Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Reporting in - Radio Workshop, Interns & Oscar Nominated Films

WORKSHOP
We have 2 openings left in our Recording and Interviewing Workshop next week, Tuesday, February 24 in San Francisco. If you would like attend or be notified when the next workshop is scheduled please send us an email kitchen@kitchensisters.org or subscribe to our email list.

This 3-hour workshop is intended not just for people working in radio, but also for those interested in recording oral histories, web audio, podcasts and others who would like to learn interviewing,
documenting, and radio and online broadcasting skills for the projects that they do. In the past we have had a freelance photographer for the New York Times, an archivist from UC Berkeley Bancroft Library, oral historians as well as many independent journalists. The group is kept to a small size so everyone has a chance to be involved. The fee is $100. A snack is provided.

SALT - THE ART OF DOCUMENTARY STORYTELLING
If you are looking to emerse yourself in the art of documentary storytelling you might also want to look into SALT Institute in Maine which trains aspiring writers, radio producers, and photographers in the art of documentary storytelling. A number of our interns have attended SALT. Eloise Melzer just returned and former intern, Alix Blair, is on her way to SALT next week. We invited Alix to report in from time to time here as a guest blogger.

Interns Eloise Melzer, Catherine Kastleman, Allie Wollner & Lisa Morehouse

Listen Up - Interns Past & Present

Independent journalist and KS intern Lisa Morehouse's story Hunters Up Their Game With Camouflaged Trucks aired on NPR's Day to Day recently. Visit her blog to read and hear more of her work. "We're all about the camos, says Gary Linman, who's had a multiple hunting vehicles, like this Jeep, painted in custom camouflage to blend in with the Alabama woods."


Ruxandra Guidi worked with us in 2002 and then left for Austin, Texas where she did production and reporting work for NPR's weekly show, Latino USA as well as freelancing for other radio programs. She dropped by our office recently on her way through town after living in Bolivia. Awarded a five-week IRP Fellowship from John Hopkins University Ruxandra traveled to Haiti to examine the effects of foreing aid on human rights, violence and poverty. Her piece, “South-South” on the effort to overhaul Haiti's' state trash collection system aired on NPR. Rux has been collaborating with her husband, photographer Roberto "Bear" Guerra, and their latest collaboration is a multimedia story which can be seen and heard on the International Reporting Project website of John Hopkins University.
photo /Roberto Guerra

Alison Budner is producing stories for KPFA in Berkeley after completing an apprenticeship at KPFA's First Voice Media Action Program. Her most recent radio show was focused on the Victory Gardens -- with one piece on the historical gardens from WWI and WWII and another on the present day Victory Gardens program in San Francisco. It is a wonderful piece that goes hand-in-hand with our Hidden Kitchens story - Garden Allotments - A London Kitchen Vision.

OSCAR NOMINATIONS
THE GARDEN
Director Scott Hamilton's Oscar nominated documentary The Garden is a portrait of the fourteen-acre community garden at 41st and Alameda in South Central Los Angeles - one of the largest of its kind in the United States. Started as a form of healing after the devastating L.A. riots in 1992, the South Central Farmers have since created a miracle in one of the country’s most blighted neighborhoods. Growing their own food. Feeding their families. Creating a community. Learn more online and spread the word.

Robert Lloyd, LA Times Television critic, writes about another powerful, Oscar-nominated short film premiering tonight on HBO. The Witness: From the Balcony of Room 306,” The film is focused mainly on the memories of Memphis preacher Samuel “Billy” Kyles, who was the only other person on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel when King was shot. Read his review here.
Photo / Samuel "Billy" Kyles at the Lorraine Motel



Thinking of this period of time again, about the sanitation workers strike that brought King to Memphis and the movement organized around the slogan “I Am a Man” made us think about about some audio clips from our story WHER 1000 Beautiful Watts, a two part story that we produced as part of our NPR series Lost & Found Sound in 1999, about the first all girl radio station. Sam Phillips started the station with his wife Becky Phillips and from 1955 through 1971, a team of women ran the station; working in almost every position from on-air disc jockey to copywriter to sales manager. It was an "easy listening" music format but along with starting the first call-in radio show, they covered the local news as well - including the sanitation workers strike.

It was on the talk show, "Open Mike" that on air host Marge Thrasher announced the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. That was a memorable moment for the women of WHER.

Donna Barlett: "I remember standing at the news machine and watching the news tap out that Martin Luther King had just been shot. Marge was on the air and I took her the paper and I could not talk and tell her what I had in my hands...I couldn't talk."

Our story on WHER is available online - Part 2 which includes the section on King is here lostandfoundsound. Take a listen.

And ah yes ! If you're interested in joining our internship program visit our site for more information.


Friday, February 6, 2009

Today is the birthday of Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, The Botany of Desire, and most recently, In Defense of Food.

Michael has been a good friend and adviser to The Kitchen Sisters and when we were producing our story, Deep-Fried Fuel, about biodiesel made from farm crops and recycled restaurant grease, we spoke with Michael and asked him to weigh in on the rise of biofuels. Take a listen to this Kitchen Conversation with Michael Pollan.