uk create THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO A CapeUK research report THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO The Arts and Community Radio A CapeUK research report Pat Cochrane and Graham Jeffery with Ruth Churchill Dower, Jo Garnham and Sheila McGregor Date of Publication: February 2008 capeuk create This report, written in July 2007, is based on research carried out in 2006 and 2007. The authors recognise that the field is so fast moving that the circumstances and practice in individual stations will have changed. If you would like to update any details, the CMA would be happy to add these as a supplement to the report. Please forward details to cma@commedia.org.uk or Community Media Association, The Workstation, 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield S1 2BX Radio itself is an art: presenting is performance. CHRISTINE BRENNAN, WYTHENSHAWE FM contents Preface 4 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 5 2 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 INTRODUCTION 11 Community radio: the background 12 A dynamic and fast-changing environment 12 Research remit 13 Research process 14 3 3.1 3.2 3.3 CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND THE ARTS 16 Culture and Community: working definitions from the sector 17 Perceptions of the arts in the community radio sector 18 Community radio and the arts: rationale for arts programming 20 4 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING 21 Literature and spoken word 22 Drama 26 Music 30 Film and Visual Arts 35 Arts promotion, festivals and carnivals 36 5 5.1 5.2 INNOVATION AND SUPPORT FOR NEW TALENT 39 Community radio – a platform for innovation in the arts 40 Community radio – a platform for emerging talent? 43 6 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS 45 Reaching wider audiences 46 Community Radio: a vehicle for promoting the arts 53 Audience Development – Partnerships 53 Learning and Training in and through the arts 55 7 7.1 7.2 7.3 CONCLUSIONS 60 Policy issues 61 Role of community radio within the arts sector 61 Art form development 62 RECOMMENDATIONS 66 Community radio bibliography 73 Appendix 1 Methodology 74 Appendix 2 Glossary and list of abbreviations 75 Appendix 3 Station List 76 Preface In 2006 the Community Media Association, in association with Arts Council England (ACE) and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), commissioned CapeUK to undertake a research project about ‘The Arts and Community Radio’. The project aimed to: • Investigate the place of the arts in community radio • Explore how the developing relationship between community radio and the arts can benefit individuals and communities • Identify the benefits of arts output and activities to community radio stations and to artists and arts organisations • Highlight good practice in this area and make recommendations for the future. The research was carried out by a combination of quantitative and qualitative data-gathering and analysis, including desk research, a questionnaire and face-to-face and telephone interviews. Stations were also asked to complete a log of their programming content over a four day period. Representatives from a large cross section of stations participated in the research and we are grateful to all those who gave up there time to contribute. It is hoped that the findings of this report will be of interest to a wide audience, including: • • • • • • • Opinion-formers Arts organisations and promoters Arts officers Funders Voluntary sector Community media practitioners Parliamentary and other political supporters Written and broadcast media. 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 06 This research report examines how community radio uses and promotes the arts. It investigates the ways in which community radio supports individual art forms, encourages emerging talent and experimental artistic practice and develops new audiences for the arts. The report also makes recommendations for the future development of the sector. The key focus for this report is the licensed tier of community radio. Although there are many other community based stations operating with Restricted Service Licences (RSLs) and also significant activity in web/internet radio, the research brief was to focus on those stations which were both licensed and on air. However, during the early stages of the research it was agreed that all the 107 stations which had been granted a full licence at the outset of the research process in Autumn 2006 should be invited to take part. Thirty-two stations agreed to take part in detailed face to face or telephone interviews and a further seven returned completed questionnaires. Additional information was gathered by desk research, questionnaires and programme logs. Volunteers from a further four stations with RSLs took part in targeted interviews. Although the sector as a whole is at an early stage in its development we found many rich examples of innovative arts practice, particularly in the more established stations which have been broadcasting since 2001 as part of the access programme and in stations which had grown out of arts based organisations. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Community radio: context and background Community radio is a new tier of not-for-profit broadcasting, owned and run by local people, more often than not working on a voluntary basis. Over 2000 short term licences (Restricted Service Licences) have been granted since 1990. Many of these broadcast annually for up to twenty eight days and are flourishing in all sorts of contexts including festivals, schools, arts and community settings. The first 15 full time community radio stations were granted a licence in 2001 as a pilot programme to assess the viability and potential of the sector. After a highly positive evaluation of the work of these stations, the government agreed to open up a new tier of licensed community stations and the number is now rapidly developing with five new stations going on air every month. Community radio occupies a fast-changing cultural landscape, in which network technologies are transforming the relationship between consumer and producer and providing new opportunities for ‘active citizenship’ and ‘mass creativity’. It provides an alternative to both the BBC’s offer and that of commercial radio offering unmediated access to the airwaves. Because it is produced by and for different local communities, it both represents particular communities and connects together diverse cultural, ethnic and social groups. Community radio operates as a new kind of ‘public interest’ broadcaster because it enables people who are less likely to be represented within mainstream media to have a voice. In a globalised world it offers an important local channel for minority cultures and alternative perspectives to be voiced. The arts, communities and community radio Many community radio stations serve a clearly defined geographic area, although broadcasting on the web means that most stations are reaching audiences beyond the geographic limitation inherent in their licence. 07 Community is both a geographic entity and a community of interest. Some stations successfully target and reach particular minority ethnic groups, age groups and communities of interest. Community radio has itself developed from the community arts movement of the 1970s and 1980s, which promoted involvement, dialogue and selfrepresentation. Most stations do not regard the arts as a ‘separate sphere’, but as intimately bound up with the lives of the communities they serve. Most stations programme across a range of art forms, with particular reference to the specific cultural interests and heritage of the different communities they serve. All share a fundamental commitment to the idea of social gain and accessibility, which is a requirement for the award of a community radio licence from Ofcom. A few stations are explicitly dedicated to arts programming. For example, Forest of Dean Community Radio fulfils a vital function in a rural area poorly served by cultural venues, while Radio Reverb in Brighton and Resonance FM in London are committed to using radio as a platform for experimentation and innovation in the arts. At the time of writing Arts Council England provides revenue funding for two of the 117 community radio stations licensed by Ofcom – Resonance FM in London and New Style Radio 98.7 FM Radio in Birmingham. A small number of other community radio stations have been awarded funding from ACE for projects – these include Forest of Dean Community Radio, Desi Radio, Life FM and Wythenshawe FM. Community Radio is funded from a variety of sources, and there are a number of different business models in operation. Some stations rely entirely on funding from local government and regeneration sources, the arts funding system, trusts, foundations and donations; others take up to 50 per cent of their income from advertising. The diversity of business models means that it is impossible to generalise about the financial circumstances THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO EXECUTIVE SUMMARY of community radio stations. To date, the sector as a whole has not received large scale attention from ACE or other cultural funders. Given that such a high proportion of many stations’ output is devoted to arts and cultural matters, there is considerable potential for increased investment, directly and indirectly, from the arts sector in community radio. Currently, arts programming is mainly funded through core station budgets. Literature and spoken word A third of the stations interviewed demonstrated a high commitment to literature and spoken word programming. The most popular forms of broadcast in this area are poetry or literature readings; stand-up comedy; readings of rap or music lyrics; theatre, cinema and gallery reviews; book reviews and discussion programmes involving local authors; and oral history programmes about aspects of local heritage. A number of stations serving Black Minority Ethnic (BME) communities broadcast a high proportion of culturally specific literature and spoken word content. Stations’ inability to afford author/royalty fees is a barrier to reading the work of published authors on air. Some stations, for example New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham and Forest of Dean Community Radio, are developing library and archive resources that relate to their spoken word and literature output, linked to local history and heritage projects. Drama A number of stations produce drama on a regular basis. This is a particularly strong feature at Wythenshawe FM and Resonance FM. But the complexity and cost of producing drama for radio deters many stations from programming it. Several have successfully applied to ACE for funding for this area of their work. However, with longer-term investment and partnerships, it is likely that drama would become a core part of many stations’ output. 08 Many urban stations have ready access to a large community of producers and performers and well-established theatre organisations and some are beginning to develop effective partnerships. However, much of the drama activity that does take place on community radio is driven by the interests of local amateur and community groups. Some is performed in local languages and dialects. Some is also explicitly used to raise awareness of particular issues (e.g. disability, drug abuse). Participation in radio drama can have a powerful effect on the self-confidence of those taking part (especially in marginalised communities) and provide a route into further education and training. Drama on community radio has the potential to become a test-bed for new, experimental forms of interactive narrative in which the audience can engage with the protagonists. Music Approximately 70 per cent of the community radio sector’s programming is music-based, although – with the exception of Resonance FM – most programming relies on commercially available recordings, albeit drawn from a diverse range of sources. Music programming often reflects the complex layers of musical practice that exist within particular communities and draws primarily on the enthusiasm and expertise of local people. The increasing blurring of the divide between professional and amateur music-making means that community radio offers platforms and pathways for musicians at different stages in their career, together with opportunities for more established musicians and DJs to mentor and support new entrants to the music industry. Approaches to programme-making vary, from the familiar solo DJ shows to more imaginatively ‘curated’ offerings. The musical output of community radio is enormously eclectic, even within particular genres (e.g. Black-led and Asian musics). Some stations, for example Desi Radio, have been THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO EXECUTIVE SUMMARY systematically digitising recordings for broadcast, thereby creating a de facto archive of popular music, much of it rare and otherwise unavailable. Artists from abroad often use community radio as a vehicle for reaching key audiences. There are a few examples of well-researched music documentary content within the sector which could be further developed with increased resources. Community radio plays an important role in broadcasting local live music, albeit on a small scale. Most stations do not have the technical resources to mount complex outside broadcast operations. The advent of low cost broadband telecommunications may soon provide solutions to the problem of remote broadcasting. With greater investment, combined with a more strategic approach to supporting creative and cultural learning and enterprise by linking with other agencies, community radio could offer greater support and encouragement to local music-making and participation. Film and visual arts Film and the visual arts have a firm place in the output of community radio and feature prominently in listings and review programmes. For example, Resonance FM offers weekly magazine shows about film, video, video games and new forms of interactive visual arts. A number of stations broadcast interviews with artists, programmes offering guidance on particular forms of artistic practice and coverage of exhibitions, events and openings in local galleries. Some stations, for example Sound Radio and Resonance FM, are interested in the work of visual artists whose practice incorporates sound. The latter has a close relationship with London’s large and increasingly international visual arts community, including major galleries such as the Serpentine and Tate Modern. 09 Arts promotion, festivals and carnivals Community radio often plays a central role in local events, festivals and carnivals. Some community radio stations organise their own festivals, as well as supporting events organised by others. In some cases, the stations’ own festivals are explicitly designed as a platform for new and emerging talent. Festival and carnival programmes cover a wide range of art forms, including literature, poetry, storytelling, music, road shows, film, multicultural activities, dance, craft and theatre. Supporting innovation and emerging talent Support for experimental artistic practice can most obviously be observed in the work of stations such as Resonance FM and Radio Reverb, which locate themselves in a tradition of audio-work and experimental music-making that stretches back to the early 20th century. In general, artist-led stations that serve cosmopolitan urban areas appear more likely to experiment with new approaches to programming than their counterparts elsewhere. Many community radio stations actively support new talent by giving emergent practitioners air-time and advertising up-andcoming events. Increased resources would allow community radio to commission more new work. Community radio offers unmediated air space for practitioners developing their practice given space for creative experimentation. In this respect, it should be seen by the arts sector as a key potential ally and delivery partner. Developing audiences for the arts Community radio stations target a wide audience base. Although it is not possible to generalise about the nature and extent of participation of underrepresented groups across the sector, the research evidence suggests that individual community radio stations successfully reach and interact with communities that do not have a strong engagement with mainstream arts provision – THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 10 such as those in rural areas, older people, black and minority ethnic communities, refugees and asylum seekers and economically disadvantaged groups, thus supporting the Arts Council’s Agenda for the Arts which is seeking to increase the level of participation in the arts from these groups. Approaches to training vary, with some stations offering accredited courses but the majority relying on informal mechanisms for training volunteers. However, even when training is accredited, stations report that it is difficult to obtain sustainable, ongoing funding for such activity. Many stations, for example New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham, Desi Radio in London and Radio Ikhlas in Derby, serve specific Black and minority ethnic communities. Others, such as Talkin’ Toxteth FM Community Radio, make strenuous efforts to meet the needs of marginalised cultural groups. A number of stations have developed structured training programmes in radio production and presentation accredited by the National Open College Network or through vocational qualifications in media and radio production. There is scope for this to be developed further in relation to skills for arts programming. A few stations are based on university or college campuses and emergent links with Higher Education could enhance the sector’s sustainability. Certain stations, for example Bradford Community Broadcasting and Sound Radio, provide arts coverage in a wide range of languages and all encourage use of local expression and dialect. Community radio is also an important provider of arts activity in rural areas. Community radio often helps older people find new skills at a later stage of life and, by involving a wide range of age-groups in its activities, can also contribute to strengthening inter-generational relationships. Partnerships and networks Community radio acts as a conduit for information about the arts and cultural activity. In some places its physical location and social reach enables it to function as a cultural ‘hub’, connecting and enabling productive relationships between artists, organisations and audiences. The sector has considerable synergy with the ‘creative industries’ policy agenda and notions of cultural entitlement. A number of stations are successfully broadening their audience and income through the development of partnerships that combine business enterprise with social and creative activities. Learning and training Community radio cannot function without training its largely voluntary workforce. There is considerable scope for the Learning and Skills Councils and the Sector Skills Council to support training in community radio settings. Some stations are developing a distinct strand of work in relation to creative education, including the new 14-19 Creative and Media Diploma. However, community radio’s involvement with formal education and accredited training needs to be developed in ways that take account of the sector’s informality and slender administrative resources. There is strong anecdotal evidence that many volunteers working in community radio go on to pursue a related career in ‘mainstream’ media. With increased resources and support, the sector could greatly strengthen its training offer. 2 INTRODUCTION THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INTRODUCTION 12 Community radio opens up tremendous opportunities for members of a community to generate and broadcast material directly relevant to their own specific and specialised interests. 2.1 Community radio: the background Community radio is a new tier of not-for-profit broadcasting, owned and run by local people. It opens up tremendous opportunities for members of a community (be it a geographical or cultural community or a community of interest) to generate and broadcast material directly relevant to their own specific and specialised interests. Open to everyone, relatively inexpensive to operate and committed to public benefit and social gain, community radio provides an exciting alternative to the mainstream mass media. In 2001 the Government approved a pilot scheme which allowed 16 full-time community radio stations to be established. In 2003, arts researcher and consultant Anthony Everitt carried out a detailed evaluation of the work of these stations. In it, he describes the sector as “the most important new cultural development in the United Kingdom for many years”. Following his report, the government agreed the licensing of further community radio stations and, since then, the regulator Ofcom has licensed 117 fulltime community radio stations in the UK.1 The pace of change within the sector is now rapid, with five new stations going on air every month. Most stations are run with the support of committed volunteers, who can vary from a few stalwarts to a large network of hundreds of regular contributors. The social ‘reach’ of community radio is potentially enormous. As the Community Media Association (CMA) notes in a recent report: Groups and individuals feeling excluded can bring their stories to a wider world. Young people who did not succeed at school can tackle literacy issues through media education. Diverse communities can be served with appropriate and culturally sensitive information. Fragile communities can be strengthened through genuine community broadcasting.2 Community radio is not, however, a completely new phenomenon. The Community Media Association has been campaigning since 1983 for a legal basis for community broadcasting in the UK. Community organisations have been making use of temporary licences or Restricted Service Licences (RSLs) since 1990 to broadcast for short periods of time, usually up to 28 days. These licences have often been linked with a specific event, such as a festival, and have generated a huge level of enthusiasm in both user and listener. This experience of RSLs has given many communities an insight into what is possible when they can control their own production, edit and shape their own programmes and broadcast stories, often in languages which gain limited coverage in mainstream public and commercial broadcasting. Many organisations have been successfully broadcasting on the basis of RSLs over a number of years. (The CMA estimates that over 2,000 RSLs had been awarded by the end of the 1990s.) There are now community radio stations all over the country, and more demand than availability. 2.2 A dynamic and fast-changing environment The community radio sector is developing its work in the context of a fast-moving and complex cultural landscape. Network technologies, now widely characterised as the “Web 2.0” phenomenon, are transforming traditional conceptions of the relationship between cultural producers and consumers by giving new power to the ‘ordinary’ internet user. Citizen journalism, blogging, podcasting and the uptake of social networking technologies are all providing mechanisms for people to participate in screen-based culture through the internet and other media channels. These developments can, however, exclude people who either do not have ready access to these technologies or who do not speak the dominant languages of the internet. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INTRODUCTION Community radio has the potential to play a significant part in democratising creative production and consumption. It gives a voice to people who might not otherwise participate in arts and cultural activity. With increasing ‘convergence’ between traditional print and broadcast media and digital networks, community radio occupies a pivotal position in enabling communities to participate in producing cultural products for wider audiences. It has the potential to create radio broadcasting which moves beyond a simple producer-consumer relationship, where dialogue and participation are built into the way the medium is used. It provides a social gateway into the world of new media, enabling participants to build their confidence in using media technologies alongside their peers, in a communally supportive setting. In the process participants often develop skills that are transferable to other contexts and into the world of work. Community radio offers an alternative to the professional models of ‘public service’ broadcasting offered by the BBC, and the agendas of commercial radio that focus on mass entertainment. Many community stations draw on elements of both approaches, but from a much smaller resource base. In many other ways, too, community radio is contributing to the development of ‘active citizenship’. It has major relevance for wider debates within the cultural sector about issues of access, social inclusion and cultural diversity. Community radio offers a relatively low-cost point of access to the airwaves for communities that are often significantly under-represented in the output of the BBC and commercial radio. Although the sector’s dependence on the energy and commitment of unpaid volunteers has some disadvantages, this accessibility also provides a means of skills development and learning for a new generation of radio broadcasters and creative entrepreneurs. 13 A recent interim report on the future role of the third sector in social and economic regeneration from the Treasury draws attention to the role of community radio in providing employment and supporting community cohesion.3 Already, some local Learning and Skills Councils have supported short-term projects in community radio that explore lifelong learning and alternative routes into the creative industries. For example, New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham is a partner in the distributed 4 model of a networked ‘Creative College’ being developed there. Altogether, the potential of community radio to contribute to regeneration, employment, social cohesion and inclusion is enormous. What we need to recognise is that this is often happening in and through the arts. With five new stations coming on air every month, it is a growing arena and one that deserves a heightened profile within the mainstream arts community. 2.3 Research remit The CMA commissioned CapeUK to carry out research into the role and potential of the arts in community radio in Summer 2006. The term ‘arts’ was to be interpreted as widely as possible to include performance and reportage; showcasing of new talent, as well as sharing the work of established artists; interpretation and presentation, as well as engagement with new audiences and local arts communities. The aims and objectives of the research which were specified in the research brief were: • To identify how the arts are expressed and developed through community radio • To examine how individuals and communities are affected and potentially benefit from engagement with the arts through community radio • To identify potential benefits to community radio stations in arts output/ activities and to identify THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INTRODUCTION 14 Community Radio ... is a place for experimentation and innovation. It is also a space for cultural expresssion. benefits to artists and arts organisations in being involved with community radio • To provide some in depth case studies of individual examples of good practice in the arts on community radio. The remit was to focus specifically on the role of the arts within the sector with a number of supplementary questions such as: to what extent are stations broadcasting arts content? What art forms are being covered and what is the nature of the programming? Are the stations supporting the development of new talent? Do the stations generate new audiences for the arts? Are they developing new forms of engagement with the arts? If so, how? We were charged both with surveying arts activity in the sector in order to identify current levels of involvement and with identifying practice which indicates the potential of the sector for further development. Many stations operate in areas of economic disadvantage and seek to engage with marginalised communities. Although this research was not primarily focused on ‘social gain’, this dimension of the impact of community radio was nonetheless a strong and recurrent theme in discussions with station managers, staff and volunteers. Many stations provide a vibrant meeting point within a community. Where this is the case, the arts are not a separate entity but an integral part of the life of the station. Community radio is a space for learning. It is a space where people acquire skills and in some cases expertise. It is a place for experimentation and innovation. It is also a space for cultural expression. Case Study Sheffield Live! Window on the World Sheffield Live’ is housed in the centre of the Cultural Industries Quarter in Sheffield, opposite the Workstation (a managed workspace for cultural and creative industries) and in the same building as Sheffield Hallam University Students’ Union. On the day that we visited the station, the reception was staffed by two helpful volunteers, and the large, airy central room was fully occupied by a mixture of asylum seekers and young people using the equipment and recording studios to surf the net, search for jobs, mix, and prepare music – altogether, a welcoming, inclusive, relaxed but highly purposeful climate. In one of the studios a Chilean refugee living in Sheffield, was putting out his lively weekly show – a Latin music programme to the Sheffield Chilean and Spanish speaking communities – whilst also chatting to his cousins in Chile on-line and through a web cam. This was a truly global community in one of the ‘drums’ of the former National Centre for Popular Music. 2.4 Research process The research team reported to an advisory group consisting of representatives from the CMA (Jaqui Devereux Acting Director and Alan Fransman Deputy Director and Strategy and Communications Director), the Arts Council (Gill Johnson, head of broadcasting) and the Department for Culture Media and Sport (John Mottram). Staff from the CMA supported the process throughout. The brief was to focus on those stations that had been granted a full community radio licence and to prioritise those that were broadcasting on air rather THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INTRODUCTION than on the internet. Radio stations with experience of RSLs were to be included only where this had led to them gaining a full licence. The initial sample of licensed stations that were on air in 2006 was too small to provide sufficient data. We therefore extended our sample to include all stations with a full licence as well as four RSLs with significant arts practice which were involved at a later stage – particularly in relation to the experience of volunteers. As the research was funded by Arts Council England, it concentrated largely on stations in England. We recognise, however, that there is much valuable practice in relation to the use of the arts in community radio in other parts of the UK. The stations which participated in the main research process, their location and the station manager or key contact as well as the date of licence approval and going on air are listed in Appendix 3 on page 76. Thirty five stations agreed to take part in detailed face to face or telephone interviews and a further nine returned completed questionnaires. Additional information was gathered by desk research, questionnaires and programme logs. Volunteers from a further four stations with RSLs took part in targeted interviews. The research therefore involved forty four radio stations with full licences and a further four stations with RSLs. This is a high participation rate – almost fifty per cent of those stations with approved licences at the time of commencing the research. Ten of these stations have been broadcasting on air full time since 2001 as participants in the access pilot that led to the legislation approving the establishment of community radio stations in the UK. They are referred to either as access stations or ‘mature’ stations in the report. The research team worked closely with the advisory group to identify the sample group and to agree the final methodology, which sought to combine detailed quantitative and qualitative data-gathering and 15 analysis. The process involved desk research, a questionnaire supplemented by telephone interviews, in-depth telephone interviews and face-to-face interviews with a selected sample of radio stations. Stations were also asked to complete a log of their programming content over a four-day period in December 2006. A detailed account of the research methods can be found in Appendix 1 on page 74. Community radio in the UK is at an early stage in its development, and this has led to some difficulties in the research process. At the time of the research, many stations were in a transition either from broadcasting for a few weeks to broadcasting all year round or else entering the world of broadcasting for the first time. For stations with a small team, sometimes only one person, but often with significant and rapidly increasing numbers of volunteers, responding to our requests for written and quantitative data was challenging. However, station managers and others gave generously of their time to respond to both telephone and face-to-face interviews giving ample rich material for analysis. Their co-operation, enthusiasm and depth of knowledge have made this report possible. Notes 1. This number is constantly increasing as new stations are approved. In April 2006, shortly before this research was commissioned, the figure was 107. At the time of publication, the figure had increased to 132. 2. CMA., Response to Scotland’s Draft Culture Bill, 2007. 3. HM Treasury and the Cabinet Office, ‘The future role of the third sector in social and economic regeneration – interim report’, 2006. 4. Distributed learning opportunities and provision which is provided in a range of venues and by a range of organisations across the city. 3 CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND THE ARTS THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND THE ARTS 17 “I think that the station has brought a community into being rather than articulated a pre-existent community” ED BAXTER, RESONANCE FM. 3.1 Culture and Community: working definitions from the sector Within the community radio sector there are considerable differences in the way the word ‘community’ is understood and defined. Each station, because of the terms of its licence, serves a clearly defined geographic area. However, communities are not just constituted geographically. There are many layers of community – cultural, ethnic, economic and demographic – present in any physical locality and individuals will identify with more than one category of community at any given time. Moreover, other modes of delivering content are undermining the geographic limitation inherent in an FM licence: some stations have a considerable listenership via satellite broadcasting, podcasts and/or through web streaming. The stations with whom we talked understood very well that community is not a fixed or uncontested entity. Some see their role as being to ‘reach out’ to all sections of their locality (for example Wythenshawe FM, Ipswich Community Radio or Bradford Community Broadcasting), while others have particular ethnic affiliations (e.g. Awaz FM in Glasgow or Desi Radio in Southall in London). Some have religious affiliations (e.g. Cross Rhythms City Radio, Radio Ikhlas in Derby) and others target particular age groups (e.g. Takeover Radio in Leicester or Angel Radio on the Isle of Wight). A few are more closely defined around communities of interest (e.g. Resonance FM in London or Canterbury Student Radio). Ed Baxter from Resonance FM turns the notion that stations simply ‘serve’ a community on its head: In my mind the community is an amorphous blob that the station re-creates on a minute by minute basis: I personally think that the station has brought a community into being rather than articulated a pre-existent community. We found plenty of evidence that community radio facilitates communication and builds social connections between disparate groups. Most stations demonstrate an awareness of the requirement to reach out beyond the most willing volunteers, although lack of resources to support systematic and sustained outreach work in some cases limits their capacity to do so. These nuanced and differentiated understandings of community are unpacked in greater detail throughout the report. But whatever the variations in approach, all stations share a commitment to social gain and accessibility as a core requirement of their broadcast licence. Community radio is based on the premise of promoting participation and involvement. Virtually all of the stations, with the possible exception of the stations broadcasting to army bases such as Garrison FM, have mechanisms and strategies in place to encourage participants and volunteers to become involved in the work of the station, in front of or behind the microphone, whether through formal training programmes or informal mentoring The only limits to this are the capacity of each station to manage its relationships with volunteers and the availability of time and resources for training, development and production. All community radio stations are run on a not-for-profit basis and could be regarded as a new form of public-interest or public-service broadcasting. Lol Gellor of Sound Radio, based on the Nightingale Estate in Hackney and broadcasting on Medium Wave across East London, characterises the station’s work as a “…human rights platform. We provide access to the airwaves for people whose voices are hardly ever heard on other radio channels”. Nick Greenland from Ipswich Community Radio describes their purpose as ‘Citizen Action Radio’: THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND THE ARTS We don’t have a single type of audience in mind, whereas a commercial station, even the BBC local station, aims at one type of audience and [tries to] maximise that. We don’t expect any one listener to be interested in everything we do. We are here to provide an alternative to what’s on other local stations. Localism is a strong theme for many stations, although how the idea of the ‘local’ is articulated varies. In the words of Ed Baxter, of Resonance FM: This project is about London and it’s about describing or articulating London. It’s not about the great global community of musicians and artists... It’s what [writer] Kodwo Eshun once told me is an example of ‘defiant particularism’, which I took as a compliment. In general we found that stations in areas of higher cultural diversity were less willing to make assumptions about the cultural make-up or affiliation of their audience Because community radio places media technologies into social networks, it has the potential to create radio broadcasting which moves beyond a simple producer-consumer relationship, as Roger Drury of Forest of Dean Community Radio explains: I would hope it’s a mutual relationship. It is a real partnership as opposed to a word that’s just used. Because we try as much as possible to be here to provide something for the community, reflecting the age-old quote that it’s about 90 per cent community and 10 per cent radio, and that’s what’s most important. What’s not important for us is hitting a drivetime audience or getting the adverts on, or not offending people through our choice of programming! It is almost impossible, then, to formulate a generalised definition of community radio and its cultural interests. Indeed, the strength and potential of the sector lies in this diversity. However, this diversity also raises issues of comparability and 18 generalisation, and the research team encountered very different models of management, scheduling and programme content across the sector. This variety of models indicates that the sector has the potential to be seen as a kind of experimental laboratory for participatory media production and to provide fertile ground for supporting innovation and experimentation within the arts. Alongside this platform for innovation, community radio is also providing valuable information and cultural content for the communities it serves – a form of public service or public interest broadcasting that stays very close to the needs and interests of its audience. 3.2 Perceptions of the arts in the community radio sector Community radio itself is developing in some places as a form of arts practice drawing on approaches pioneered in the 1970s and 1980s in community arts and media that promote involvement, dialogue and self-representation by people whose voices may well have been marginalised or silenced by mainstream media channels. 5 This is shown in considerable linguistic diversity, in interviews, phone-ins and political debate, in coverage of community events and upcoming performances, and in artistic activity of all kinds across many different art forms. Democratic definitions of the arts accordingly predominate within the sector. For example, Mary Dowson of Bradford Community Broadcasting talks of “…people expressing themselves in any way is the arts”. And for Christine Brennan of Wythenshawe FM, “radio itself is an art – presenting is performance”. Within the sector there is a strong sense of freedom to experiment and take the kind of creative risks which many of our respondents claimed were absent or at best more difficult to achieve within mainstream broadcasting. This approach is linked to notions of cultural democracy and the role of participatory THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND THE ARTS 19 Culture and the arts are not seen as a separate sphere but bound up with everyday life. media in providing mechanisms for self-expression and spaces for communities to ‘articulate themselves’, sometimes in contrast to the way they are represented by others. Sound Radio’s strong sense of the values of social justice and commitment to enabling participation allows a culturally diverse and historically marginalised east London community to have a voice. Arguably this is particularly important for communities that are under-represented in mainstream arts provision. Sound Radio’s Lol Gellor comments: We deliberately have a VERY broad and inclusive definition of what constitutes the arts and don’t make a rigid distinction between ‘professional’, ‘amateur’ and ‘emerging’ artists. We want to ‘promote harmony’ and the only thing we take a strong line on is what facilitates that. For some stations, the notion of the arts as a separate cultural category is problematic and Lol Gellor also notes: When you talk about ‘the arts’, some of our programme-makers wouldn’t recognise what you mean and just think that you are talking about the high arts, the opera, the ballet, that sort of thing... In our programming, which goes out in loads of different languages, it’s normal for music, stories and cultural events for those particular communities just to be discussed... So the Somali programme plays Somali music, our Latin American shows discuss all aspects of Brazilian and Latin American culture here in London, and that includes coverage of events, visiting performers, news from the community and from back home, and so on... I couldn’t even tell you the detailed content of some of the shows, because I don’t speak the language, but I know from the audience response that we get – the phones don’t stop ringing – that they’re connecting with their listeners and providing an important cultural service. Arts based programming is a fairly high proportion of the content of Talkin’ Toxteth FM in Liverpool. Alex Bennett, the station manager, estimates that about 40 per cent of its programming is music with some sort of recognisable art base to it. Culture and the arts are seen not as a separate sphere, but as bound up with everyday life for the communities that the station serves. He explains: We started [the multicultural project] on the Sunday night and by the lunchtime on the Monday, you could walk down all the Arabic shops on Air Lodge Lane and the radio was on there. One guy even said to my partner, “Now we feel like we’re part of Liverpool because we can hear Somali music on the radio station here”. It’s simple little things like that which make the role of community radio really important. Similarly, at Forest of Dean Community Radio the link between the arts and everyday life is made clear through the programming. For example, the threat to the two main hospitals in the Forest has been closely covered by the station through open-air rallies, storywriting projects with Lakers School and campaign songs written and broadcast by the radio. The station has given people a chance to voice their views over the air and feel that they are being listened to – an important aspect of cultural expression. As the station’s director, Roger Drury, says: When you go out and talk to someone and say ‘what do you think?’ they can come out with really powerful messages. And for me that’s part of having a place in the culture where you’ve got a message that you want to get listened to, and we provide an amplification for that on the radio. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CULTURE, COMMUNITY AND THE ARTS 3.3 Community radio and the arts: rationale for arts programming Some radio stations, such as New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham, incorporate several art forms as part of their programming policy, with a distinct commitment to including specific art forms that reflect the cultures of the communities they are serving (for New Style Radio 98.7 FM this is Birmingham’s Black and African Caribbean communities). Other stations, such as Talkin’ Toxteth FM in Liverpool, have a much more generic approach to the arts. They include any content offered or driven by the interests of their volunteers and listeners that is of suitable quality to broadcast and supports the activities happening within their locality. The same applies to Brighton’s Radio Reverb, which argues that it is the specialist talents of the station’s volunteers that enable it to achieve the right balance in its arts programming. J.J. Maurage, the station’s curator ,6 comments: The main issue is just finding the right person. They won’t need to have radio experience already, they just need to know their area inside out, so if you find someone who is really cool in their community, they bring all their stuff to you. It’s as simple as that for me. A few stations, however, are dedicated arts stations. Forest of Dean Community Radio, for instance, began life as a community arts project for which the medium of radio proved the most successful means of exposing, exploring and understanding different art forms, cultures, identities and ways of life. This commitment is strengthened by the geographic and demographic character of the Forest, which doesn’t host any arts venue suitable for live music, theatre or literature performance. Hence the crucial role played by the radio station in arts delivery, as Roger Drury explains: The arts have always been central [to our work]. The radio is just the medium through which we can give 20 people a chance to reflect, share, consider, debate, to perform. And that’s one of the challenges to listeners, as they’re used to radio stations just being radio stations. J.J.Maurage of Radio Reverb sees the arts as central to what the station does: “What I’m trying to get to is the point where there are few specific arts programmes, but actually arts reviews and previews are dotted about all over and in between, so it feels like something that is properly integrated on the station”. The station is also committed to using radio as an arts medium in itself, encouraging volunteer programme-makers to explore the creative potential of the medium to make new sound-worlds. Their scheduling format includes ‘open spaces’ for short experimental audio programmes, three to four minutes long, an ideal format for volunteers developing content for the first time. According to J.J.Maurage: It’s very difficult to make more use of radio (as an art form) in its own right. Even the BBC don’t have any money for that kind of thing as it’s not seen as mainstream enough. You get ‘Between the Ears’ on Radio 3 as a late night slot and that’s it. Commercial radio isn’t going to touch it with a barge pole, so where else is the space where you can explore radio as an artistic medium? Community radio offers creative and artistic freedom to their contributors unmediated by the editorial control exercised in commercial or public service broadcasting. This is seen by many volunteers, participants and artists as a key motivator for becoming involved in community radio. Notes 5 See Everitt 2003 for exploration of development of community radio and community and participatory arts movement. 6. Radio Reverb describe this editorial role as ‘curatorship’ emphasising the creative dimension of the role. 4 COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING 4.1 Literature and spoken word Most stations consulted were positive about the inclusion of spoken word as an art form within their programming. A third of the stations interviewed demonstrate a fairly high commitment to spoken word: it represents up to 40 per cent of all programming at Forest of Dean Community Radio and up to 30 per cent at New Style Radio 98.7 FM Radio; Talkin’ Toxteth FM and Phoenix FM are aiming for 50 per cent, although they have only just gone on air. Spoken word content ranges from poetry readings and short stories right through to a local church broadcasting its parish sermons each week. Most of these programming strands were specifically or broadly related to the arts, with only a small proportion directed more towards public, business or religious information. The range of arts related spoken word programming includes: • Poetry or literature readings (from short story-telling and ancient legends through to ‘high brow’ romantic poetry) • Performance poetry, stand-up comedy, readings of rap or music lyrics, sometimes to music • Readings from new works of prose, including those by school students and teachers • Phone-in discussions on a range of issues, of which a few revolve around the arts • Information bulletins on ‘what’s on’ in the arts and cultural sectors locally • Cinema, theatre and gallery reviews • Book reviews and discussion programmes, including local authors • Oral history programmes, particularly on the local heritage or history of a particular music genre • Vox Pops and prepared interviews – both of well known and unknown people • Programme links, jingles and DJ-ing • Religious or ethically oriented presentations, such 22 as church sermons, ‘thoughts for the day’, or readings from the Koran. It is sometimes hard to categorise and quantify a station’s coverage of specific art forms, as programmes often include a mix of content. New Style Radio 98.7 FM Radio recently broadcast an in depth live interview with local MP Clare Short, followed directly by a reading by poet Benjamin Zephaniah. Forest of Dean Community Radio regularly broadcasts two or three poems on an information loop, often set to music – for example, a popular series about the composer Herbert Howells. The station has broadcast an ongoing series of concerts, accompanied by talks about Howells’s life and work, the original impetus for which came from people in the local community. Despite the difficulties of quantifying the broadcasts we estimate that across the sector the main spoken word content relates to poetry and reviews of arts programmes. (See figure 1) 21% 21% 17% 17% 16% 8% POETRY SHORT STORIES STORY TELLING THEATRICAL PERFORMANCE RADIO DRAMA FIG. 1 ARTS RELATED SPOKEN WORD PROGRAMMING REVIEW OF THE ARTS THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING However, the picture varies with the maturity of the stations. There seems to be evidence that as stations became more established they become increasingly confident in broadcasting arts-related spoken word programmes. Stations that have been involved in the community radio access pilot since 2001 consistently broadcast a higher percentage of arts-related spoken word content than stations newer to the field. The one exception to this is the broadcasting of reviews. (See figure 2) ACCESS NON-ACCESS 12 23 Spoken word programming for ‘minority’ audiences In terms of how individuals and communities are affected by or influence spoken word programming, this appears to be the one area, apart from music, that engages a range of minority cultural communities. The community radio AllFM demonstrates a high level of involvement with Asian communities through the regular broadcast of locally written poetry and literature. In addition, the station’s ‘Open Access’ programme offers a series of themes to which the local community is invited to respond through creative writing for broadcast. Radio Ikhlas and Unity FM regularly broadcast ethnically specific poetry and cultural stories, often to music; Talkin’ Toxteth FM and New Style Radio 98.7 FM both engage young rap artists and poets from Black and ethnic minority communities through the link into training and skills development; and at least six stations engage Islam, Sikh, Hindu and Christian listeners through their religious broadcasting, although the emphasis is more on the reinforcement of cultural and religious heritage than the promotion of culturally diverse arts content for its own sake. 10 8 6 4 2 0 POETRY SHORT STORIES STORY TELLING THEATRICAL PERFORMANCE RADIO DRAMA REVIEWS FIG 2 COMPARISON OF SPOKEN WORD BROADCASTING BETWEEN STATIONS ON AIR SINCE 2001 (ACCESS PILOT) AND MORE RECENTLY ESTABLISHED STATIONS (NON ACCESS) Talkin’ Toxteth FM has nurtured relationships with several professional poets who are well established and, in some cases, internationally renowned within their communities. The station adopts a reactive approach to programming poetry, building this around the availability and contributions of their poets. A local group, ‘Mothers against Guns’, has been inspired to write poetry for a regular programme. For Talkin’ Toxteth FM, it is essential to broadcast local poetry from cultural communities around Toxteth in order to publicise and help them gain access to important public services. As Alex Bennett, Manager of Talkin’ Toxteth FM, sees it: THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING It takes an awful lot of time to set up these relationships in order to properly represent different cultural identities. You need to build people’s trust by trusting them, as you may well have programmes going out which you can’t translate yourself, but which are nevertheless an important cultural contribution. If our approach carries on being this successful, and if we can encourage other people to do it, then arts and cultural diversity will be reflected in the daily programming of all stations, as opposed to being separated and ghettoised in different cultures. Spoken word programming – links with schools In several cases (AllFM, New Style Radio 98.7 FM, Takeover Radio, Forest of Dean Community Radio, Wythenshawe FM), schools are heavily involved in writing projects that relate to areas of the national curriculum such as history. As a result of these experiences, a wealth of new writing about the subject emerges, providing not only an insight into a specific period of history, but also interesting and fresh content for the radio stations and a greater ownership by younger listeners of the broadcasts. Forest of Dean Community Radio goes a step further, inviting authors whose books are featured in the national curriculum to analyse each others’ texts and explore their relevance to learning within the curriculum, including learning about the process of writing itself. Spoken word programming – published authors One station (Takeover Radio) would like to read stories by published writers on air, but the requirement to obtain permissions, and sometimes pay royalty fees, is a barrier. The quality of the literature read on air is thus determined by the availability of local writers who are willing to have their works broadcast free of charge. Similarly, Resonance FM would like to commission work from such contemporary writers such as J.G. Ballard or 24 Harry Matthews, but does not have the funding to do so. Instead, they have invited a local bookshop to run the weekly literature review show and have also supported a volunteer to read the complete works of William Blake. But they fear that this may not go far enough in reflecting their listeners’ interests and needs. Resonance FM’s approach is built upon working through networks of communities of interest and is limited only by the resources available for commissioning and developing content. A number of stations, including Bradford Community Broadcasting and Talkin’ Toxteth FM, have such good relationships with established writers and poets that they are frequently offered free content for broadcast. Renowned artists such as Levi Tafari (dub poet), Patti Grey and Maurice Bestman (Brookside writers) visit Talkin’ Toxteth FM station regularly, as they have a strong commitment to supporting the Black community across Merseyside. Forest of Dean Community Radio documented the life and work of Dennis Potter (probably the area’s most famous writer) in a series of programmes that involved many local residents who had been extras in his films or had known him during his lifetime. At ‘Open Access’ sessions run by 7 Waves Community Radio Community Radio, local residents are invited to submit poetry or literature on a certain theme. Many of its contributions come from local schools. At the time of writing, Ipswich Community Radio has plans in place (dependent on the outcome of a current funding bid to Arts Council England) to facilitate workshops across different communities with a professional writer in order to develop and broadcast stories about the experiences of Ipswich people – a blend of oral history, documentary and creative writing. This programme will be facilitated by John Row, an established writer. From this they intend to develop a forum for writers to support the growth of storytelling, poetry, drama and writing for radio. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING Volunteer pathways From festival volunteer to performance poet It was just this thing of being heard. The world opened up. It is about opening up to the world Kate Fox, performance poet and stand up comedian, describes ‘finding her voice’ through community radio. She first got involved when she was at school in Bradford and saw an advert for Bradford Festival Radio (this was before it became Bradford Community Broadcasting). I must have been about eighteen living in a bedsit. I knew I liked speaking. I had lots of confidence in school things, but not so much confidence personally – in my ability to have a voice. I went along to the station, did a mock interview with the station manager and he said I was really good, so then I reviewed shows and talked about them on air. The first thing I did was a street performance and when people heard it they said I was really good and really funny, so I sort of got drawn into this creative world and got asked to review other shows as well. And that was where Kate found out that she wanted to be a poet and to work in radio: The festival and the radio were quite intertwined. I met a wider cross section of people than I’d ever met at any point. There were literally hundreds of acts of all arts. I saw the first world music I ever saw. I saw the first performance poet and the importance of a multiplicity of arts type events all happening at once all over the town. It was only three weeks at Bradford Festival but it was something about beginning to identify myself as a possible radio person. I was at a very crucial age and a very crucial time. I was invited in. I realised I could be part of this. 25 Following a successful career in commercial radio and BBC local radio Kate now works as a freelance artist, organising live poetry events, and workshops in schools, leading events for young people to experience and develop their voice, performing herself, both as a poet and less often these days as a stand up comedian. She is keen to extend the reach of poetry performance beyond the small but loyal audiences of traditional poetry readings. It was while interviewing a performance poet for the radio station that Kate remembers thinking, ‘I could be a performance poet.’ It might have happened anyway if I’d just seen the performance poet’ but Kate feels strongly that the community radio and festival experience speeded her entry into this new world. She sums up the aim of her work as an artist and facilitator succinctly, I have a voice – you have a voice – we have a voice. Archiving spoken word content New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham concentrates heavily on the spoken word, as evidenced by its Sunday evening programmes on Black literature. It is developing a library of books about Black literature, art, drama, and music, which will be open to anyone who uses the centre in which the station is housed and which will help sustain local cultural heritages. The scheme is being developed in partnership with the central library in Birmingham, which will assist in sourcing materials. Similarly, Forest of Dean Community Radio is working in partnership with the Dean Heritage Centre’s Local History Society to help catalogue and open up access to the station’s enormous oral history archive. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING 4.2 Drama Producing radio drama Drama is one of the more difficult art forms to represent on community radio due to its complexity and cost. The nature of script-writing and programme development requires specialist skills which are not always affordable; technical requirements are complicated; high staffing levels are needed for broadcast quality productions; and sourcing the right number of people to fill the cast requirements, both for rehearsal and recording or live broadcast, is logistically challenging. The majority of plays broadcast are short plays performed by amateur players, and stations largely depend on the vision and energy of volunteers to make this happen. The more complex the content is, the more resources are needed to co-ordinate and produce a drama. Hence the predominance of talk shows, discussion and music programming on community radio. Limited funding for the costs of high quality radio drama was cited as an issue for several stations. A number of stations have successfully accessed Grants for the Arts funding. However several stations (e.g. Radio Reverb, Ipswich Community Radio, Forest of Dean Community Radio, Sound Radio, Wythenshawe FM and Bradford Community Broadcasting) have applied to Arts Council England for funds specifically to produce radio dramas, but have either been unsuccessful or were awaiting the outcome at the time of the research. We cannot comment here on the quality of the applications. However, there was a perception that the funding régime appears to favour innovation rather than investment in a process which had been proven to be successful. They therefore felt uncertain whether they could apply to build on existing successful programmes. Despite these challenges, a number of stations do broadcast radio drama on a regular basis suggesting that this is an area of potential development for many stations. 26 Volunteer pathways From festival volunteer to performance poet Desi radio’s work in the arts has been particularly strong in the area of drama and spoken word. It has a partnership with Ealing Borough Council to produce the annual Five Rivers Poetry Festival, which is recorded in front of a live audience and combines reading and music from professional poets and writers with poems written and read by local people. Through its network of participants the station has also employed writers, directors and poets to work on training programmes funded through the European Social Fund, by the local Learning and Skills Council, through ACE’s Grants for the Arts scheme and by Awards for All. In doing so it has opened up a rich seam of work in oral history and over the last two years worked with BBC London producing content for the `Voices’ project, which aimed to capture some of the diversity of oral traditions and languages within London’s diaspora communities. By making an inclusive space for people to explore cultural heritage in its broadest sense, Desi Radio is both articulating and reinventing Punjabi culture in a thoroughly contemporary way. Live Drama – new work, partnerships and networks of arts practitioners Resonance FM in London produces its own live (experimental) radio drama, ‘The Sunday Play’, which brings in new writers to “…tickle your catastrophe and remix your mind". Resonance FM has also discussed liaising with theatres such as the Royal Court and Theatre Royal Stratford East to enable a collaborative approach to broadcasting professional theatre, but has lacked the right combination of resources and capacity to bring such relationships to fruition. Rather than put scarce time and THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING resources into developing partnerships at an organisational level, it has cultivated relationships informally. This station is strongly committed to providing a space for experimentation and innovation not available in larger institutions, and so is wary of developing formal institutional links. The capacity to respond quickly to writers, performers and directors seeking a platform to explore and experiment with new drama for radio, and reach a listenership drawn from London’s community of artists, ensures that the station has a steady stream of proposals for new work in drama and storytelling. Providing the proposers can take care of much of the production and logistics themselves, with some support from the station, it is possible to develop quite sophisticated content for broadcast. In this regard Resonance FM has the considerable advantage of being located in a network of artists, activists and producers who have independent access to tools, skills and resources for audio production. This is not the situation of many other community radio stations. In Cambridge, 209radio wishes to work more closely with the city’s large-scale arts venue, ‘The Junction’, and has submitted a funding bid to Arts Council England to facilitate the production of a regular soap opera, plays and monologues. Currently 209radio broadcasts weekly dramas in partnership with Cambridge Storytellers, who improvise stories during the live broadcast based on e-mailed suggestions from listeners. Angel Radio, Havant, has commissioned a drama series (a remake of the BBC classic ‘Dick Barton Special Agent’) at the instigation of a local writer who wanted to produce a professional spoof detective drama over 10 episodes. Almost none of the other stations interviewed have the resources to commission drama. As far as possible, stations like 27 Talkin’ Toxteth FM and Forest of Dean Community Radio make efforts to record any live performances (royalties and performing rights licences permitting) and offer as much local work as possible to listeners, including full performances (with some editing). The majority of live or pre-recorded drama output is generally written and performed by amateur dramatics groups, local community groups, or school groups. Bradford Community Broadcasting, for instance, has teamed up with the local amateur theatre group to produce its drama programme ‘Act Now’. Some of the better resourced stations have been able to broker partnership projects between arts and cultural organisations and schools or communities which want to design dramas, thereby providing a training opportunity at the same time as developing programming content: “We have excellent links with The Drum, New Century Arts, Symphony Hall, playwrights like Don Kinch. Amateur drama is used as a platform and a stepping stone towards the professional sector for all of our volunteers”, says Martin Blissett, of New Style Radio 98.7 FM. Sound Radio in Hackney, East London, has produced three original dramas that bring together young people with professional theatre producers and programme-makers with a theatre background. They have found that using as many local people as possible alongside professional practitioners is the most viable way of creating drama within limited budgets. Given the presence of many small theatre companies within Hackney, this is a promising area of work. But lack of organisational capacity makes it difficult for the station to broker and sustain its partnerships with theatre practitioners. Through some of its presenters who have done ‘stand up’ at Hackney Empire and the Theatre Royal Stratford East, Sound Radio has also engaged with the professional Stand Up Comedy circuit in London. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING Radio Reverb in Brighton has the advantage of being based in a highly active performing arts community and has successfully recorded a number of short radio drama segments. One drama by a local writer retains the names of real localities and personalities in Brighton, so that listeners can recognise and identify with the area and the people involved. Several stations demonstrate a commitment to producing, recording, editing and broadcasting dramas in local languages or dialects in order to ensure that their output reflects local cultures. Alex Bennett of Talkin’ Toxteth FM expresses this strongly: “If somebody wants to do a contemporary version of Othello, like with a scouse accent, by all means we’ll use it, but if they can write their own new local tragedy, that would be even better”. Drama aimed at specific audiences Awaz FM in Glasgow has broadcast a season of plays by local people called South Siders (loosely based on the EastEnders model), as well as producing its own Urdu drama in-house. Desi Radio in Southall has begun to experiment with producing performances of well-known works of Punjabi drama. Other stations concentrate on specialist drama to meet the needs of minority audiences or to raise awareness about particular issues. New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham has produced performance poetry and dramas to stimulate interest in Black literature. Similarly, Cross Rhythms City Radio in Stoke-on-Trent has worked in partnership with the council’s Youth Services team to produce a play about cannabis, made by the Young People’s Training Group and broadcast to a large youth audience. Desi Radio has broadcast several radical social dramas inspired by a drama teacher from the Punjab, who is contracted to train up and work with Desi Radio volunteers three times a week. Their approach 28 is not just to increase skill levels, but also to tackle personal and social issues, such as raising selfesteem and confidence in self-expression. This is particularly important for groups of women who face multiple disadvantage and considerable challenges in accessing services, self-education and having a voice within their communities. Desi Radio works closely with the west London charity Women in Radio and, with the support of a grant from Awards for All, has produced on-line training materials for developing radio drama (see http:// womeninradio.org.uk/). In the wake of this initiative, Desi Radio is also discussing with CMA and Arts Council England the possibility of having an interactive on-line radio drama festival, which would enable new script-writers to be trained and have their writing reviewed by professionals before being produced. Desi Radio also made brief dramas for public service information slots before the last set of local elections as a way of encouraging people to vote. While some stations cite the high production costs of drama as a reason for limited broadcasting of drama, this does not seem to deter Wythenshawe FM Station manager Christine Brennan, who has a background in professional drama (indeed she appeared in a recent episode of Hollyoaks) and so is confident in supporting drama-based activities. The ‘Wythenshawe FM Soap’ ran for several years on a shoestring budget. Broadcast several days a week, the script was written by a local woman called Jane (a mother with three children), who developed her skills through working at the station. Starting as a volunteer with no experience in writing, she became interested in this aspect of the show and ended up writing all the scripts for the soap. Christine describes what happened: THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING It was an extraordinary learning curve. When she first came to us she couldn’t write, she didn’t have the confidence, she’s never written dialogue before, she had no background in drama or any relevant qualifications. On the day when you’re recording, if one of the cast doesn’t turn up, you have to rewrite the script or change a character. She just gets on the computer and rewrites it. She can write under pressure. That’s learning incredible skills that most writers wouldn’t have. She’s very sure-footed with her dialogue and creating characters with a clear voice, which obviously they didn’t have when she first started writing. She’s now doing teacher training and we’re hoping that she will be able to work with us as a youth trainer in drama and writing, as well as with adults. Case study Wythenshawe FM Drama at the heart of community radio Reminiscence and oral history programmes are a strong dimension of community radio. Wythenshawe FM has taken this a step further by developing a series of drama projects from the audio material they have collected. In 2005, the station secured a grant of £10,000 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to carry out research on memories of the ‘Home Front’ as part of the celebration of the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II. The first step was to collect as many audio memories as possible from the local community. The focus was the Home Front – people working in munitions at Ringway Airport, fire wardens, the routine life of families, allotments, rationing and recycling. Jane, who had by now gained immense confidence as a scriptwriter, developed a play aimed at 10 and 11 year-olds to tour local primary schools. Although World War II is part of the curriculum, schools were struggling to engage children because the period seemed too remote. But the stories drawn from local people, places and events, just round the corner from where they now live, really enthused them. Christine explains, “Because we collected so many stories, photos from the library, ration books and baby gas masks, we decided that we could use this with the audio materials to put together an exhibition to tour the local community”. Jane then used this material to stimulate the creation of a visionary audio play ‘What if’, a sort of Wythenshawe FM version of Roth’s novel ‘Plot against America’. What would Wythenshawe FM be like if Germany had won the War? Christine drew together a professional cast of seven, as well as nine actors from the local community who had been involved with the soap. Her aim was to share knowledge and skills. Everyone did it as a favour. The professional actors liked the script and the opportunity it gave them. The local actors relished the opportunity to stretch their skills. The production standards were deliberately higher than for the soap, with rehearsals and a clear recording schedule. Although the experience wasn’t quite so easy-going as it had been for the soap, it was nonetheless rewarding. “We put our heart and soul into it”, said Christine. Drama programming – reportage As well as supporting participatory drama, several of the metropolitan stations also provide regular coverage and discussion of what is happening in theatre within their region. Resonance FM produces the weekly show ‘On the Fringe’, which is advertised on the station’s website as highlighting “…work often neglected due to the sheer number of venues and performance spaces in the capital, and to the 29 THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING 30 Several stations ... deliberately ‘push the boundaries’ of music content, featuring genres and styles of music that rarely feature in commercial or public service broadcasting. indefinable, constantly evolving nature of fringe theatre”. Wythenshawe FM has a team of reviewers who visit and review all the local productions in Greater Manchester. Drama – future potential In a piece written for Ofcom’s scanning exercise on the future of what it is calling PSP (public service publishing), Andrew Chitty, Managing Director of Illumina Digital and Chair of the Skillset Interactive Media Forum, makes a powerful case for the development of new forms of interactive narrative, mixing broadcasting interactive media across channels and platforms, fiction and forms of live ‘forum theatre’ in which the audience interacts with the protagonists in the drama. He points out that such forms offer: huge potential for new forms of storytelling – engaging the users as active participants in unfolding dramatic experiences rather than as passive consumers [...] new forms of storytelling [...] can take forward the fundamental cultural purposes of public service drama – to create unfolding imaginative experiences that examine, reflect and represent contemporary Britain to itself with the active engagement of the audience. 7 The unfolding and interactive narratives represented by those actively making dramatic content for community radio broadcasting have much to offer this debate. But the sector may need to develop collaborations and partnerships with other organisations involved in developing drama content in order fully to realise this potential. And whilst the current volunteer economy enables responsiveness, experimentation and innovation, there is considerable potential for genuinely groundbreaking work in radio drama to be produced by the sector, should the resources available to it be increased. These resources could be realised by direct funding from Arts Council England or other agencies, or through the growth of partnerships with other arts and media organisations. In a time of limited funding, working together in imaginative ways, as some of the examples in this section begin to show, could bring about stronger outcomes for both the arts and community radio sector – enabling the venues to connect with diverse communities, providing an outlet for experimentation and offering the stations greater expertise in drama production. Arts Council Literature officers and local authority arts officers could broker and support links between community radio stations and local theatre venues. 4.3 Music Music programming: a range of approaches We estimate that approximately 70 per cent of the community radio sector’s programming overall is music-based. Given that stations have strong ties to particular localities, much of the stations’ output reflects the complex layers of communities of musical practice that exist for the audiences that they serve. Music has a deep role in producing and expressing social and cultural identities; and the sector is demonstrating its potential to harness and build on the musical passions, enthusiasms and in many cases considerable expertise of its participants. The increasing blurring of the divide between professional and amateur music-making (perhaps a reflection of what has been called ‘the pro-am phenomenon’ 8 ) means that community radio offers pathways and platforms for musicians at many different stages of their careers. The medium provides another vehicle for broadcast of established commercial musical product, a listening space in which alternative and experimental music forms can reach a wider audience and a place in which global and minority musics of all kinds can be broadcast. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING In the case of some stations like Resonance FM in London and Radio Reverb in Brighton, both located in cities with thriving communities of contemporary artists, many volunteers involved in producing programme content are experts in their field. Community radio offers routes into producing culture, opportunities for freedom of artistic expression and ground for experimentation that is less readily available in the commercial or public service broadcast sector. Many areas of Britain have thriving local music scenes and there is some evidence that community radio is playing an increasingly important role in sustaining and developing audiences, performances and extending knowledge about local opportunities to produce, perform and listen to music. There is certainly considerable potential for the sector to do even more. Definitions and types of `music radio' produced by the sector vary widely. By far the most common programme format is the solo DJ show, playing a wide variety of recorded musical genres, often interspersed with short interviews or phone-ins. This format is recognisable from both BBC local radio and commercial radio and is often adopted by stations for reasons of audience `familiarity' and cost effectiveness. However, there are many more imaginative examples of music programming – from, for example Ipswich Community Radio's 'Roots and Shoots' programme, which plays a very carefully selected mix of acoustic, folk-influenced and `world' music in a late night slot, to many of the shows across Resonance FM's offering, which feature such established DJs such as Kevin LeGendre (contemporary jazz), Mr Trick and Wax Factor (turntablism) and Coldcut (contemporary dance music). Some stations, predominantly those in suburban and rural areas, have a music policy that restricts daytime music programming to ‘chart’ music and uses ‘playlist’ formats and content management systems 31 similar to commercial radio. Not all of the stations surveyed make much use of the considerable latitude and freedom in terms of programme format that is offered by the community radio medium. This raises questions, which some stations might need to address, about the distinctiveness of their offering compared to their commercial competitors, but it also probably reflects some of the expectations and interests of the audiences that the stations seek to serve. Many have adventurous aspects to their music programming, particularly in the evenings and at weekends, where it is common practice for stations to produce shows featuring ‘niche’ music and inventive choices of material. Almost all respondents identified are serving particular ‘niche’ audiences for music as part of their core function. (Some of these programmes, such as the Wythenshawe FM ‘Northern Soul’ show and ‘Adventures in Modern Music’ hosted by ‘The Wire’ magazine on Resonance FM, generate a national following.) This enables unusual crossfertilisations and collisions to take place, broadening the range of music that audiences experience: as Nick Greenland from Ipswich Community Radio says, “We’re not aiming for a single type of audience; rather we want to reach the widest possible range of people […] we’re here to provide an alternative to what’s available on the other local stations”. Several stations have taken a decisive approach to music programming and deliberately ‘push the boundaries’ of music content, featuring genres and styles of music that rarely feature in commercial or public service broadcasting, from ‘black metal’ to the music of Uzbekistan. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING Volunteer pathways From bedroom dj to broadcaster and web designer Henry, a 17 year old obsessed with junglist music and bedroom dj, was walking past Sheffield Live five years ago and took up the invitation to walk in and talk about an idea for a programme. He discussed his idea and was signed. After a short training programme he and a small group of friends, who had set up Junglist Alliance, got a slot every week to showcase their music. He describes the specific experience of radio broadcasting, “It’s different to playing to a crowd or in your bedroom, because you’re in a room talking to nobody, but you are playing to people. It gives you knowledge, exposure, experiences and a chance to promote yourself and your nights.” Now in their early twenties, the group are still involved in music and the creative industries as web designers and music promoters. Henry is convinced that it has been one of the factors that has helped him in getting work. The team set up a night at a local venue which was rated by the Guardian as one of the best events to go to New Year’s Eve 2006. Music programming for ‘minority’ audiences Community radio provides significant support for ‘minority’ music programming and because of this ought to be of considerable interest to those interested in supporting the diversity of the UK’s music sector. As well as offering a platform for emerging and unsigned artists, it also provides a platform for noncommercial and experimental music, religious music and experimental and improvised forms, including in some cases sonic art, electro-acoustic music and audio experiments which exploit the potential of radio as an artistic medium in its own right. 32 The musical diversity in the output of community radio stations may also challenge some of the categories and boundaries of genre found in mainstream radio programming. Stations like Resonance FM and, to an extent, Radio Reverb in Brighton and Sound Radio in Hackney consistently produce content that defies the musical categories and boundaries established by the commercial sector and the BBC. Across the sector as a whole, the musical mix on offer is often very eclectic, even within music genres. For example, New Style Radio 98.7 FM Radio in Birmingham programmes across a wide range of Black-led music, from soul to jazz to dancehall and reggae music. Cross-Rhythms City Radio in Stoke-onTrent promotes a wide diversity of ‘Christian Pop’ drawing on evangelical appropriations of popular music styles. Many different forms of Black, Asian and other global music are represented across the sector, offering a historically unparalleled choice of listening on the radio. There are some wider public benefits of promoting this musical diversity too. Desi Radio points out that, in systematically digitising recordings in preparation for broadcast, they have been creating a de facto archive of the history of Punjabi popular music over the last 70 years, much of which is rare and unavailable commercially. It is likely that there is a growing repository of audio and music content within the sector as a whole that is significantly under-exploited and under-recognised. As a record of community cultural heritage and as a social document, these ‘living archives’ of musical practice within community radio hold wider cultural significance. Where community radio comes into its own is in supporting artists who are seeking to establish reputations or in reaching audiences who tend to be ignored by larger media players. For artists from abroad doing small-scale touring, community radio THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING 33 There is considerable potential for the community radio sector to be a vehicle for research into new forms of musical production and collaborative music practice. can be an essential vehicle for reaching key audiences. Desi Radio, Bradford Community Broadcasting and Voice of Africa Radio all indicated that they were an essential port of call for visiting artists from diaspora communities seeking to connect with local audiences. There is considerable potential for community radio to act as a key partner for venues and promoters seeking to develop new audiences, for it is embedded in many informal networks of musical participation and acts as a connecting point between professional, established musicians, ‘emerging artists’ seeking to develop their profile, and enthusiastic audiences, participants and advocates. Case study New Style Radio 98.7FM Radio – profiling the arts of black communities New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham is proactive in supporting African-Caribbean music of all genres. Martin Blissett, the station manager, explains their approach: We are an unpretentious Black radio station. The principal drivers of the station are people of Caribbean culture [...] We reflect Caribbean culture but we don’t exclude people. Presenters are principally of Caribbean origin but we have a mixture [...] Our audience is quite wide because you don’t get this kind of station anywhere in the city [...] The nature of the radio that we do has very wide appeal [...] Volunteers are drawn from Asians, Whites, Chinese as well as from AfroCaribbeans; there are a whole range of cultures involved in the project. As long as they like Black music and are into arts and culture, then they fit into what we do. We cover reggae, salsa, calypso, R&B, soul, Latin, drum n bass, African, Gospel, jazz [...] all the popular ones – Black American, Caribbean, African, also Black French. Our programmes vary [...] you might see us as an ‘infotainment’ station [...] One of the things that we have been able to do that commercial radio hasn’t is to embrace the arts in a big way, particularly music, drama and the spoken word. We are a vehicle to promote events [that are] associated with Black people. We have a great relationship with The Drum, the biggest Black arts venue in Europe [...] Lots of artists coming into Birmingham from America, Africa and Europe are introduced to the community by New Style Radio 98.7 FM... [We] give people opportunities to send in material and as long as it is good we will play it, unlike mainstream commercial radio or the BBC [...] People who don’t normally have the opportunity to expose their work can do so on New Style Radio 98.7 FM. If people ask for us to promote an event for them, if they haven’t got the means to promote it themselves, then we will do it for them. For example, we helped to produce an EP for local artist Yaz Alexander which is in the record shops now [...] Because we have recording facilities we can support artists in terms of their development. Music documentary Music documentary content usually consists of indepth surveys of the work of particular artists or bands, although it is often difficult for stations to get direct access to artists, particularly well-established ones, unless they happen to be available to promote a performance or product. There are a few examples of well-researched and thorough documentary content. Ipswich Community Radio (ICR) helps volunteers to produce two-hour surveys of the recorded output of particular musicians or bands that are broadcast as part of their overnight programmes. Nick Greenland from ICR suggests that this is a way of supporting the production of programmes by people who would be less comfortable with live THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING broadcasting, or who have commitments which preclude them from being able to broadcast live. Some musical commentary on community radio is more ad hoc and lacks the depth of research or knowledge required to produce authoritative programming. This reflects a lack of time and resources rather than the absence of expertise per se. But there are notable exceptions. Resonance FM, an artist-led station based in central London, is able to draw on the expertise of established music journalists and expert presenters who are attracted by the dynamism and radicalism of the station and its ability to respond quickly to programme ideas. Ed Baxter, station manager, explains how he selects material: You say ‘no’ to people who say ‘I’ve got an eclectic record collection’; I get an e-mail like that every day [...] So what you want is a very narrow idea. You want someone to say ‘I’m only interested in 1968’ and really know what they are talking about. There are maybe a dozen people [involved with the station] who are experts in their field and it’s very easy to get material out of them [...] The classic example is ‘The Traditional Music Hour’ with Reg Hall, which is still a great show because he’s a genius, really. He knows everything about his subject. Robert Sandall and Mark Russell, presenters of BBC Radio 3’s long-running late night show ‘Mixing It’, have moved across to Resonance FM, following the removal of the programme from the Radio 3 schedule. Programme content seems to works best when it draws on the specialist knowledge and enthusiasms of the participants. In an edition of Sound Radio’s ‘Art on Air’ programme broadcast in November 2006, a songwriter explained the processes behind her music, including lyric clips and techniques, and a performance poet described how he captured ideas 34 and inspiration for his work. This was an interesting example of radio being used to expose process, rather than simply describe a product, in a way that not only uncovered the creative process but also provided instruction to other musicians. Live music broadcasting Community radio plays an important role in supporting local live music scenes. ‘Session’ programmes featuring live music performances by local musicians are commonplace, although they tend to be limited to relatively small-scale arrangements owing to the cost and technical complexity of broadcasting large groups of musicians. For example, Afan FM in Port Talbot, New Style Radio 98.7 FM, Life FM, Bradford Community Broadcasting and Sheffield Live all regularly broadcast live musical performance. There are strong relationships developing between local bands and DJs and the community radio sector. Many stations have shows presented by musicians and DJs who are prominent or emergent within local music scenes. In 2005 Phoenix FM in Chelmsford produced a ‘creative sessions’ CD showcasing a wide range of unsigned local acts and distributed it via the station and at local live music events. Such activities open up pathways for musicians and enable them to reach wider audiences. Musical events are occasionally relayed live, although the cost and complexity of doing so means that most of these are studio-based rather than in venues. The majority of stations in the sector do not have the technical resources to mount complex, live, outside broadcast operations. Recording live events for subsequent broadcast also presents challenges, because high quality, large-scale field recording requires significant investment in technical staff and equipment – something that most stations, poorly resourced and staffed by volunteers, cannot afford. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING Some stations have developed innovative solutions to this problem: because they have access to suitable spaces in the buildings they occupy, Ipswich Community Radio and New Style Radio 98.7 FM Radio can stage live session performances and small-scale performances with audiences present. Resonance FM regularly broadcasts coverage of music events from a range of venues including, for example, the Spitz Festival of Blues in April 2007. With the continued growth of low cost broadband telecommunications, it is possible that technical solutions to the problem of remote live broadcasting will soon be within reach. Such solutions may also enable stations to experiment with new approaches to programme-making, mixing live audio feeds from studios and remote locations, or experimenting with improvised music, with the potential for members of the radio audience to feed audio back into the station, live or recorded. Radio Reverb has experimented with producing live alternative soundtracks to films being broadcast on terrestrial television. There is considerable potential for the community radio sector to be a vehicle for research into new forms of musical production and collaborative musical practice. Programmes that do break new ground could be supported in reaching wider audiences, through syndication or re-broadcast on other networks. 4.4 Film and Visual Arts For self-evident reasons, film and visual art are not inherently suited to radio. Yet many stations have nonetheless found innovative ways of engaging with film and visual art, in addition to promoting them through listings and review programmes. Forest of Dean Community Radio has worked with Newent School, a specialist arts college involved with Creative Partnerships (see www.creativepartnerships.com/forestofdean), to evaluate the 35 impact of the visual arts on children’s sense of identity, growth and development. Radio Ikhlas has interviewed a local graffiti artist about his methods, approaches and sources of inspiration. The station makes extensive use of its website as a gallery for local calligraphy artists who also feature on its programmes. Similarly, Resonance FM has broadcast a 24 hour show from the Serpentine Gallery, followed by a regular feature entitled ‘Radio Gallery’, which invites young, international visual artists to explore their work through the medium of radio. Resonance’s station manager, Ed Baxter, suggests that the strength of contemporary visual arts in London has “…generated an audience that is attuned to radio in a way in which the theatre or other literary audiences aren’t”. Resonance also has a weekly magazine show about film and video called I’mreadyformycloseup, which covers film-related events, premières, books and debates about moving image culture. Phoenix FM in Essex provided contemporary musicians for and broadcast information about the Brentwood Visual Arts Exhibition, thereby attracting a much broader audience than normal, and Unity 101 FM has explored the creativity of graffiti artists as part of its arts features. Another station, 7 Waves Community Radio FM, holds live visual arts classes with local illustrators and sculptors, and Sound Radio actively seeks out contributions from artists working in the most unusual forms of media: “I want the programme to be a catalyst, drawing together an arts community…”, says Meriel Goss, presenter of Art on Air, at Sound Radio. Sound Radio and Resonance FM regularly feature individual interviews with contemporary artists, sometimes as an element of dedicated arts shows and sometimes as part of a magazine or news feature. 209Radio’s remit has largely been dedicated THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING “We’re like a virtual arts centre” ROGER DRURY to exploring audio artworks or radio art as a creative medium and it has therefore engaged with contemporary artists almost entirely for this purpose. Other stations, such as Sound Radio and Forest of Dean Community Radio, deal with the visual arts within the broad spectrum of their general arts programming, often emphasising photography and new media with a strong local focus. “We’re like a virtual arts centre”, says Roger Drury. “The radio covers about as wide as you can get and we support all the different little things that go on, so we provide access to find out about things, or go and experience things as part of a whole approach to life.” Case study Wythenshawe FM Community engagement through the arts A cardboard model sitting on the table at Wythenshawe FM (located on the Wythenshawe estate in Manchester, one of the biggest post-war council estates in the UK) has been made as part of an innovative arts-driven public consultation about climate change. The project is a partnership between three organisations: Wythenshawe FM (through its umbrella organisation Radio Regen); UHC (Ultimate Holding Company), an interdisciplinary art collective based in Manchester; and MERCI (Manchester Environmental Resources). The partnership plays to the strengths of each of the organisations involved. Wythenshawe FM offers a strong connection to the local community for the team of arts and environmental practitioners, as well as a good understanding of the role and potential of participatory arts in community development. A full week of consultation with members of the local community has led to a plan to create a series of pods and a ‘massive structure’ designed to contain information about climate change and draw people in. The structure will be entirely made of recyclable materials and the aim is that the project will be carbon neutral. The structure will be housed outside the Forum (an arts and leisure complex on the estate). As Christine, the station manager, explained: All of the pods will be removable in order to create a workable space that’s taken to schools and community centres, again to talk about climate change and work with people on arts workshops all sorts of things to spread the word about climate change and also to chart people’s attitudes to climate change and whether their attitudes change over the process of this project. Staff at the radio station are doing a series of broadcasts to link up with this initiative and are also attending the consultation sessions. The project finale will be a carbon neutral community party, with the participants generating the energy needed to hold the party. The project is funded by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the project worker is linemanaged through Wythenshawe FM. 4.5 Arts promotion, festivals and carnivals Almost all the stations interviewed demonstrated a high level of engagement with festivals and carnivals, ranging from the direct promotion and production of the entire event (e.g. FeileFM, part of a West Belfast community arts organisation) to the recording of selected interviews and programme content from the festivals. Bradford Community 36 THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING Broadcasting grew out of the Bradford Festival and continues to have strong links with the festival and with the Mela, which is the largest in the UK. Some stations have even written this commitment to festivals into their programming policy. Forest of Dean Community Radio, for example, covers all festivals within a one-hour drive-time of Cinderford, reflecting the distance its listeners are likely to travel in response to publicity material. For this particular station, the promotion of festivals demonstrates its core commitment to extending access to the arts, as Roger Drury makes clear: It’s important to encourage the listeners to attend live events at festivals wherever possible, as they don’t have anything of that scale locally. There is no arts venue in the Forest, and this is often their only chance to hear large-scale, live music, particularly from established musicians. It’s also one of the only other ways for up and coming local artists to gain exposure. As a largely community-oriented form of activity, festivals and carnivals are seen as a primary contact point between the radio station and its listeners. Several stations, including 7 Waves Community Radio, New Style Radio 98.7 FM, Awaz FM, Talkin’ Toxteth FM and Forest of Dean Community Radio, host an annual festival which reflects their target audience, age-group and remit. Other stations have a huge involvement with the main festivals organised by other stakeholders in the community: Bradford Community Broadcasting, for example, dedicates a large proportion of its programming to literature and is committed to supporting the Bradford Book Festival. As well as hosting poetry and short story readings, interviews with authors, live broadcasts and information about the festival itself, Bradford Community Broadcasting is planning to host a radio book club modelled on Radio 4’s ‘A Good Read’, as Mary Dowson from the station explains: 37 It’s something we are keen to develop in partnership with the Festival team. We have lots of ideas and I know we could do more, it’s just the resourcing really. It’s not getting the ideas that is the problem, it’s just that we can’t do them all at once and we already have at least 70 programmes each week, so finding time to give access to everyone’s ideas is hard. The chart (figure 3) shows that the more ‘mature’ stations, those which have been broadcasting as part of the Access Radio pilot since 2001, are involved in a higher proportion of live performance than newer stations. It does not follow that all stations will develop links with live music and events, but it is possible that stations will develop increased capacity for this work as they become more experienced and established. ACCESS NON-ACCESS 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 CULTURAL FESTIVALS CONCERTS RECITALS MUSIC GIGS CARNIVALS FIG. 3 BREAKDOWN OF LIVE MUSIC AND FESTIVAL COVERAGE BY STATIONS BROADCASTING SINCE 2001 (ACCESS PILOT) AND MORE RECENTLY ESTABLISHED STATIONS. (NON ACCESS) THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND ART FORM PROGRAMMING In some cases, the stations use festivals strictly as a platform for new and emerging talent. For example, 7 Waves Community Radio Community Radio hosts an annual ‘Summer Sensations’ talent show, dedicated to nurturing and judging the quality of new talent. Similarly, Awaz FM hosts an international platform for unknown as well as established artists, including an annual dinner at which artists perform to distinguished guests. Talkin’ Toxteth FM not only hosts festivals for its emerging young hopefuls, but also actively helps to create opportunities for them in the programmes of other organisations in the area, such as DJ or band competitions, club nights, and other festival events on a larger scale (e.g. the Liverpool Biennial, DaDa Fest, Arabic Arts festival and the Capital of Culture 2008). Talkin’ Toxteth FM is particularly keen to do this because it feels strongly that local, high quality talent should have a high profile in the event: I would be seriously upset if we didn’t get a chance to contribute to the Capital of Culture festival programming. We should be running in conjunction with the other radio stations, generating our little bit of the programme as part of an overall network, and at the same time receiving the recognition that Talkin’ Toxteth FM’s contribution brings a vital and direct connection into numerous ethnic communities and cultures in Liverpool. (Alex Bennet) In addition to organising or participating in arts festivals, community radio stations are often asked to be present at community events, which raises their visibility and profile within the community and encourages participation. The range of art forms covered by the stations through festivals and carnivals is extensive. Aside from the broadly based local community festivals or village shows, stations cover a range of individual art form events, including high profile international festivals with an extensive following. These include: 38 • Literature and poetry: Cheltenham Literature Festival and Hay-on-Wye Festival by Forest of Dean Community Radio (FoD); Bradford Book Festival by Bradford Community Broadcasting; • Music: Coleford Music Festival, Folk, Jazz, World and Brass Band Festivals and Youth Arts Festival all by FoD; Dewsbury Festival of Christian Music by Branch FM; Blackmore Festival by Phoenix FM; Adventures in Modern Music by Resonance FM; and Brighton and Brunswick Festivals by Radio Reverb; • Road Shows: Awaz FM Road Show; Summer Sensations by 7 Waves Community Radio and Stockport Youth Arts Festival by Pure Radio; • Images of Black Women Film Festival by Resonance FM; • Outdoor Events/Festival: Black Birmingham Festival by New Style Radio 98.7 FM; Arab Arts Festival by Talkin’ Toxteth FM; Bollywood Festival and Bradford Mela by Bradford Community Broadcasting; Sports & Diversity Festival by 209 Radio; Black History Month by Talkin’ Toxteth FM; and the Refugee Festival by AllFM; • Dance: Dancing through the Dean by FoD; • Crafts: Taurus Crafts Fringe Festival by FoD; • Theatre & Storytelling: Cambridge Storytelling Festival by 209 Radio; Voices in the Forest Festival and the Newent Arts Festival by FoD; • Notting Hill Carnival: by Life FM. This impressive list shows how community radio is extending its local reach, while also providing serious support for major art form festivals and events. Notes 7. See http://www.openmedianetwork.org.uk/contentandvision/story.htm 8. Charles Leadbeater and Paul Miller, ‘The pro-am revolution: how enthusiasts are changing our economy and society’, Demos, London, 2004 5 INNOVATION AND SUPPORT FOR NEW TALENT THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INNOVATION AND SUPPORT FOR NEW TALENT 40 “In a world where it is too easy to be dumbed down, the composer has been given the space to vigorously intellectual.” JJ MAURAGE 5.1 Community radio – a platform for experimentation in the arts Resonance FM is a striking example of a community radio station willing to take a lead in innovation: Imagine a radio station like no other – a radio station that makes public those artworks that have no place in traditional broadcasting – a radio station that is an archive of the new, the undiscovered, the forgotten, the impossible, that is an invisible gallery, a virtual arts centre whose location is at once local, global and timeless. And that is itself a work of art. Imagine a radio station that responds rapidly to new initiatives, has time to draw breath and reflect. A laboratory for experimentation, that by virtue of its uniqueness brings into being a new audience of listeners and creators. All this and more, Resonance104.4FM aims to make London's airwaves available to the widest possible range of practitioners of contemporary art. (Ed Baxter) Few stations take the sorts of risk associated with contemporary radio-as-art programming, but Resonance FM and Radio Reverb in Brighton feature highly among those that do. This is partly because they locate themselves within a tradition of work in audio and contemporary music-making reaching back to ‘musique concrète’ in the 1950s as well as to the electronic and electroacoustic soundscapes of the 1960s and into contemporary sampling and remixing cultures, sound art and installation. 9 Early experiments in electroacoustic music and ‘musique concrète’ in the 1950s and 1960s were often housed in the research facilities of radio broadcasters, as well as in university music departments. 10 Some community radio stations today are offering a comparable space for experimentation, combined with the ability to reach wider audiences. Resonance Magazine, produced by the London Musicians Collective, has devoted several issues to ‘adventures in international radio art’. It is difficult to describe the immense variety of programming in this vein on stations like Resonance FM and probably much better simply to listen. But programmes can vary from experiments in ‘acoustic ecology’, in which recordings of environments and soundscapes are remixed and manipulated,11 through to forms of improvised and electronic music which draw on sampled textures and references to preexistent music genres. Even within mainstream popular music, sampling, looping and pasting has become a dominant mode of composition. Hence the production, re-production and distribution of audio content are no longer limited to specialists with access to expensive equipment and technical know-how. Internationally there are large numbers of artists working in the medium of sound from, for example, the sculptural installations of Janet Cardiff to work in sound designed for film and new media, and the huge range of approaches to composition in contemporary music. Commentators have identified an ‘auditory turn’ in contemporary culture, as the range of channels and media for the distribution of sound and music have proliferated and virtually-generated audio environments blur into the soundscape of everyday life.12 For those committed to experimenting and questioning, community radio offers an accessible and affordable means of critically exploring some of these new conditions of sound. J.J. Maurage explains one of Radio Reverb’s current experimental audio projects in this way: There is another soundscape we are doing called ‘dissipation’ which is about a text radio environment. I can’t think how to describe it other than – a load of noise! It deals with the Futurists and ideas of noise machines and an idea around creating music in particular ways, sampling it and resampling it. It is quite an academic approach. In a world where it is too easy to be dumbed down, the composer has been given the space to be vigorously intellectual. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INNOVATION AND SUPPORT FOR NEW TALENT Forest of Dean Community Radio tried to explore new aesthetic approaches to using the medium of radio for expression by commissioning ‘soundscapes’ for the Voices Festival in 2004, a celebration of the life and work of the playwright Dennis Potter. However, people found it hard to write for sound rather than the spoken word. The station has also broadcast material from a project in Stroud that focuses on experimental digital work. But Forest of Dean Community Radio’s experience has generally been that people do not have the confidence to broadcast this kind of programme live and that most existing theatre/performance groups are locked into practice of a more traditional nature. Thus the station’s strategy is to begin to change perceptions of how to write for radio by working on small-scale experimental projects in schools. Similarly, Resonance FM regularly explores alternative ways of thinking about radio as a medium for expression as opposed to simply “having someone talking at you all the time”, says Ed Baxter. Resonance FM has facilitated sessions for visual artists to explore their work through radio, produced a number of programmes which investigate ‘found’ sounds and acoustic ecology, and lately discussed the possibility of devoting air time to live rockclimbing. 41 Volunteer pathways finding a space for creativity What would motivate someone working for BBC radio as a sports presenter also to volunteer with a community radio station? Nelson volunteered at Life FM for several years while also studying at a London college. He enjoyed the creative freedom, flexibility and challenge of preparing a show for broadcast each Saturday morning. He’s been a sports presenter for BBC local radio for several years now and is planning to start volunteering again in community radio. Although he holds a qualification in radio production and broadcasts regularly, Nelson explained that community radio gives room for flexibility and creativity which is simply not open in many presentation roles in commercial or public sector radio. “You have play lists and the producer really tells you what to do. With community radio you’ve got a lot more freedom to express yourself and develop creatively.” Although there is considerable evidence of innovation and experimentation within the sector, not all stations have been comfortable with taking on this role. Artist-led stations that have multiple embedded relationships with a region’s cultural and artistic infrastructure (such as Resonance FM) and serve cosmopolitan urban areas are inclined to take artistic risks and programme experimentally. In smaller more isolated communities, unless there are groups of participants/listeners who actively want experimentation, such risk-taking may seem less desirable or attainable. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INNOVATION AND SUPPORT FOR NEW TALENT Case study Resonance FM – at the cutting edge of arts practice Resonance FM combines the DIY aesthetic of post-punk music cultures with a serious and cosmopolitan approach to exploring contemporary culture in all its facets, across London. The station was established by the London Musicians Collective in 2001. LMC is a thirty-year old collective of radical musicians, audio artists and practitioners of sound art which has a long history of mounting provocative interventions into London’s music scene, working in improvised and electronic musics from free jazz to hip-hop, exploring and crossing the boundaries of musical practices, forging new approaches to musical performance. Ed Baxter, the station manager, explains how radio came to be seen as such an important medium to develop this agenda: Radio is a pre-eminently user-friendly medium. Yet in the UK access to it, until now, has been in inverse proportion to its very real accessibility – and its usage has been hedged around with numberless rules of behaviour, real and imaginary. The rules which govern radio broadcasting are mostly matters of common sense. Even so, in tandem with the actual laws laid down by Ofcom, there are ingrained habits which have determined the nature of radio from the point of view of the listener: typically, the rhythm of a radio station is grasped in terms of its traffic reports, weather forecasts, adverts, time signals and repetitive news broadcasts. But these are not givens: they are merely conventions which are swept away when one suggests that radio is in essence a new medium (as vinyl also appeared as a new medium in the wake of the compact disc), one that can be grasped by its aesthetic handle. Radio implies lateral mobility: it is the stuff of movement across cities, across countries, across time zones and zones of experience. It enters and exits space dynamically. Radio’s aspirations are lateral, not vertical: the star system associated with Reality TV, whereby a nonentity ascends to the dizzy heights of celebrity – and whereby the rest of us sit and pick our teeth and are yet still somehow meant to empathise – seems a long way off from radio, with its palpable civic and social meanings, its fluidity, its plurality, and its shifting sense of dislocation. (Ed Baxter, from a keynote presentation given at a 2006 conference at The University of Sunderland ‘Sounding It Out’.) Resonance FM works with a provocative, artistled agenda. And it deliberately aims for a mix of content and programming that defies easy categorisation. Although there are some constants in the station’s schedule, notably some acclaimed and long-running shows such as Calling All Pensioners presented by reformed ex-bank robber Harry Haward, and Reg Hall’s weekly show which features a unique archive of folk and traditional music from the British Isles, it mixes these together in a constantly shifting palette of music, audio cut-ups, reviews, features, and new writing across the range of artforms, from visual arts, video and photography to new media, theatre and audio arts. There is no shortage of volunteers and presenters at Resonance FM. The station attracts a mix of established and well-known voices, artists and journalists, who value what Resonance makes possible as a platform for experimentation and innovation, but also offers opportunities for complete outsiders to London’s contemporary art and music scene to reach audiences. As well as producing in-depth surveys of particular music 42 THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INNOVATION AND SUPPORT FOR NEW TALENT 43 “I feel strongly that we shouldn’t celebrate mediocrity. We are ‘laying down markers’ for young people to strive to do things well.” MARTIN BLISSET genres, it provides an almost indescribable mix of sounds from different parts of the planet – one could almost say the universe, given that some programmes explore sounds that are from unknown radio sources or manipulated beyond simple recognition. In doing so it has begun to redefine the art of what is possible in radio. 5.2 Community radio – a platform for emerging talent? Community radio is a space for learning, a space where people acquire skills and in many cases, expertise. It is a place for experimentation and innovation as well as cultural expression, because its premise is fundamentally about promoting participation and involvement. The research identified numerous examples of people of all ages who had been able to identify and develop their skills and talents through community radio. The routes in are varied – seeing an advert in a local paper, or outside the station, being referred through a friend or intermediary agency or responding to an advert on the station’s broadcast or simply approaching the station directly. The motivations of volunteers and points in their life experience and career development are also hugely varied. We encountered numerous examples where individuals had been enabled to take a first step into a creative world through involvement with creative radio, In some cases it has supported people into a path which they had already started on, in others it has encouraged people to engage with arts and creative processes for the first time. We include a few examples here some of which are explored in more detail in the case studies. Volunteer pathways Making new connections in arts practice Rik is a young illustrator who applied to a placement scheme being run by an artist’s group called Fresh in Preston after finishing his degree and was a bit take aback to find himself on a placement with a community radio station. ‘I’d not done anything with radio before but it worked out really well [… ] I did drawing from the places and people that I interviewed and they are all on the Preston FM website now’. ‘Preston postcards’ combines lively visual and audio reporting on a selection of venues and personalities in Preston – the city centre, the Guildhall, Harris Museum, the Unity Centre and a singing postman. Working at Preston FM offered him access to creative networks as well as developing the confidence and skills in presentation involved in making radio programmes and uploading content on the web. Community radio stations support new talent in different ways. In a rural area such as the Forest of Dean one of the challenges facing many arts practitioners is lack of any live performance or cabaret space where new writers, comedians, poets and story tellers can try out new work and rewrite and develop it in front of a live audience. Forest of Dean Community Radio provides one of the only spaces for this to happen (either on air or during the festivals it promotes), and as such is a pivotal facility for emerging artists in the area. It helps plug them in to mainstream opportunities, so that they can have a possibility of making a viable living from their work. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO INNOVATION AND SUPPORT FOR NEW TALENT Case study New Style Radio 98.7 FM Supporting a dynamic Black creative culture Martin Blissett of New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham describes how the station supports new talent in an urban context: As a Black radio station our music is art. There are some brilliant local Black talents who don’t get exposure, so we use the radio to give them this exposure. We have a show that is just for local talent. We also advertise events where potential audiences will be, such as at the Hippodrome, because we know Black people go there as well. We promote local creative arts such as sculpting and architecture and drawings, performing arts, word art and things like that. We need to create a dynamic Black creative culture and as a radio station we’re in the middle of doing that. We have helped produce an EP for local artist Yaz Alexander, who has now got her EP in record shops. It’s a very accessible approach, as people can walk in with their own CDs and ask for them to be played, or ask New Style Radio 98.7 FM to promote an event for them. As long as they haven’t got the means to promote it themselves, then we will do it for them. Political correctness isn’t part of our agenda. We feel integrity is something that’s important, so we are having the debate about quality and striving for excellence. I feel strongly that we shouldn’t celebrate mediocrity. We are laying down markers for young people to strive to do things well. We are seeing this as real radio, seeing it as a real cultural creative bonus. We bring a huge amount of added value into our society and one of the things we have argued for is an overt celebration of community radio in the UK. People still don’t know about it beyond the communities that listen to it. 44 Notes 9. See for example Douglas Kahn’s ‘Noise, Water, Meat: A history of Sound in the Arts’ (1999) 10. For example, Karlheinz Stockhausen’s pioneering experiments in electronic music in the 1950s were conducted from the studios of West German Radio in Cologne. 11. See for example, Chris Cutler’s CD ‘Twice Around the Earth’, compiled from source sounds recorded in 81 different global locations, available from www.resonancefm.com/shop 12. See, for example ‘Audio Culture: readings in modern music’, edited by Christoph Cox and Daniel Warner (London, Continuum, 2004) and ‘Ocean of Sound: aether talk, ambient sound and imaginary worlds’ by David Toop (New York, Serpent’s Tail, 1995). 6 COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS 6.1 Reaching wider audiences The Arts Council England’s Agenda for the Arts has an ambitious aim, which is for: everyone in the country to have the opportunity to develop a rich and varied artistic and creative life by 2008’ […] a more confident diverse and innovative arts sector which is valued by and in tune with the communities it serves[…] a more active participation in the arts by adults and young people across the country. The strategy sets a target of increasing attendance by three per cent and participation by two per cent by adults from Black and minority ethnic, disabled and economically disadvantaged social groups by: enabling people to access the arts how they choose, by implementing a distribution policy and strategies for live touring, broadcasting, publishing and new technologies. Our research consistently demonstrated the capacity of the community radio sector to engage with audiences and programme making volunteers drawn from Black and minority ethnic groups, from rural communities, the young, older people, people with disabilities and people with mental health difficulties and, although many stations are at an early stage of development, the sector is well placed to contribute to meeting the Arts Council’s ambitious aims. As our analysis of support for specific art forms has already shown, such engagement and interaction with these communities is fundamental to what community radio does. Audience reach Few stations have carried out systematic surveys of their audience size and reach. However, Ofcom commissioned quantitative research of four stations – AwazFM, Angel Radio, AllFM and Forest of Dean 46 Radio in 2004. Statistically significant potential audiences were sampled through in-street interviews. The evidence indicated that the reach of stations serving a community of interest is substantial. For example in the case of Awaz FM, which caters for Glasgow’s Asian communities, ‘spontaneous awareness’ of the station was found to be ‘remarkable’: Sixty per cent of the total sample were spontaneously aware of the station, while another 31 per cent recalled Awaz after prompting. Seventy-three per cent of the total sample indicated that Awaz FM was one of the stations they `ever listen to’, The evidence of audience ‘reach’ for those stations covering an area with a generic mix of programmes and catering for a range of tastes was significant though not as strong. Angel Radio Havant aims to serve people over the age of 50 in the region and within the target sample and the research found: Spontaneous awareness of Angel Radio was good: 19 per cent of the total sample were spontaneously aware of the station, while another 31 per cent recalled Angel after prompting. Twenty-three per cent of the total sample indicated that Angel Radio was one of the stations they `ever listen to’; while 11 per cent stated that Angel Radio was the radio station `most listened to’. More recently, Wythenshawe FM located in an area of high socio economic disadvantage commissioned market research which estimated that 23 per cent of local people in the broadcasting area of the station were regular listeners. Based on a total population in Wythenshawe, Northenden and Brooklands of 121,000 this is a significant reach and the station estimates that, with additional listeners on the web, it has a regular audience of 37,000 listeners. Specialist programmes, such as their Northern Soul night, receive 3,000 hits a show. They have tracked where the audience come from based on emails and THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS enquiries and have established it is a ‘semi diasporic’ Wythenshawe community who reconnect to this popular on a Tuesday night. Resonance FM estimates that it has 50,000 regular listeners and a similar number of listeners on the web and New Style 98.7 FM FM estimates an a regular audience of 80,000. CMA records the hits to each station on its webstreaming facility. Although the figures fluctuate depending on the programming, the more established stations such as Resonance FM, Voice of Africa and AllFM can have in the region of 1,000 listeners a day with most other stations achieving around 100 - 200. During an RSL, online listenership can increase up to ten fold and as licensed stations begin to broadcast on air, the number of on line listeners also increases the listenership on the web also increases. Areas of high socio economic disadvantage. Many stations are located in areas of high socio economic disadvantage and work almost exclusively with residents of such communities. Wythenswhawe FM on the Wythenshawe estate, one of the largest post war estates in the country; Sound FM located in Hackney, East London; Life FM in North West London; Desi Radio in Southall; and AllFM in Manchester are five prominent and successful examples. Volunteer pathways Giving a platform for young talent Donna has had to face a lot of challenges in her young life, but she knew she wanted to be a poet. She got involved with Vera Media and Leeds 11fm a year ago when she was looking for ways to get her poetry heard. She initially contributed to a radio programme about writing in the community and was recorded reading some of her poems. Over the year, she kept in touch with Vera Media and subsequently found out about the ‘Introduction to Radio’ course. At first she was interested in gaining radio skills to assist her creatively and develop her poetry, but found that the course helped her gain new skills and find new sources of inspiration and interest. Donna has seen many benefits from taking part: I feel as though I am a lot more confident now that I’m with Vera Media and also a lot more observant to what’s going on around me […] because I’m noticing things more, I think this will also help inspire me writing my poetry. She’s also learnt many technical skills – writing scripts, learning about digital editing, using the recording studio, and using different interviewing techniques: When I did vox-pops a month ago, I was really nervous and felt as though I didn’t want to do it. But now, after a month, I feel lots and lots more confident and am actually going out on my own and interviewing people on the street and also professionals. Donna is currently not working and is not involved in any other educational or training programmes. Yet she feels that through her involvement with Vera Media she has gained 47 THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS 48 “I would never have thought I’d be at the stage of having written and produced a programme on my own.” DONNA a sense of direction about her future. She would like to pursue volunteering with Leeds 11fm and either progress onto a journalism or broadcasting course at college or paid employment. It has also increased her determination to get her poetry published. I’ve really, really had a lot of fun. The people I’ve been working with and learning with have been great too. It’s really been a massive learning curve and I would never have thought I’d be at the stage of having written and produced a programme on my own and to have it broadcast live on the radio will be amazing. Black and minority ethnic communities Many stations serve Black and minority ethnic communities as their core business. For example, New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham, Desi Radio in London and Radio Iklhas in Derby successfully reach and engage with specific target audiences from BME communities. Other stations such as Bradford Community Broadcasting and Sound Radio broadcast eclectic programmes in twenty or more languages during the week. Information about the arts and culture is integral to the programming. The work of these stations in reaching BME communities appears throughout this report. Linguistic diversity is strongly supported in some (generally urban) stations. Something like 35 per cent of Ipswich Community Radio’s output is made by individuals from ethnic minority backgrounds. A few stations are also working actively with migrant communities from Eastern Europe. Artistic and cultural content, ranging from music, interviews, news and coverage of events, features very strongly in programmes made by minority communities. These provide a vehicle for selfrepresentation and a means of expressing ideas about identity and community for groups that do not see artists from their own histories prominently represented by the ‘professional’ media. For example, Sheffield Live hosted an on-line event for Portuguese speakers with some connection to the city. A web-link connected participants in Sheffield, Portugal, Angola and Brazil for a live sharing of poetry, music and cultural exploration. Case study Talking Toxteth FM Exposing and celebrating different cultures is one of the major commitments of Talkin’ Toxteth FM. Talkin’ Toxteth FM began to work with the large Somali community in Liverpool in 2004 by committing two hours on each weekend day to Somali Beat cultural music. This became so popular that Talkin’ Toxteth FM decided to dedicate some of the regular daily programming, such as news, public information and community items, to Somali cultural activities which Somalispeaking presenters translated for the community. Alex Bennett, Manager of the station, describes its development: “The response to our new programming was hugely positive. The Somali community articulated the fact that, for the first time, they felt a visible part of mainstream culture in the area.” In the light of this success, Talkin’ Toxteth FM’s programming grew from occasional dailyslots to a dedicated hour of Somali Base music which reflected the community’s contemporary youth culture. Before long, significant cultural activities such as the summer Arab festival were linked closely to the radio station, which played an THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS “People think community radio is just about local people putting on records. It is so much more – it can be all kinds of things.” MICHAEL FRYER important role in either hosting or promoting them. Talkin’ Toxteth FM feels that the cross-overs now amongst young people are enormous and that mainstream programming needs to find new ways of reflecting this: “Our musicians and DJs will be playing western tunes with Somali backing tracks. It’s crazy but they understand it and it works. It’s really popular,” says Alex Bennett. During Black History Month, Talkin’ Toxteth FM has provided opportunities for a specific broadcast for Ramadan. As certain categories of secular music are not permitted during the festival, Talkin’ Toxteth FM takes its lead from the community and covers classical Islamic styles instead. Rural communities Forest of Dean Community Radio’s First Screen Project brings new films in to the local cinema twice a month but, as more world cinema is getting general release, so it is increasingly difficult to sustain the project through the box office in competition with bigger cinemas. The project has built up a loyal audience (up to 300 for some films), providing an excellent advocacy route and a steady stream of volunteers for the radio station. The mix is a social one: the film is always preceded by a talk and conversational exchange, integrated with a social element to help people feel they can stay and discuss arts issues (amongst others) afterwards. Because the funding of this initiative is becoming harder to sustain, the station is now discussing the possibility of running a touring digital cinema in village halls, an idea which has been met with huge enthusiasm by a wide potential audience of people who are currently unable to receive the Forest of Dean signal or travel to film theatres across their region (the nearest one being up to 25 miles away for some villages). Volunteer pathways From Dickens to station manager It’s provided me with the key to unlock the door of an exciting new world. This is how Michael Fryer of Bishop FM describes his involvement with community radio. Michael took his first step into the radio world only a few years ago so that he could ‘learn the lingo’ to help him talk ‘knowledgeably’ to his son who was doing a degree in Media Studies at Sheffield Hallam University. A freelance book trader, he never dreamt it would take him into a new career at a time when, as he put it, ‘most people are retiring’. Michael and his wife signed up for a 10 week training course at Radio Teesdale in September 2003 and got hooked. They then worked as volunteers on two RSLs at the station in 2004 and made a couple of documentaries, ‘though we didn’t know that’s what they were at the time!’ One of these, ‘Dickens in Teesdale’ built on a successful community festival that the two had been involved in some years before, investigating Dickens’ trip north to research the infamous Yorkshire boarding schools – the inspiration for Dotheboyes Hall in Nicholas Nickleby. So when Michael got involved in community radio it seemed a good local-interest story to follow up. Edwin Shaw, great great-grandson of Willian Shaw, who had been the model for Wackford Squeers, was by then Life president of Yorkshire Dickens Readers Society. The programme caught the eye of the evaluator from Sunderland university who described it as a ‘programme of note’, but Michael describes how the experience was his first entry into programme making: 49 THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS We were so green we couldn’t get the equipment to work and we thought it was our fault, but it turned out to be a fault on the microphone Leaving school at fifteen Michael has now achieved an MA from the University of Sunderland in Radio Production and Management. A feasibility study which was part of his MA has become a reality with the setting up of Bishop FM – a station to serve Weardale, one of the most economically disadvantaged rural areas in the country. Michael is keen that the radio station should be a place for local people to express their creativity and also to fill a gap in broadcasting for children: People think community radio is just about local people putting on records. It’s so much more – it can be all kinds of things. Young people Many stations make space for young people to broadcast. Takeover Radio in Leicester, specialises solely in giving young people aged 8 - 16 a voice. Other stations report that commercial and BBC stations are highly selective of the material prepared by children and young people, editing and rejecting material with the priority of producing a highly polished product. Whilst community radio also aspires to high quality broadcasting its editorial decisions tend to be more influenced by inclusivity, allowing children and young people to have a voice and express their views authentically without a high level of editorial mediation. Forest of Dean Community Radio was approached to become a lead partner with a school in Creative Partnerships Forest of Dean.13 50 Anita Holford, Communications Consultant with Creative Partnerships Forest of Dean, is clear about the organisation’s goal: “Creative Partnerships has complex messages to get across about raising the aspirations and achievements of young people, and we feel it’s important that young people’s views are heard first and foremost rather than being represented by us”. In the spring of 2006 Creative Partnerships approached Lakers School, at Coleford in Gloucestershire, to find a way of giving young people a voice. Rebecca Hooper, a teacher at Lakers, was well aware of the challenges: “One of the keys to being successful is having that confidence to be articulate even if what you’re saying isn’t all that well developed yet!” Case study Forest of Dean Cmmunity radio and voice of young people Forest of Dean Community Radio was well placed to provide a platform that would give young people direct contact with the outside world and enable them to see the immediate impact of their work in a real-life context. The station’s Director, Roger Drury, took Year 9 pupils through a range of exercises to encourage them to engage in critical thinking and express their feelings about creativity and learning. This was followed by a Question Time session in the afternoon at which young people were able to exercise their new-found confidence and articulate their ideas about learning and culture. Both sessions were broadcast to the local community and the training sessions prepared pupils for leading presentations and discussions at an official Question Time event in the Forest THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS of Dean District Council offices, following which the young people were invited to present the project at a large-scale conference in Edinburgh. As Rebecca Hooper points out: “Forest of Dean Community Radio has exposed young people’s thinking on a broader local platform. It makes a difference that people will listen to them, that it’s not just teachers paying lip service, and has given all of us a strong voice and an excellent evaluation tool.” The partnership between the school and the radio station is a mutually beneficial relationship: the Lakers students develop skills as future radio producers/writers/presenters and provide ongoing content for the radio station, whilst simultaneously benefiting from an exciting, accessible experience which fulfils the literacy and communications requirements of the English curriculum. The overall goal of building a wholeschool culture of well-rounded, expressive and confident young people has been greatly assisted by Lakers’ relationship with the radio station. Anita Holford is fully convinced of the unique nature of this approach: There’s really no other organisation that combines the media with the community focus to it. The only other option would have been to approach BBC Radio Gloucestershire who have a much narrower remit. We wouldn’t have had the same outcomes. Forest of Dean Community Radio has been critical. We hope the programme will be extended beyond Coleford, so that even more young people and teachers will have increased understanding of the relevance of community media. 51 Young and old – intergenerational arts Many stations can offer examples of crossgenerational relationships emerging as a routine aspect of programmes that focus on reminiscence and music. (Descriptions of some of these have been cited earlier in the report in the sections dealing with each art form.) In addition, collaboration that builds on the strengths and experiences of different generations is a natural part of the life of many stations. So, for example, younger participants at the station will sometimes give technical support to older station users who may be initially more reluctant to use the technology. The older volunteers in turn can often provide a sense of social stability and continuity. Much of this contributes to developing an atmosphere of cohesion and trust. In the case of one station, this was worked into an inter-generational creative project. As part of a heritage project, Wythenshawe FM in Manchester worked with pensioners in the neighbourhood to record their recollections of World War II. The materials were developed into a play, an exhibition and the radio programmes already profiled in a previous case study in section 4.2. Case study Wythenshaw: intergenerational arts When a teacher from a local High School (Newall Green, which has performing arts specialist status) approached the station with an idea for a reminiscence project about World War II, they found that a wealth of material had already been collected, including an exhibition and 45 hours of audio memories. Through working with older volunteers, the station had become aware of their huge fear of young people and saw this as an opportunity for old and young from the local THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS community to work together. Wythenshawe FM offered to share its own existing documentation about World War II, so that the project funding could instead be used to develop an intergenerational radio show. Before launching into the process, the station worked both with students and pensioners to help them understand each others’ experiences and see life through each others’ eyes. Drama techniques and images were used as a stimulus and participants were encouraged to talk honestly about their fears and prejudices about each other. The young people and pensioners were then paired up to create a two-hour radio show. They wrote poetry, stories and reminiscences together and talked about what they had learned about each other. Although the young people were allowed to play any music they liked, they chose to play 1940s music throughout the broadcast. The project took place in 2005 and many of the young people and pensioners are still in contact with each other. 52 Insight’s arts coverage is particularly strong in terms of audio books, film and television, offering reviews, discussion and interviews. The station is also strong in the area of news and current affairs, providing analysis and discussion of issues as they are perceived by the blind and partially sighted community as well as relaying and summarising wider media coverage, particularly from magazines and print outlets. The station has a working partnership with BBC Radio Scotland and has produced reports and programme segments that have been re-broadcast on BBC Radio. Many stations profile work by and for people with disabilities, often drama based. AllFM produces the ‘Access All Areas’ show, which features plays by disabled people under the banner of ‘Enabling Theatre’. ‘Celebrity Pig’, a company of learning disabled actors from South Manchester, has broadcast on Wythenshawe FM and Stockport’s Pure Radio’s drama, ‘Brush Strokes’, also enables participants to express issues relating to their disabilities. Bradford Community Broadcasting produced a successful play about Asperger’s Syndrome with the local theatre group. Mental Health Disability Insight Radio in Glasgow is Europe’s first radio station devoted to the blind and partially sighted community. Funded by the RNIB and the local authorities of South Lanarkshire and Glasgow, it broadcasts daily to the Clyde Valley region between 8am and 5pm. The station is developing the mechanism to stream its broadcasts and offer ‘ondemand’ programming via the world wide web. Staffed almost entirely by blind and partially sighted people, Insight won a Silver Sony Radio Award in May 2007, in the ‘new internet programmes’ category, for its programme/podcast ‘The Insight Show’. Although not a part of our specific research brief, in the course of our field visits we found a number of examples of stations successfully offering work experience, training and volunteering opportunities to individuals with mental health problems although we did not identify any that specifically related to the arts. Stations do not currently have the capacity to offer intensive support and a close collaboration with the mental health services within the community would be required to make this aspect of community radio work sustainable. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS 6.2 Community Radio: a vehicle for promoting the arts Many stations feature regular coverage of local arts events and exhibitions in the form of calendars, reviews, information about upcoming concerts, and, more rarely, live relays or recordings of events. Presenters often themselves belong to wider groups of local people active in the arts and do not necessarily draw a clear line between ‘amateur’ and ‘professional’: the relationship between paid and unpaid workers in the arts might be best seen as a continuum, with community radio stations forming one of the crucial meeting points.14 Arguably many stations form ‘hubs’ for local cultural activity, enabling connections, networking and communication with actual and potential audiences for a wide variety of arts events. In a sense, all of the sector’s work could be described as ‘audience development’ because it develops opportunities for people to take part in cultural production. In this sense its mission aligns closely with Arts Council England’s ‘Ambitions for the arts’ and the policy focus on enabling more people to participate in arts activities. It is becoming a key part of the informal cultural economy, upon which the more formal and generally better ‘mapped’ (and considerably better resourced) media and creative industries find themselves increasingly reliant for authority, credibility and long-term survival. Collecting reliable figures for numbers of listeners to community radio stations is difficult, because none of the stations can afford to include their output in RAJAR’s survey of radio audiences. Stations can gauge the popularity of their output through other means, for example the scale of audience response to phone-ins, competitions and debates and discussions online and offline. The Community Media Association estimates that over 1,000 people currently regularly volunteer across the sector as a whole. 53 It also produces statistics for the stations that log how many people access the streaming audio service from their servers. Some stations make effective use of their websites to promote dialogue and engagement with their audiences. Around 25 per cent of stations have active online discussion forums. More than 60 per cent of those that we surveyed published their schedules online, together with information about programmemakers and programme content (although the picture is changing all the time, as more stations come on air). Some stations also provide links to weblogs and other sites made by programme-makers, which has the effect of building networks and encouraging interactivity – Resonance FM’s site shows a particularly effective use of this. Many stations also keep e-mail subscriber lists and this can be a way of judging the size of the audience. For example, Resonance FM has an e-mail list of over 40,000 subscribers and it makes use of this list for fundraising and also to promote arts events and concerts that it thinks will be of interest to its audience. This suggests that there is wider potential for arts organisations to develop marketing partnerships with community radio. 6.3 Audience Development – Partnerships Through the Community Media Association, New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham is working in the context of the CMA’s Memorandum of Understanding with the BBC English Regions,15 which provides a framework for collaboration between the community radio sector and BBC local radio, including a useful set of guidelines for working together and a commitment to communication through regular regional meetings and dissemination of ‘best practice’ in a ‘spirit of co-operation’. From February 2007, it has been the first station in the country to make programmes that are broadcast THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS 54 There may be innacurate assumptions that because community radio is located in the voluntary sector it produces programming of low quality. As a result stations may face difficulties in gaining respect and visability from professional funders. three times per month from the BBC and once from its own premises. Editorial production is shared with the BBC, which New Style Radio 98.7 FM interprets as an endorsement of the quality and diversity of the station’s work. As Martin Blissett of New Style Radio 98.7 FM explains: “The BBC has listened to what we do and it’s a lot less stuffy than what the BBC does, as well as hugely appealing for their target audience, but it’s really hard for the BBC to reproduce, so it’s great that our work has now been recognised.” In fact, New Style Radio 98.7 FM is one of the best connected of all community radio stations. This is partly because it has a remit that goes well beyond broadcasting. The station was founded by the AfroCaribbean Millennium Centre, a community organisation that secured resources (including an investment from ACE) to build its own research unit, business incubation unit, social welfare and advice service, cyber café, community hall and gallery space. These projects are seen as complementary because they are all serving the needs of the same target groups. In seeking to make the station sustainable, Martin Blissett has been open to partnerships that combine business enterprise with social and creative activities. New Style Radio 98.7 FM has developed a valuable strategic role in the community by its willingness to plant seeds which have sometimes acted as ‘loss-leaders’ but have often grown into flourishing relationships. In the words of Martin Blissett: Once you reach a certain level, then it becomes a lot easier with the track record and confidence that you take with you. The connections all feed each other. However, it is resource heavy – people never come out to you, you have to actually go out and make the time to make the connections. Many volunteers in community radio stations are artists who have relationships with cultural organisations. In this sense the stations can be seen as hubs and connectors within the wider cultural landscape, offering numerous opportunities for informal mentoring, training and networking to take place – what might be described as ‘stealth mentoring’ as opposed to formal mentoring. There is no shortage of evidence of creative, imaginative and worthwhile partnerships between community radio stations and arts organisations. However, station managers often reported how difficult it is to sustain and build on these partnerships beyond a one-off successful collaboration. Few stations had links with Arts Council or local authority arts officers (although there was growing evidence that arts officers and regeneration teams in localised areas were beginning to recognise the potential of community radio). The pressure on the station manager to manage a network of volunteers, make funding applications and organise and contribute to the station programming is considerable and is a challenge faced by all small and not for profit/voluntary sector organisations. There may be inaccurate assumptions that because community radio is located in the voluntary sector it produces programming of low quality. As a result, stations may face difficulties in gaining respect and visibility from professional funders. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS Case study Voice of Africa Connecting communities through Newham Music Month Every September, the London Borough of Newham supports ‘Newham Music Month’, which showcases the diverse and eclectic range of music taking place across the borough, from schools to pubs and clubs, large venues to small-scale, intimate spaces. As part of the 2006 Newham Music Month, Voice of Africa Radio and the music development agency Urban Development (an Arts Council England Regularly Funded Organisation) teamed up to present a concert featuring artists from West Africa at Stratford Circus, Newham's live arts venue, billed as 'Voice of Africa Radio Live!’. Acts that performed included Franck Akyl, Amy Koko, Simba, Rita K, and DJ Abass. The concert almost sold out and was an enormous success. Quinton Scott from Urban Development comments: …the relationship with Voice of Africa Radio allowed us to reach audiences directly which we would have had trouble in reaching any other way. From the point of view of the venue, which wants to make sure that everyone in East London gets access to it and comes to events, working with community radio enables us to connect with audiences and develop joint activities which are mutually beneficial. Urban Development concentrates on Black-led musics and there is probably more knowledge and expertise in organisations like Voice of Africa than anywhere else about what audiences from the West African community, particularly Nigeria, are likely to be interested in and engaged with. 55 Quinton explains how working with Voice of Africa enabled Urban Development to market the concert through community events, churches, African restaurants and even football matches: Ghana versus Nigeria at Twickenham was a huge event for London's West African community and with the help of Voice of Africa we distributed fliers there for the gig which also marketed the station. Working together gives us an opportunity to jointly build our profile. It's a relationship that is important to us and which we're continuing to develop. Such innovative co-productions support both venues and audiences. 6.4 Learning and Training in and through the arts All the stations we surveyed described their crucial role in sharing skills and working with volunteers. Several stations have sophisticated induction and training programmes, offering vocational qualifications in radio production and media or modules at different levels accredited by the Open College Network. Other stations prefer to keep their training frameworks informal and responsive. As Lol Gellor of Sound Radio puts it, “To some extent the whole station is predicated on the notion that we are doing training, although this isn’t particularly formalised or accredited”. But whatever the preferred approach, skills development and training are at the heart of the work of the community radio sector. Although some volunteers are highly educated and in employment, those participants who are unemployed or have few qualifications are given a vital stepping stone into further development, both artistic and administrative. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS Volunteer pathways From school project to creative industries degree Paddy, a 20 year-old now studying on the Foundation Degree in Film and TV Production at Leeds Metropolitan University, first came across Headstogether, an established multi media participatory arts company (and Arts Council RFO) at John Smeaton High School in East Leeds 6 years ago. Paddy describes himself as being ‘quite academic’ at school but it was involvement with a community arts event whilst still at school that first got him interested in film. I got the chance to go to a conference at Elland Road. There were people from the area talking in small groups. Me and a couple of my mates filmed the whole thing. So when Headstogether started running a radio station in the area around the school I helped out. I’ve worked for the station for the past six years first as a volunteer, but for the past two years I’ve been paid as a freelancer to be the station manager. I’ve learnt so much. It’s been fantastically enjoyable. Headstogether isn’t like any other company I’ve worked with – there’s no top down system, everybody works together it’s entirely collaborative. Last year we broadcast from three different places – Rounday High School Elland Road and Lincoln Green – an estate near the centre of Leeds. One programme we made was with a guy who was a recovering alcoholic. He couldn’t stick with anything, but he played the guitar, wrote music and poetry and he managed to make five hour-long programmes. It was brilliant. I helped him sort out the guests and the running order. Everyone at the 56 company is trained in some way – art and design, film, photography, music. I’ve got a lot of experience from those people. Paddy feels that the intensity of the RSL programme helped him to make the transition from a small groups at school (there were only two other students in his group when he was studying for the BTEC national diploma in Moving Image at school) to the larger context of the university: There are nearly 50 people involved in the radio broadcast at any one time so for me it bridged the gap between school and university where there are nearly 80 people on my course. Some stations do have firm relationships with formal educational provision, notably Canterbury Student Radio and Down FM in County Down, both of which have their studio facilities based in formal educational settings on university or college campuses. In the arts these relationships are largely emergent and not yet clearly articulated by any of the stations that we interviewed. However, there are strong potential synergies with wider education and training agendas. This should be recognised by the Learning and Skills Councils and the Sector Skills Council for the Creative and Cultural Industries, in parallel with the CMA’s existing work with the Radio Forum set up by Skillset to examine the training needs of the radio sector as a whole. Some local Learning and Skills Councils have supported short-term projects based in community radio that explore lifelong learning and routes into the creative industries. As mentioned earlier, New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham is a partner in the distributed model of a networked ‘Creative College’ THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS Voluntary/amateur teams can still hold their own against the professionals. Community radio should punch above its weight and be recognised for it. being developed there. Desi Radio has obtained short-term project funding to work with the charity Women in Radio on the development of short courses and training sessions in writing and presenting for local women from the Punjabi community. The induction courses at Wythenshawe FM are delivered through Manchester College of Arts and Technology by college tutors on site at the community radio station. The Sector Skills Councils, Skillset and Creative and Cultural Skills are charged with the task of increasing representation in the creative industries workforce for those from minority backgrounds and developing a wider skills strategy around apprenticeships, vocational learning and workforce development. Although the community radio sector can undoubtedly support this process, its contribution needs to be factored in on the basis of its capacity and willingness to work on this agenda. Stations with close connections to educational institutions have strong potential to engage with this work, and access to educational funding may open up more routes to sustainability for the sector. But such relationships may also create tensions between the informal ethos of participatory work and the accountability and reporting requirements of undertaking accredited training programmes. Some stations (notably Bradford Community Broadcasting and New Style Radio 98.7 FM) have shown that they can manage these tensions effectively. Some sections of the community radio sector are developing a distinct strand of work in relation to creative education, through collaborations with agencies such as Creative Partnerships. There is also the potential for the sector to contribute to the delivery of the new Creative and Media Diplomas for 14 to 19 year-olds. However, the balance between the independence, informality and voluntary nature of the sector and its relationship with statutory provision and large state institutions needs to be carefully considered, so that the independence and the vibrancy of the sector can be safeguarded. Martin Blissett of New Style Radio 98.7 FM in Birmingham is clear about what volunteers and community radio stations can offer each other: The media have the sort of appeal that few other areas have, so this is a good place to be for young people attracted by the ‘glamour’ potential of getting involved. It gives them a voice. Our volunteers see themselves as not only having a voice, but also making an input to their communities. It’s quite an outlet for them to share their passion with thousands of others – to make a contribution, that’s the main benefit. Skills development gives people a good chance to improve their job prospects and get promotion, because they are involved in some recognised community activity. People hear you everywhere, so it gives presenters an extra profile that other stations can’t offer. Working in the media is still seen as glamorous and it gives you kudos – plus it does a lot for people’s confidence. We don’t worry about losing people because there are always lots of replacements and we see it as part of our role. It’s something significant if someone gets a promotion as a result of doing radio with us. We don’t deliberately track our volunteers’ career paths, but because we are disproportionately successful we tend to know where they go. Probably more than 20 people have gone on to mainstream each year. We have also got people coming in on placement from the universities. We have good relations with the University of Central England through joint courses and bring students in to do training with us, just as in the BBC. Voluntary/amateur teams can still hold their own against the professionals. Community radio should punch above its weight and be recognised for it. 57 THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS At Forest of Dean Community Radio, training programmes are a particularly vital aspect of its relationship with the community. Its training ranges from a two-hour fast-track ‘Get On Air’ course on interview, microphone, programme and scripting techniques, designed to enable participants to record a short message about their group, right through to longer courses covering the ethos and detailed operation of the station. The latter encompasses a range of tasks: learning how to use the studio and recording equipment; preparing a programme; scriptwriting and the research and design of content; running orders and the computerised scheduling system. In short, it teaches people everything they need to know about making a programme. The station also provides training in the community on how to make an outside broadcast, using technology that can be plugged into any phone line. This allows coverage of such key activities as local elections, enabling on-the-spot interviews with councillors and up-to-date reporting of polling figures. Activity of this kind depends on volunteers, so training is often run on demand for specific projects or areas of work. Forest of Dean Community Radio runs regular programmes of more formal training, often sparked by the needs of a particular project but then opened up to all volunteers. The challenge here lies in accommodating participants’ individual needs, for example their travel and work requirements. This does sometimes mean that people cannot take up the training on offer. Some stations make intensive use of established artists in training, mentoring and forms of informal apprenticeship. Alex Bennett of Talkin’ Toxteth FM comments: The resources we need for training and workforce development will be the facilities to get people like Maurice Bestman (Brookside) or Levi Tafari 58 (Performance Poet) or Patrick Grady to run master classes on how to write poetry or how to script. Talkin’ Toxteth FM would be very keen to do this, but we desperately need funding for pre-production facilities to cater for all styles and genres of arts. With this sort of equipment, we could run master classes for artists on writing poetry, scripting, making music etc. Some innovative partnership approaches to addressing the issue of sustainability and training are beginning to emerge. In London, City University’s School of Arts has recently launched a new foundation degree in the Creative Industries (community radio and television), which will be partly based at the Roundhouse Studios in Camden and will offer part- and full-time accredited routes into professional work in community radio. Canterbury Student Radio is fortunate enough to share resources with the media department at Canterbury Christ Church College, and other stations, notably Siren FM in Lincoln, have strong links with university departments. These collaborations with Higher Education may well help to embed training for the sector in sustainable funding structures, and enable clusters and synergies to be developed that will lead to greater profile-building and collaboration between participants, education and training organisations and the creative and cultural industries. Notes 13. Creative Partnerships is a government-funded national initiative, which aims to unlock schoolchildren's potential, ambition, creativity and imagination through partnerships between schools and cultural organisations. 14. The role of ‘cultural intermediaries’ in enabling pathways and progression into paid work and employment in the cultural industries has been extensively explored elsewhere. Community media is part of the informal cultural economy which sustains opportunities for artistic production and, directly and indirectly, THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO COMMUNITY RADIO AND THE CHALLENGE OF REACHING WIDER AUDIENCES IN THE ARTS generates wider economic and employment opportunities for its participants. See, for example, “Strengthening local musical cultures in the ‘global city’” by Andrew Blake and Graham Jeffery (Rising East; The journal of East London Studies Vol 4 No 3, 2001) and “Public and Private in the cultural industries” by Justin O’Connor (http://www.teichenberg.at/essentials/O_Connor2.pdf) 15. The MoU includes some examples of ‘best practice’ in collaboration between the BBC and the community radio sector grouped into the categories of on-air, off-air, online and outreach activity. Several community radio stations are benefiting from training, including paid work experience placements for their volunteers in BBC local stations, with a few also beginning to cocommission and co-produce content. The guidelines for planning collaborations include advice on planning, sharing information, feedback, monitoring and evaluation, which would equally well be applied to collaborations between community radio and arts organisations. 59 7 CONCLUSIONS THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CONCLUSIONS 61 Community radio enables people to tell their own stories in their own way, through their own artforms, and hands practical ownership of broadcast content back to individual citizens. 7.1 Policy issues Community radio sits between the worlds of the broadcast industries, the arts and cultural industries and the voluntary sector. The broadcast industries, both public and commercial, tend to work on a large scale with a view to maximising audiences, an approach that does not necessarily reflect the values and ethos underpinning community radio. The notfor-profit, community oriented approach of many arts organisations appears to offer a closer fit with the aims and function of community radio. But radio is not widely recognised as a core area of arts practice within the arts and cultural sector, being more usually regarded as a vehicle for publicity, marketing or information sharing. Before the advent of community radio, ‘getting on the radio’ was a privilege reserved for artists and arts organisations perceived largely as having already ‘made it’. Community radio opens up the airwaves to a much greater diversity of voices and offers a space for more participatory and inclusive arts practices to be shared. Furthermore, although the work undertaken by community radio aligns closely with current policy in tackling social exclusion and regenerating communities, locally and nationally, neither those responsible for specialist arts funding nor those funding initiatives in social policy regard it as a mainstream delivery agent. With the exception of Resonance FM and New Style Radio 98.7 FM (both of which receive core Arts Council funding as Regularly Funded Organisations), community radio has not yet built long-term relationships with Arts Council England and established itself as a viable vehicle for arts practice, even though several stations act, in the words of Roger Drury, as ‘virtual arts centres’. The independence, autonomy and human scale of community radio – run by, with and for communities – provide credibility and authenticity in engaging with people. The stations act as anchor-points in the informal cultural economy, providing inclusive routes into and out of more formal cultural activity. It is currently difficult for community radio to attract strategic recognition, infrastructure support or longterm resources for its work. If stations attract funding at all, it is only occasionally for one-off projects. This situation exerts demand and pressure on a resource base which is disproportionately small in relation to its potential for growth, and the contribution that community radio could make, in part through the arts, to developing more creative and engaged communities. Local authorities’ understanding of and commitment to community radio is similarly patchy, with some examples of productive relationships being developed between community radio organisations and arts and cultural services teams in local authorities. These should be further encouraged. 7.2 Role of community radio within the arts sector Community radio itself is developing as a form of arts practice, drawing on approaches pioneered in the 1970s and 1980s in community arts and media that promote participation, dialogue, critical awareness and representation of marginalised voices. Nearly all stations have a commitment to representing arts and cultural activity within their daily programming as opposed to designating ‘the arts’ as a separate area of broadcast. Community radio enables people to tell their own stories in their own ways, through their own art forms, and hands practical ownership of broadcast content back to individual citizens. Given the rapid pace of change and the rapid rise of participatory forms of cultural production through the growth of ‘Web2.0’, it is important that both the arts and community radio sectors consider how their roles will change over the next decade. The critical feature of both arts and community radio practices is that they bring people together in social networks and offer shared spaces for exploring and debating THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CONCLUSIONS what it means to be human in a fast-changing world. The enormous diversity of delivery models is a strong feature of community radio and indicates the potential of the sector to be seen both as an experimental laboratory for participatory arts and media production, and as a vehicle for providing information about local cultural services and events. As a medium for developing involvement and participation in arts-based activity it has strong potential. Indeed, its lack of commercial censorship and its affordability and accessibility for emerging musicians, artists and writers make it fertile ground for supporting innovation and experimentation within the arts. However, providing such a platform requires resources, and most stations would not consider it within their remit to fulfil a professional or experimental arts brief without significant additional support. Although the evidence is mainly anecdotal, since stations have no reliable means of collecting audience statistics, it appears that the stations most open to risk and cultural exploration also generate the largest number of core listeners and participants. For many stations, webstreaming, podcasting and digital satellite broadcasting extends their ‘reach’ to an even wider audience that may not be able to access such provision by any other means. Such delivery mechanisms are likely to become even more significant over the next five years. Community radio provides a low cost and accessible, artist- or citizen-led space for existing or new ideas to be tested and nurtured into something more finely honed. The radio environment is uniquely positioned to encourage participation in the arts. It exposes existing and new work in the arts to a growing local audience (which appears to be much wider than that of the average local or regional arts venue), thereby 62 making the wider listening public aware of what is available and possible within the cultural sector. Community radio is constantly building new audiences for the arts, because its very purpose is to represent a broad range of interests within a specific geographic community. Community radio is a valuable connector and catalyst, which has the potential to enable audiences, artists, venues, communities, places and people from the most remote walks of life to enter into dialogue. 7.3 Art form development Community radio provides a popular space to explore new forms of artistic and cultural expression, especially in music, enabling access to and better understanding of youth cultures, minority cultures, and new hybrid and interdisciplinary cultures. Long term investment from Arts Council England, local authorities and government strategies to support community development would enable this aspect of community radio’s work to develop further and to play a greater role in the development of locally based arts infrastructure. The BBC and other commercial broadcasters should be encouraged to consider how they can support the development of community radio and develop mechanisms for co-commissioning arts based content. The Memorandum of Understanding between the BBC and CMA is leading to useful collaborations in a number of areas. Packaging together some of the ‘highlights’ of arts-based programming in community radio and offering them for syndication or re-broadcast on other networks could be a major development in terms of diversifying the business and revenue models for stations. Some stations, particularly those involved in the earlier Access Radio pilots, are beginning to explore new models of commissioning and producing programme content, THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CONCLUSIONS Festivals provide an ideal environment for promoting community participation and exposing new artistic talent. By broadcasting coverage of local cultural events, community radio stations build strategic links with communities, increase their own visibility and develop their skills in presentation, production and technology. But there are immense logistical challenges entailed in reconciling the demands of outside broadcasting with the requirements of their licence conditions as a daily broadcaster. Suitable provision for archiving and repositories (particularly for rare or commercially unavailable artistic recordings and oral histories) needs to be well managed and supported. Models of good practice do exist, for example: New Style Radio 98.7 FM's relationship with Birmingham Library Service, whereby the library supports the station in maintaining a specialist archive, accessible to the public, of Black music and Black cultural heritage; Radio Reverb’s partnership with the Mass Observation project at Sussex University; and Desi Radio’s unique digitized archive of Punjabi musics from the last 50 years. There is an opportunity to be grasped in exploring how Libraries and Archives Services might offer electronic audio as well as text-based Content Management Systems. These are extremely costly for smaller organisations to set up and maintain. It is more cost effective to utilise the systems and IT expertise of a larger host, such as a university or local authority library. A networked approach to archiving material could also enable manageable possibilities for syndicating and sharing programme content. New talent and workforce development in the arts sector – ‘a nursery slope for talent’ Community radio is a space for learning, a space where people acquire skills and in many cases, expertise. It is a place for experimentation and innovation as well as cultural expression, because its 63 premise is fundamentally about promoting participation and involvement. The only limits to this are the capacity of each station to manage its relationships with volunteers and the availability of time and resources for training, development and production. One of its greatest needs is to consolidate the infrastructure around training and workforce development, which is currently variable in both range and quality of provision. Greater investment is needed in the development of skills for arts specialists, e.g. writing, performance, production and technical skills for radio drama. Community radio should be recognised by Arts Council England as part of the overall infrastructure for arts development in the regions, as many stations are working on the front line of artist development. As Lol Gellor from Sound Radio puts it, they are “a nursery slope for talent”. One of the obstacles experienced by volunteers in taking the next step towards formalising (or professionalising) their training and therefore participating more directly in the arts sector is the lack of understanding of ‘routes to market’, i.e. pathways into the arts and media sectors and journeys through these for further career development either in arts or related sectors. The absence of accredited training routes in community radio may make volunteering less attractive than, for example, college-based media courses. There are some good examples of accredited training across the country using modules from Open College Network and BTEC, and between the sector and higher and further education. One example of successful resource sharing and joint planning is the very close relationship which Canterbury Student Radio has with the BA (Hons) in Radio, Film and Television Studies at Canterbury Christ Church University. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CONCLUSIONS Successful models of training and development need to be given a higher profile, such as the partnerships developed between Sound Radio with professional theatre producers and writers, which have led to the production of three original dramas, and that station’s investment in journalism and reportage, which has led to participants gaining employment with BBC London; or New Style Radio 98.7 FM’s relationship with the University of Central England, Bourneville, Matthew Bolton and City Colleges in Birmingham, which has enabled participants to progress to making work for BBC Radio 4. These approaches serve to build a legacy of high quality skills, which can enable volunteers to gain paid work with local arts and media organisations. However, community radio also needs to be understood as a legitimate broadcast outlet in its own right, not simply as a ‘feeder’ for better resourced media and arts organisations. Mainstreaming and sustainability of arts programming In order for emerging and existing artists, actors, writers, technicians, and producers working in community radio to develop their experience, skills and talent, a number of measures need to be put in place. In addition to the training issues discussed above, community radio staff and volunteers need increased visibility for the powerful impact of their work on the arts, cultural and media sectors. There is a need for ongoing research and documentation in order to provide a substantial evidence-base in support of these claims. Strategic alliances need to be developed to persuade the arts sector to value their work, and effective business support needs to be put in place to enable community radio stations to run efficiently and become sustainable. Community radio stations often have to diversify their services in order to compete for the small number of 64 available funding streams and this can have an impact on the consistency of their arts output. More complex programming such as documentaries, research for features, experimental audio, radio drama or live relays of concerts and festivals – which many stations have the aspiration to produce – is resource intensive and also dependent on a consistent skills base. The most successful community radio stations appear to thrive because they are willing to broker relationships across several different partners in order to develop their provision indirectly through other avenues; they are able to balance the demands and agendas of different funders at the same time; and they generate additional income by means of smallscale commercial activities. They also depend on the voluntary labour, enthusiasm, goodwill and skills, of hundreds of participants, and managing their input is a complex task. Business models vary according to demographic context and are often dependent on one or two key individuals, who are able to allocate time and resources to business development within the overall role of station manager, producer, advocate, trainer, promoter and so on. The drain on resources for this approach to be successful is enormous, exhausting, and, in many cases, completely unsustainable. Nevertheless, good business and fundraising models need to be shared more widely to give the less established stations ideas, support and a greater chance of success. Some stations have begun regional and sub-regional dialogue with others. This is a welcome development and could lead to some significant advantages, e.g. sharing of expertise, practice and models of working in and through the arts, joint/strategic bids for funding, sharing of content, syndication of programmes, and a stronger voice for the sector locally. In addition, new approaches to resource development and sustainability might include THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO CONCLUSIONS co-production agreements and joint projects (e.g. Tate Modern and Resonance FM); commissions from BBC local radio (New Style Radio 98.7 FM’s model); securing outsourced contracts for arts provision (Forest of Dean Community Radio’s model); developing a commercial ‘wing’ in order to develop content and syndicate it, and producing CDs and other products for purchase (currently being explored by Resonance FM); operating the station within the context of a wider social enterprise, which develops commercial activities and broader income streams to subsidise training and development (e.g. New Style Radio 98.7 FM’s Cyber Café, Research Consultancy and business incubation spaces). For more established stations there are opportunities to grow as independent producers of cultural products that challenge the mass entertainment and for-profit ethos of established production companies, producing instead programming which is rooted in participation, and foregrounding voices that are rarely heard in the mainstream media, critically and intelligently engaging with Ofcom’s notion of a “Public Service Provider”. 65 RECOMMENDATIONS THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO RECOMMENDATIONS 67 RECOMMENDATIONS 1. So that community radio can realise its potential and achieve a powerful impact within the arts sector, we recommend that Arts Council England recognises the community radio sector as a delivery agent for innovation and participation in the arts and actively seeks to support the growth of the sector. 2. Arts Council England (ACE) and the Community Media Association (CMA) should work together to build networks, ensuring a mutual understanding of opportunities for, and benefits from, partnerships between the arts and community radio sectors. This should include public and private sector agencies such as venues and promoters, arts companies and development agencies and the umbrella bodies for the various art forms. 3. Arts Council England funded organisations and individuals should be encouraged to utilise community radio more readily as a sounding board, training arena and platform for the exposure of new talent and experimentation. Community radio producers should be encouraged to make stronger links with professional arts and cultural organisations (particularly those with a remit for audience development, education, young people or outreach) so that each can benefit from the other’s services, training, equipment and audiences. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO RECOMMENDATIONS 68 4. Further discussion should take place between DCMS, relevant government departments including the Departments for Children Schools and Families, Innovation Universities and Skills and Communities and Local Government as well as the Treasury to ensure greater recognition of the role that community radio is playing in achieving cultural, social, educational and environmental regeneration and participatory, active citizenship. 5. The sector skills councils – Skillset and Creative and Cultural Skills – should work with the CMA and Arts Council England to ensure that the community radio sector is represented in planning for training, workforce development and professional learning within the wider creative and cultural sector. 6. Investment in technological hardware, software and training for outside broadcast should be supported to enable community radio to fulfil its potential as a vehicle for mass exposure to arts and cultural activities, and a powerful development mechanism for new audiences. When arts venues and centres invest in broadband telecommunications infrastructure, they should build in consideration of the infrastructure needed for low cost broadcast and webcasting of their activities. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO RECOMMENDATIONS 7. 69 ACE and CMA should enter discussions with the National Sound Archive, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) to develop strategic frameworks for archiving and distributing culturally and historically significant content from community radio. Linkages with higher education research agendas should be actively encouraged and opportunities sought by stations to work with HE on knowledge transfer and joint research projects in order to build the knowledge base of the sector. 8. Skillset and Creative and Cultural Skills, working with the CMA, should map and publicise existing training opportunities in and through community radio. Training in community radio should include information about the arts, arts project management and engagement. 9. Schools and colleges involved in developing work in the new 14 to 19 Creative and Media Diploma, the Young People’s Arts Award and specialist arts colleges should be encouraged to engage with the community radio sector and consider how they can jointly resource education and arts projects and programmes. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO RECOMMENDATIONS 70 10. ACE and Creative and Cultural Skills, working with the CMA, should actively recruit leaders from the community radio sector to participate in the Cultural Leadership Programme in order to extend awareness and provide opportunities for professional learning and exchange between the arts sector and the community radio sector. 11. CMA should continue to promote network opportunities, to enable community radio to link strategically with other networks which can support training and development for emerging arts professionals in specific areas, such as Youth Music; Museums, Libraries and Archives; Business Links; Learning and Skills Councils; Media and Cultural Industry Quarters; Regional Cultural Consortia; and Local Authorities. ACE should work closely with CMA in this process. 12. Community radio practitioners have noted that it is hard to navigate the arts funding system. We therefore recommend that ACE ensures that there is a designated officer in each regional office who acts as a ‘first contact’ for community radio. ACE officers with responsibility for community radio should network nationally, with support from the CMA, to share their learning. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO RECOMMENDATIONS 71 13. DCMS and DBERRR should encourage local and regional agencies with responsibility for creative industries development, including the Business Links, to link more systematically with the community radio sector and ensure that local stations are aware of the business support services on offer for social enterprises and for individual artists and creative entrepreneurs. 14. CMA should organise a series of regional seminars which showcase excellence in arts-based programming and raise awareness of the work of community radio, supported by ACE’s regional offices. Invitees should include community radio stations, members of Regional Cultural Consortia, local authority arts and culture officers, officers from Creative Partnerships, key arts and media organisations, and agencies involved in arts development and creative industries business support, including HEIs, FE colleges and specialist arts and media colleges. 15. CMA should continue to share learning around good practice in arts project development and management, through its programme of seminars, conferences and events and online forums. 16. ACE and CMA should encourage the development of at least one exemplar pilot collaboration between Arts Council RFOs and community radio stations in each ACE region. These should be carefully selected, documented and evaluated. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO RECOMMENDATIONS 72 17. The CMA should develop a marketing, press and communications strategy to raise the profile of the sector, sharing success stories from this ‘quiet revolution’ taking place in the UK’s broadcast landscape. It should also explore models of syndication and networked distribution of content. 18. A further ‘scanning exercise’ should be commissioned by DCMS, ACE and CMA in late 2008 to update the knowledge base in relation to the arts and community radio. Parallel developments in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland should also be tracked. Further research should be undertaken which situates the development of the UK community radio sector in an international context, given the rapid globalisation and internationalisation of the media landscape. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO APPENDICES Community radio bibliography Printed works Websites Benkler, Y. (2006). The Wealth of Networks: how social production Arts Council (2006): Ambitions for the arts (accessed 01.05.07) transforms markets and freedom. London: Yale University Press Blake, A. and Jeffery, G. (2001). ‘Strengthening local musical cultures in the global city’, Rising East, the Journal of East London Studies, Vol 4 No 3 Cabinet Office/HM Treasury (2006). The Future Role of the Third Sector in Social and Economic Regeneration. London: HMSO Calhoun, C. (1998). ‘Community without propinquity revisited: www.artscouncil.org.uk CMA/BBC (2007): Memorandum of Understanding: Community Media Association and the BBC English Regions (accessed 01.05.07) www.commedia.org.uk/default/documents/user/CMA_BBC_ final_draft.pdf. communications technology and the transformation of the urban Community Radio Toolkit – produced by Radio Regen public sphere’, Sociological Inquiry, No 68 Vol 3, pp 272-397 www.communityradiotoolkit.com Community Media Association (2006). The Community Media Sector in Scotland: response to Scotland’s Draft Culture Bill. Sheffield: CMA Cox, C. and Warner, D. (2004). Audio Culture: readings in modern music. London: Continuum Department of Culture Media and Sport (2006). The Community Radio Sector: Looking to the Future Edmonds, N. and Buckley, S. (2005). Making it Work: Learning from successful Community Radio stations. Sheffield: Community Media Association Everitt, A. (1997). Joining In: an investigation into participatory music. London: Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Everitt, A. (2003a). New Voices: an evaluation of 15 Access Radio Projects. London: Radio Authority/Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Everitt, A. (2003b). New Voices: an update. London: Radio Authority/Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation Harris, K. (2006). Localism, Governance and the Public Realm: issues for the local cultural sector. London: Museums, Libraries and Archives Council HM Treasury and Cabinet Office (2006). The Future Role of the Third Sector in Social and Economic Regeneration – interim report. Ings, R and Cochrane, P. (2006). Making Radiowaves: internet radio and the creative school. Leeds: CapeUK Kahn, D. (1999). Noise, Water, Meat: a history of sound in the arts. Boston: MIT Press Leadbeater, C. and Miller, P. (2004). The Pro-am Revolution: how enthusiasts are changing our economy and society. London: Demos O’Connor, J, (2004). Public and Private in the Cultural Industries, available at http://www.teichenberg.at/essentials/O_Connor2.pdf., (accessed 01.05.07) Ofcom (2005). Radio: Preparing for the Future. Phase 2 – implementing the framework: a consultation. London: Ofcom Richards, R., Foster, F. and Kiedrowski, T. (eds) (2007). Communications: the next decade. London: Ofcom. Toop, D. (1995). Ocean of Sound: aether talk, ambient sound and imaginary worlds. New York: Serpents’ Tail Ofcom website – contains up to date details of all licensed radio stations www.ofcom.org.uk Community Radio stations. Useful directory of all licensed radio stations on air in the UK, together with web links www.radio-now.co.uk/main.htm 73 THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO APPENDICES 74 Appendix 1 Methodology The research processes sought to gather and analyse detailed quantitative and qualitative data. The research team worked closely with the advisory group to identify the sample group and to agree the final methodology. The research process and data gathering The process involved desk research, a questionnaire supplemented by telephone interviews, in depth telephone interviews and face to face interviews with a selected sample of Programming diary and sample programmes As a result of consultation with the commissioning team it was agreed to devise a programming diary to enable stations to report the amount and nature of their arts programming using the typology which had been developed. This was issued to stations with the request that they complete it for the four days in December 2007 specifying total broadcasting time and with a brief description of content. radio stations as well as a log which requested stations to submit As well as the diaries, stations were asked to provide examples of data on their programming content over a four day period in arts programming from the days identified. Sample programmes December 2006. were received from four stations. Development of typology In the event this process proved too cumbersome for stations The research group developed a typology of arts and community radio which identified subsets of different art forms and correlated this to whether the activity involved participation and performance of volunteers and listeners. This enabled us to structure the analysis into useful categories. The questionnaire was designed to feed into this structure. Although this typology was helpful in analysing responses, it proved difficult to produce robust quantitative data on the basis of the responses. Desk research and questionnaires A literature review was conducted to ensure that the research was informed by recent research and publications in relation to the community media sector. The team also accessed Airflash – the CMA publication and the CMA online mailings and discussion working on skeleton staffing. Mixed content of much programming, the relative autonomy of volunteer programme makers in relation to programme content, the fact that station managers do not always know the detail of content of a programme, particularly where it is in a language other than English also made it difficult to categorise programmes Questionnaire The questionnaire sought to identify base data about the current work of the station, the focus of their work, their experience in relation to arts based work, the number of staff and volunteers engaged in the work and their experience, turnover of staff and volunteers, progression of staff and volunteers and any relevant research or evaluation work which they have carried out. forums. In depth interviews An initial analysis of the arts content of the programming of all the Face to face or in depth telephone interviews were carried out with radio stations which had gained a full licence was carried out 31 stations. The process adopted was a semi structured interview through analysing the web content where this was available. using open questions to elicit a meaningful, rather than formulaic, Although not all stations have an online presence, this enabled us response. In may cases this was followed up with supplementary to identify a number of stations which appeared to have a strong visits or telephone calls. Station staff responded with generousity arts programming dimension. These stations were approached to and enthusiasm to the interview process. arrange a face to face interview. All other stations in the sample group were issued either with a questionnaire, or were approached to take part in a telephone interview Where the response to this questionnaire suggested that the station was involved in significant levels of arts programming this was followed up either with a request for a supplementary face to face interview or with a telephone interview. Where the response to this questionnaire suggested a limited element of arts programming no further interview was set up. The questionnaires and the programming diary were tested and explored with Radio Regen and Wythenshawe FM prior to use to ensure that the questions were appropriate for the stations. Methodological constraints in the research process The community radio sector is evolving rapidly – stations came on air at different points during four month period covered by the research and wherever possible these stations were included in the research process. Some stations experienced difficulties in funding during the research process and so the nature and priorities of their programming changed significantly during this time (Forest of Dean is a particular example). However, the research is a snapshot of the stations at the time when we carried out the field work and is intended to reflect the potential of the sector. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO APPENDICES 75 Appendix 2 Glossary and list of abbreviations ACE Arts Council England BME Black Minority Ethnic CMA Community Media Association DCMS Department of Culture Media and Sport DTI Department for Trade and Industry FE Further education sector HEI Higher Education Institutions MELA a Sanskrit word meaning 'to meet', used to describe all sorts of community celebrations and festivals in the Asian subcontinent and the UK MOU Memorandum of Understanding Ofcom Office of Communications (Independent regulator of UK Communications Industry) RAJAR Radio Joint Audience Research – the official body in charge of measuring radio audiences in the UK. It is jointly owned by the BBC and the RadioCentre on behalf of the commercial sector. RFO Regularly funded organisation which receives financial support from the Arts Council on an annual basis RSL Restricted Service Licence – short term licence usually for maximum of two periods of 28 days per annum THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO APPENDICES 76 Appendix 3 Station list Station name Station Manager /Key contact for research Data Location Launch date Description 1 209 FM Karl Hartland Int Cambridge 25.01.07 Broadcasting over the internet from Cambridge venues and studios since March 2003, 209 radio has a range of specialist music programs with community and arts programmes being added all the time. 2 7 Waves Community Radio Pauline Murphy Int Wirral 11.05.06 7 Waves Community Radio in the Wirral aims to be run ‘by the community, for the community, with particular attention to the elderly and disadvantaged’. 3 Afan FM Craig Williams PD/Int Port Talbot 20.04.07 Afan FM is presented purely by young people, aged 11-25. The station is open in the day for anyone with an interest in radio to go and get training and advice in radio. Afan FM plays alternative music (rock) including bands like Razorlight, Manic Street Preachers & Keane. 4 Aldershot Garrison † Richard Wyeth Q Aldershot 5 AllFM Alex Green Int Manchester 01.01.06 ** Provides a community radio service for the benefit of the inhabitants of the culturally diverse areas of South Central and East Manchester. 6 Angel Radio Chris Gutteridge Isle of Wight 24.03.07 Provides a service focusing on the music and memories of 1900-1959 combined with up to date information on issues relevant to listeners, such as health, pensions and mobility. 7 Angel Radio (Havant) Tony Smith Int Havant, Hants 01.01.06 ** Provides a community radio service specifically for persons aged 60 and over who live in Havant. 8 Awaz FM Ali Malik Int Glasgow Serves the Asian population of Glasgow, delivering entertainment, community information, local, national and international news broadcasting in Urdu, Punjabi, Hindi and English. 9 Black Diamond FM † G Clayton Q Midlothian and South Edinburgh Int Bradford Mary Dowson 10 Bradford Community Broadcasting (BCB) 11 Branch FM Stephen Hodgson Int Serves all soilders, their families and MoD civilians living and working within the Army community in Aldershot Garrison & Mytchett Barracks. 01.01.06 ** Black Diamond FM will provide a service to people living and working within east and central Midlothian The station will broadcast programming reflecting Midlothian’s unique blend of community interests, cultural and linguistic diversity when fully functional. 01.01.06 ** BCB aims to serve the diverse inner city communities of Bradford. Dewsbury Branch FM brings an international flavour – you'll hear good music, lively chat, positive ministry and biblical discussions. Welcome to this active and growing Christian Internet radio station that has been on-air from the 1990s and broadcasting online since 2002. Burngreave Community Radio is a project linked to various Sheffield community groups. Karen Wilson 12 Burngreave Community Radio † Q Sheffield 13 Canterbury Student Radio Liam Preston Int Canterbury 14 Cross Rhythms City Radio Jon Bellamy Q Stoke on Trent 20.09.06 CSR provides students with the opportunity to make their voice heard in the city whilst ensuring there is an advert-free, fresh sounding radio station that caters precisely for the needs of young students and other individuals in the area. Cross Rhythms City Radio serves the Christian community in the Stoke on Trent area. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO APPENDICES Station name 77 Station Manager /Key contact for research Data Location Launch date Description 15 Desi Radio Amarjit Khera /Ajit Kaur * PD/Ext I Southall 01.01.06 ** Provides a community radio for the Punjabi community in West London, including the different faith communities and nationalities, and people of all ages. 16 Down FM Ian McCormick Int Downpatrick, Co Down 30.03.06 Down FM serves the town of Downpatrick and surrounding villages. 17 Edinburgh Garrison FM Mark Drysdale Q Edinburgh 14.08.06 This station provides a service to soldiers, families and MoD civilians living and working within the Army community in Edinburgh's military locations. 18 Féile FM Emma Mullen Int Belfast Ext I Gloucester 01.01.06 ** The Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire is a rural area, and Forest of Dean Community Radio has built a relationship with communities across the varied landscapes and distinct culture of the Forest, through its commitment to social inclusion. The service is aimed at everyone who lives, works or studies in the area. 09.07.06 Provides a community radio service for Verwood and surrounding hamlets and villages in rural East Dorset, on the edge of the New Forest. Roger Drury 19 Forest of Dean Community Radio Féile FM broadcasts from 8am-12midnight. There are over 120 volunteers involved in the broadcast with over 800 participants lined up for discussion and debate programmes, music programmes from all genres, live bands as well as interviews and live recordings of this year’s artists and acts at the August Féile 2006 Festival. In 2007 Féile FM will also be making live links-ups to community radio stations around the world so tune in for what's guarantee a truly fantastic 21 days of live community radio. 20 Forest FM Steve Saville PD/Int East Dorset 21 Gloucester FM Derrick Francis Int Gloucester 22 Hayes FM † Sutish K Sharma Q Middlesex From 01.09.07 Focuses on the area around Hayes, West London. 23 Ipswich Nick Greenland Community Radio PD/Ext I Ipswich 16.03.06 Ipswich Community Radio serves a number of different groups within Ipswich; in particular residents in south east Ipswich, minority ethnic communities, asylum seekers and refugees, young people, and those whose musical tastes are noncommercial. 24 Life FM Jennifer Ogole Ext I Stonebridge, London 16.04.07 Serves residents in Stonebridge, Harlesden and surrounding areas. The station aims to provide “community radio for the community by the community” with programming that reflects local interests and concerns. 25 New Style Radio Martin Blissett Ext I Birmingham 01.01.06 ** A station for people of Afro Caribbean heritage and its derivatives living in Winson Green and the surrounding areas of Birmingham. 26 Phoenix FM Stephen Mead Ext I Essex 23.03.07 Provides a service to the town of Brentwood and its surrounding areas which have been under-served in the past in order to stamp Brentwood’s identity on the local airwaves. 27 Pure Radio Doug Cresswall /Gill Moss * Int Stockport 13.09.06 Serves disadvantaged and deprived communities in Stockport. 28 Radio 19 Phil Gibbons Int Bristol 29 Radio Ikhlas Aftab Rehman Int Derby Provides a service targeting black and ethnic minority communities as well as disadvantaged groups in the city of Gloucester. Radio 19, which has had five RSLs each for two weeks duration, was interviewed as BCFM did not go on air until April 07. BCFM is a further development of Radio 19 which covers east central Bristol. 23.09.06 Aims to serve the Asian (primarily Pakistani) community in the Normanton area of Derby. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO APPENDICES Station name Station Manager /Key contact for research Data Location 30 Radio Regen Zoe Chapman Ext I Manchester 31 RadioReverb Karen Cass /JJ Maurage * Ext I Brighton 26.03.07 RadioReverb provides a service for the Central and East Brighton & Hove area. The station aims to reflect the diversity of lifestyles in the city using an eclectic mix of locally relevant speech and music programmes targeting adults 16 years+ from across the city. 32 Resonance FM Ed Baxter Ext I South Bank & Bankside, London 01.01.06 ** This service is targeted at inner London's community of practising artists and those outside the mainstream media. The audience also includes the socially deprived, minority groups and the culturally under-represented. Int Cumbernauld Revival Radio Ltd was incorporated in October 1995 and launched its first broadcast in March 1996, celebrating Easter. As far as licensing regulations permit, the station broadcasts twice per year for 28 days, the maximum broadcast time permitted under the Restricted Service Licence (RSL) granted to Revival Radio. www.revivalradio.org.uk/about/vision.htm" Our vision is to establish full time Christian broadcasting in Scotland. Sheffield Live! brings you the sounds of a lively and diverse City and fights to break down the barriers of stereotype. 33 Revival Radio Launch date 78 Description Since 1999, Manchester-based charity Radio Regen has enabled more than 5,000 residents of disadvantaged areas of Manchester, Salford and the North West to get on air. 34 Sheffield Live! Sangita Basudev Ext I Sheffield 35 Siren FM Andrew David Q Lincoln 16.03.06 A university-based group, Siren FM provides a service intended to be of interest to students, school children and other young people in the City of Lincoln. 36 Sound Radio Lol Gellor /Meriel Goss* Ext I Hackney, London 01.01.06 ** This station offers a schedule of multi-cultural multilingual programming with a backbone of English language community output. 37 Takeover Radio Graham Coley Int Leicester 01.01.06 Takeover Radio is for children and young people. It is characterised by the involvement of the young people they serve, who receive training and produce programming with energy, enthusiasm and originality. 38 Talkin’ Toxteth FM Alex Bennett Ext I Liverpool 11.05.06 Talkin’ Toxteth TTFM is operated by and for the people of the south central cluster of Liverpool and surrounding areas. As a multi-cultural community station, it is in a unique position to provide a service designed to reflect and celebrate community arts, culture and diversity. 39 Tempo 107.4 FM R E Preedy Wetherby Community Radio † Q Wetherby 20.09.06 Wetherby's own 24 hour radio station providing Easy Listening music interspersed with local information, appeals and news 40 103 The Eye Int Melton Mowbray Int Southampton 41 Unity 101 FM Ram Kalyan 103 The Eye is a radio station with a difference. It broadcasts from the heart of Melton Mowbray, for the people of Melton Mowbray and the beautiful Vale of Belvoir. 08.12.05 Our aim is promote and broadcast music and culture of the Asian and other minority ethnic communities in Southampton. THE ARTS AND COMMUNITY RADIO APPENDICES Station name 79 Station Manager /Key contact for research Data Location Launch date Description Space Clottey Ext I Stratford, London 16.02.06 Voice of Africa Radio activities involve the dissemination of information, news, advice, discussion and entertainment aimed at the Black communities; the provision of work placement for students, volunteers' scheme, etc, to particularly those living in Newham. 43 VIP Radio .Insight Kev Roberts Int Europe Insight Radio is the new name for Europe's first radio station dedicated to the blind and partially sighted community. Programmes are broadcast via its website for listeners in Glasgow and surrounding areas on 101FM 44 Wythenshawe FM Christine Brennan Ext Int Wythenshawe, 01.01.06 ** Manchester Wythenshawe FM aims to become a vital part of the life of Wythenshawe, providing 'radio for the people, by the people'. 45 Youthcomm. Radio Worcestershire Int Worcestershire 07.11.05 Youthcomm Radio is Worcestershire's only 24/7 internet radio station exclusively by and for local young people. Youthcomm, a community radio station, is 'fresh, young & fun', broadcasting a mixture of music, information, features, and news – and it's all about local young people! 42 Voice of Africa Radio * Denotes person who partook in research at station ** Denotes an Access station † Denotes questionnaire returned but no further action taken Data Key: Int Ext I PD Q Interview Extended Interview Programming Diary Completed Paper-based Questionnaire Data correct at the date of the original research. Acknowlegements We would also like to acknowledge the contribution of a number We would also like to thank Phil Korbel of Radio Regen for helpful of stations which broadcast with RSLs as well as individuals who and generous advice, Ashok Ohri of OSDC for his support in contributed to the research: listening to programmes broadcast in Punjabi, Kelly Sames and Jo • Leeds 11 FM supported by multi media company Vera Media – Al Garthwaite the station manager, and volunteers Joanna Garnham of Cape UK for their support in the research process and Anne-Marie Sharman for her keen editorial eye. Stansbie and Donna Kelly • East Leeds FM supported by participatory arts complany Headstogether – Adrian Sinclair of Headstogether and volunteer Paddy Garrigan • Preston FM supported by community arts organisation Prescap – Darren Jenkinson Prescap project worker – and their volunteer Rik (Richard Liprott) • Bishop FM Michael Fryer station manager and volunteer • Henry Firth former volunteer at Sheffield Live • Kate Fox freelance performance poet and formerly volunteer at Bradford Festival Radio (now Bradford Community Broadcasting) • Nelson Kumah of the BBC and LifeFM. DESIGN Rob Bowden Design T: 0113 245 2286 With thanks to our funders Further copies The whole report can be downloaded as a PDF directly from the following websites: www.capeuk.org www.artscouncil.org.uk www.commedia.org.uk capeuk Exploring creativity for teaching and learning Working in Research Training and Consultancy CapeUK Head Office Host Media Centre 21 Savile Mount Leeds LS7 3HZ Tel: 0113 200 7035 create