Who's the Boss?
Every couple of weeks I get to trade in my traditional duties and assume the director's chair in 3A. It's a great way to keep my directing skills up to par (it's amazing how much you forget after a month not directing... and then you get called in to direct a last-minute press conference from the Rose Garden and think, "wait a minute, what am I supposed to be doing again?"), but, even better, it's my favorite job at Talk. While it's fun to be the boss*, the best part is that I get to pick out all the music that airs during the program. Not everyone hears our music breaks -- many member stations use that 59 seconds to update listeners on local stories, weather, and traffic -- but picking them out is a time-consuming and creative process (you can see what we play each day on the program page for the day after 6pm, and even listen to clips). Tone is paramount -- you don't want the upbeat Architecture in Helsinki following a story about deaths in Iraq -- but you also want to mix things up, pulling from a variety of genres and artists. As a result, I'm always on the prowl for instrumental music. The best breaks I've run across lately have been from Lost in the Trees and Toumani Diabate. So do you have any suggestions for me? The bare minimum length that's useful for us is 30 seconds, but for some breaks we need as much as 3 minutes... what would you like to hear? And if you're a musician and want to submit music, leave a message in the comments section and I'll be in touch!
*Actually, the incredible engineers at NPR -- these days, our Technical Director Kimberly Jones and engineer Neil Tevault -- don't need me at all. They could drive the show in the dark. But I get to sit in a tall chair and look important, anyway.
9:34 AM ET | 05-29-2007 | permalink
