All the Best program which plays short features about Sydney made by emerging story tellers.

The second half of the night feature Jane Ulman and Steven Tilley’s ‘A Green Thought in a Green Shade’ which was the inspiration for holding the event at St Stephens.  The piece was about the church itself and the idea was: what would it be like to listen to a site-specific feature in the actual space the story is referring to?  I hope we achieved something with this idea… anyway Jane gives the background on the piece in the audio which we played just before the feature (Jane was over at the Prix Italia awards so couldn’t be there on the night).

A couple of weeks ago I spent a Saturday with Guy and his family, a friend of mine who was hosting a garage sale.  The story was produced to promote the New Beginnings ABC Pool project that I’m running.

Across Australia young and old celebrate the garage sale, a weekend ritual of haggling, bargains and community spirit.

At their first garage sale the Maxwell family will see all types; from the addicts to those that wouldn’t dare leave the car. All items must go but the big question is, who will buy the purple pleather boots?

Flick through the record collection, dig through some preloved toys or try on a hat – it’s all in the fun of garage saleing.

Broadcast on 360documentaries, ABC Radio National 17th September 2011

2ser held their first ever ‘Live at the Loft’ gig, it was a live broadcast of a 30 min set from 90′s Sydney indie legends, The Hummingbirds.  I was asked to fill in for the show and introduce the band.  It was a great afternoon that ran smoothly (lucky!).  Have a listen to the second half of the show including the entire Hummingbirds set.

ABC Radio National, 2SER 107.3 and FBi’s All the Best presents the second In the Dark listening event in a unique location in the heart of Newtown. After a very successful debut, In the Dark is back again.

In the Dark offers a unique way for people to gather, turn off the lights and simply listen to audio/radio features, documentaries or soundscapes for pleasure.

This time the event will be all ages and take place inside St Stephens Church in Newtown, a 137 year old building considered a masterpiece in gothic revival architecture.

This will be an extra special In the Dark because the feature piece is specifically about St Stephens Church, Camperdown Cemetery and Newtown itself. Jane Ulman and Steven Tilley are two of the most experienced radio makers in Australia. In the late 90’s they constructed “A Green Thought in a Green Shade”; an engaging feature around the stories, history and poetry of the inner-west suburb.

The night will also feature a selection of short audio stories from Sydney’s own dedicated feature show All the Best. All the Best, broadcast on community radio station FBi 94.5, is a weekly radio show made by emerging story tellers that looks at Sydney and its people.

What: In the Dark: A night of stories told through sound

When: Saturday 24th September, listening starts at 7.30pm

Where: St Stephen’s Church, 189 Church St, Newtown Tickets: $8

Contact:  Organiser; Mike Williams – 0421 882 285

Sweeping 60’s walls, lush production and sweet harmonies are just a few ways to describe Sydney songstress LIA TSAMAGLOU… also known as MELODIE NELSON.

This weekend Melodie will be launching her debut, ‘meditations on the sun’ and 2ser’s Mike Williams caught up to dig deeper into Lia’s background and this great album.

Catch Melodie Nelson tomorrow night at her album launch at GoodGod Small Club.  Tickets are $15 supported by the Magnetic Heads and Swimwear.

Broadcast on Friday Overdrive, 2ser 107.3, 2nd September 2011

This week I launched an ABC Pool project around the theme New Beginnings.  Pool is a fantastic community where members from anywhere in the country (or world) can submit various forms of media including text, audio, video and photos.  Projects help focus ideas and promote collaboration between members.  Anyone can start a project but ABC producers that start projects have the ability to collate work around an idea, promote through radio national and produce a piece for broadcast.  To launch the project I made a short promo video.  I made it to give (hopefully) an approachable face to the project so people could feel like I was an approachable source for bouncing ideas and helping with content.

Everyone loves to tell you Sietta are from the Darwin, partly because it’s great to hear something from the top end get such a great response in the metro music market.  We discuss this as well as sparse production, Caiti’s blues upbringing and why collaboration was key to the success of their debut, ‘The 7th Passenger’.  At the end of the interview I was lucky enough to be treated to a live, acoustic version of “What am I supposed to do”.

Sietta are on tour with The Herd in September.

Broadcast on Thursday Overdrive on 2ser, 11th Aug 2011

Melodie Nelson is Lia Tsamaglou and apart from having a silent ‘T’ in her last name and being a top friend she also plays 50′s-60′s psych-pop music under the alias ‘Melodie Nelson’. As a big fan I’d mentioned to her that if she ever needed something filmed I’d be keen to help out, and sure enough it just so happened she was filming a clip for her new single ‘Orpheus She’s Gone’. Lia was hoping to get up a very short ‘behind the scenes’ look at how and why the film clip was made – I was the man for the job. This is the final result of hanging out for a couple of hours on the set of ‘Orpheus she’s Gone’, directed by Danielle Zorbos and filmed at Serial Space in Chippendale August 6, 2011. It will also serve as online content for the Into the Music documentry I’m making about iconic Australian music video TV show, Rage.

Mars Volta are insane.  Their shows are always high energy, unpredictable and full of long improvised sections.  I recently delved into their extended back catalogue and read up on the interesting history of the band for the 4th and final episode of Into the Music’s ‘Rock and the New’ series which I produced with Cathy Peters and Mark Don.  For the doco I interviewed Peter Callender, the biggest Mars Volta fan I know – he even travelled to their home country of Mexico to see them play live!

I had tried to arrange to speak to Cedric or Omar from the band for the ITM doc but unfortunately they were a bit too hard to nab.  A month after it went to air though I got a call from their publicist, “Mars Volta will talk” she said.  It wasn’t as dramatic as that but I certainly was excited.  TMV were coming to Australia to play Splendour in the Grass and also do some dates in Syd, Melb and Adel.  I decided to interview (I wasn’t going to turn down an interview with them was I?) and edit something together to go as extra audio on the Prog website but also to be played as a stand alone piece somewhere else on RN.  Night Air Live were keen and they played it in their monthly live show on the eve of Mars Volta’s Australian tour.

Broadcast on ABC RN, Night Air (live show) – 31st July 2011 ‘Housing the Situation’

THEME MUSIC: Quirk
MUSIC: Epitomes – demo
(Both bands from the South Coast)

This video was made to go with my application to be an ABC Open producer.  Apart from family holidays on the south coast, I had never properly engaged with the community. I thought it was essential when applying for this position to get a sense of the people, the projects that already exist and the projects I might be able to assist with in the future.
I grabbed some gear, jumped in the car and drove to Nowra, just one town in the South Coast/Tablelands region.

I allowed myself just one day to talk to as many people as I could and produce this audio slideshow on the run. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to edit the photos but I’m proud of the effort and glad to now have such an insight on the area and what the ABC Open project could involve.

Over the June long weekend this year I spent quite a bit of time following around a production crew and musician who were together competing in this years Music Video Mash Up competition (or MVMU).

The MVMU is the brainchild of Brisbane creatives Dorian Ribeiro and Glenn Bernauer, a young duo who own their own production company.  Their twist for this comp was using local musicians songs as the basis for the videos.  This allowed teams to not have to worry about editing sound, convergence and collaboration of creative practitioners and also gave teams endless possibilities of exploring the ideas, form and elements of the music video.

Here’s the finished product that the Hungry Metal animals and Mordechai produced (in only 72 hours!)…

The Music Video Mash Up aired on The Music Show, ABC RN – 16th July 2011