Radio is part art, part science, part skill, part luck. If you're reading this, it means you're interested in telling stories with audio. You may be a newspaper reporter looking to expand into audio. You may be a student starting to work at your college radio station. You may be a photographer who wants to put your pictures to sound. You could be the next superstar podcaster. You may be an NPR listener who wants to know how your favorite shows make radio magic. Throughout this section of the website, you will see us reference "radio." As you well know, these days radio skills can be useful beyond the radio medium. We hope these posts help you achieve your audio goals...radio and otherwise.

We'll occasionally update this section of the website with our latest musings about making radio. But we encourage you to first read our radio production guide:

Lessons:
Recording
Writing
Voicing
Editing
Additional Resources

At B-Side we like our stories to break the rules. But before you can break them, it's good to know what they are. This guide contains the rules for creating great radio. As you read through it, we encourage you to follow links to sample scripts, sample audio and other examples. This is a work in progress, so please send all comments and suggestions to comments@bsideradio.org

Part of an occasional series of posts on bsideradio.org about the art of making radio.
By Tamara Keith

I recently spent some time with the Swarthmore College students who produce War News Radio.  I was there, I guess, to preach the gospel of great radio reporting.  We talked about what makes a story a story.  We talked about voicing (something I still struggle with) and what it’s like to work at NPR.  We spent most of our time talking about writing for radio.  I prepared a little handout that I think would be useful to just about anyone looking to improve their writing.  These are techniques I’ve learned in training sessions with some amazing coaches and in years of trial and error.  Now, I will admit, I don’t always follow my own advice but these tips are good reminder of how it can be done. Here goes… Read the rest of this entry »

Transom.org showcases great independent audio, as well as lots and lots of really good technical advice. The editing how-to has great tips and tricks for Protools users. www.transom.org

Radio Diaries, home of great non-narrated radio documentaries, has some good recording and interviewing tips. www.radiodiaries.org.

Ira Glass and the folks at This American Life are really good at making even heavily edited material sound natural. They sell a comic book that shows how they put their shows together and has advice on how to make your own stories. If you don’t want to spring for the whole thing, you can see a preview of the editing page (plus a few others) on their website, www.thislife.org.

Radio College, from the Association of Independents in Radio, has lots of expert advice too. www.radiocollege.org.

-There’s more good radio to be heard at Stories 1st. www.stories1st.org

By Lyssa Mudd

Most radio listeners don’t realize how intensively the stories they hear have been edited. That’s because with good editing, stories flow well and sound smooth. Read the rest of this entry »

By Dave Gilson

Writing for radio is different than writing for print. You’re writing for the ear, not the eye. Listeners have to get it the first time around- they can’t go back and hear it again (unlike re-reading a sentence in a magazine). And while a reader may get up and come back to an article, a radio listener who gets up may not come back. So you want to grab their attention and hold onto it for as long as possible. Writing feature stories like the ones aired on B-Side is also different than writing news copy. You can loosen up a little. You can be more literary, more creative, more personal. This handout is a quick guide to writing a script for a feature radio story. Read the rest of this entry »

By Tamara Keith

Radio is all about sound. We don’t have pictures or printed words to help us tell the story, just the sounds of people’s voices and their surroundings. Sound brings listeners into our stories, takes them to a place, helps them feel the events we describe. It’s a powerful thing if gathered well and used correctly. Read the rest of this entry »

By Mia Lobel

Be Yourself
Unless your are one of the few producers out there who can make a career out of non-narrated pieces, chances are you are going to have to VOICE your piece from time to time. This is one of the most challenging aspects of radio production and can make or break a story. But voicing can also be a lot of fun and it gives you the opportunity to put yourself into your work – to give your piece the emotion or levity the piece deserves. Most importantly, have fun with voicing and let your personality shine through. The following are a few tips that can help you properly voice your work. Read the rest of this entry »

What is B-Side?
Like its name implies, B-Side focuses on stories that don’t necessarily fit into the mainstream.  We don’t need a “news peg” to put a story on the air.  What we do need is a strong story line, compelling characters, refreshing writing and interesting uses of sound.

Each month B-Side examines a theme and tackles it with an approach that’s both offbeat and revealing. Every show is a half-hour experience, complete with music, which takes reporters, producers and, of course, listeners, to a place that ties into that month’s theme. This is the “glue” that links the stories together, showing the personality of the host and providing an overarching narrative and tone for the show.  Each month B-Side’s host gathers the “glue” as they go out and explore the theme.  This gives the show a “live” feel and brings listeners along for the ride.

The idea of B-Side is to have fun.  We’re not getting paid, so in a way B-Side is more a hobby than a job.  But like the most obsessive stamp collector or model car aficionado, as producers we must aim to be as great as possible.  Each story that airs on B-Side should be something we feel good about, both as individual producers and as a team.  This is our chance to make the kind of radio that we want to make, the kind of radio that we want to listen to, and the kind of radio we can’t make within the current framework of public radio programming. Read the rest of this entry »