The nerves somewhat jangled as I entered the radio labs for our workshop on Friday! My nerves resulted in the growing concern of repeat disappointments. Will everyone pitch up this time? Have they done the work that was assigned to them? History suggests that I had every right to be concerned about this, but to my delight, all 5 of the Upstarters came, on time I might add. Furthermore, they had all done what was asked of them. Reggie did his jokes, Sim and Batha found their interview sources, and they even came prepared with questions. It just goes to show that if everything goes as planned, it makes life, and in particular Upstart on radio, seem so much simpler and stress free!
So the workshop on Friday was more of a nitty gritty one (lets say that if all the workshops were like this, the Upstarters wouldn’t be quite so enthusiastic!). In the beginning we brainstormed potential interviews for Aphiwe, Reggie and Xabiso, and once that was established, we debriefed them about what was going to happen the next day on the Yung Amplified show.Reggie recorded his jokes, whilst the rest finished the formulation of their questions for the interviews. Then on Saturday, I was again pleased to see all 5 of them in RMR, already settled in with the presenters. Clearly Shireen and I drilled into their heads the importance of punctuality! Sim and Batha conducted their interviews. I was pleased with the way it was arranged. Instead of it being just two ten minute interviews in a row, the interviews were spread out across the two hours. So after every few minutes of the interview, the show would resume as normal with a song or topic of the day etc. It was obvious that Sim and Batha were nervous, but they put in commendable efforts! Batha was calm, collected and professional, whilst Sim established a great partnership with his interviewee from the onset, making the interview interesting and easy to listen to. Sim in particular put in a great effort considering he only found someone to interview the day before. But Batha sits on the top of my list as the candidate to anchor. He sounded confident and so natural on air.
Whilst everything went to plan, it could have gone quite differently! I sent an email to Gugs the day before the show (perhaps in hindsight this was a bit late) confirming that we go ahead with the interviews discussed in a meeting we had. I get a reply asking us to get in touch with Nan (programming manager) and Buhle. It turned out that Nan had no idea bout the Upstart interviews, and I dare say she wasn’t even aware of Upstart on Radio in general! This resulted in an email from her on Friday night saying that we can’t do it on Saturday as it’s too short notice. I pretended that I never got that email, and proceeded to RMR the next morning. Luckily Buhle was there for the Yung Amplified show, and allotted the time for us. Potential panic over!
So for next weeks workshops I see a very similar setup happening. We will generate more content, in light of the homework that we set each Upstarter, and the three remaining Upstarters will conduct their interviews. I go back to the importance of the interviews being spread across the show here, because now it’s opened up the opportunity for Reggie, Xabiso and Aphiwe to conduct their interviews across the two hour show, rather than a half hour long haul of Upstart interviews. Things are definitely coming together..here’s for hoping I can be just as positive next week!
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