MATTHEW WILLIAMS
MW MEDIA PRODUCTIONS
MATTHEW'S BLAST
FROM THE PAST
Bournemouth University Broadcasts
12th October 2023 - Present
Expanding my Show's Format:
At Farnborough College of Technology, my show had hung closely onto a basic format - whereby I would play the songs of today and yesterday with radio-presenting from tie to time, in-between. However, this had a few issues. For a start, sometime it would be hard to know what to say during my radio presenting as I had to come up with this dialogue myself, and had no one to bounce back off, giving a lack of conversation within my radio content from college. Furthermore, it made it harder to one show to stand out from the other because despite there being specific songs per show, the format was the same with very little change.
A major part of these issues was primarily down to my show's time of broadcast whilst at college - every Wednesday from 16:00 to 17:00. This wax the quietest part of te working week at college which meant that many students would have been finished for the day and the radio (for most of the time I was there) did not broadcast online or outside of college. This made finding contributors extremely hard.
Nerve Radio:
Struggles to expand upon my show format began to change when I joined Bournemouth University, as I now became part of Nerve Radio. The radio setup at BU wad very different FCOT (Farnborough College of Technology) because whereby at college radio was a much smaller medium run by one person, Nerve Radio at Bournemouth University was a much larger organization with around a dozen commitee students, all pf or at-least the majority of them students at BU within the Faculty of Media Communications. At BU, radio is student-led, for the students and is award winning, having one second place at the... in 2023, earning the committee a trip to BBC Radio 1. Furthermore, people were more wiling to appear in my radio show at BU because I found it easier to socialise with people at BU and often used every opportunity to network with others, whether as a firend or a aspiring professional businessman.
Expanding my Radio Format:
Now at Nerve Radio, I now sought to expand on "Matthew's Blast from the Past" by including more interviews. On my first Semester alone, I was able to find an array of interviewees each with their own specialist topic. I remember my first contributor called Achilleas (who I would later collaborate with for "The Cypriot Who Captured Space": I had overheard him talking about Astrophotography earlier on the same day of broadcasting one of my shows. Upon hearing hearing his interesting stories, I confidently approached him, asked him to be on my show and the evening of that day, I interviewed on my radio show.
I also hope to expand my radio by producing audio-recorded poems with SFX / Music in the background to make my show unique and dynamic. Alongside this, a Nerve committee member (called Ruby Plunkett) recently worked with another committee member called Jacob Dyer to record my show's new jingles. This makes me happy because I know have my own branding for "Matthew's Blast from the Past", thus enabling it to stand out from other radio shows.
Planning my Shows:
With expanding "Matthew's Blast from the Past" came a new necessity for more planning - a change from my college radio shows, which were primarily based on improvisation with no or little planning whatsoever. Hence, it is at Bournemouth University that I was now taking radio more seriously.
Methodology for planning came from my own course at university, BA (Hons) Television Production. In TV, everyone uses a Running Order to show what is coming up in a show. Hence, why not use it for radio? All my Running Orders were based on my contrbutors in that we would pre-agree what I would interview them on. I would then split the predicted dialogue into bite-sexed chunks (around 5 minutes at most per dicsussion), and would base my songlist that week based on themes linking to what me and my interviewee were discussing. For instance, for one interviewee, I focused on music mentioning America, and Amercia music artists because of interviewing my contributor on her childhood in Canada and the USA.
In the next section (after the radio poster for Nerve Radio's "Matthew's Blast from the Past" are some edited cuts of my radio show - primarily focusing on dialogue. Enjoy!
To The Right:
Utilizing Canva, the right is the poster that I created for my run of "Matthew's Blast from the Past" at Nerve Radio, from September 2023 onwards. This poster was originally released in October 2023, on my professional Instagram Page which is dedicated to showing Behind-the-Scenes photos and occasional video of my Media Work, and journey at Bournemiuth University.
Sign-Ins, Sign-Offs and Best Presenting
Here are a few of my favourite moments of presenting, signing out myself and/or my guests out of my show, alongside introducing myself and/or my guest to "Matthew's Blast from the Past". Feel free to browse this page for plenty more radio content!
Broadcast Highlights - 30th November 2023
30/11/2023 saw me do my first show independently since my first radio show at Bournemouth University. This is because of, during that week, being busy with coursework - thus preventing me from finding an interesting interviewee. However, I used my improvisational skills and on-the-spot problem solving to talk about myself, my Autism, and my most recent / current university-work of the time.
Broadcast Highlights - 23rd November 2023
The dreamland on North Amercia is a major theme on 30/11/2023 because of my interviwewees backgfround from Canada. Here, Simmon discusses her childhood in both Canda and the stats, and compares her story there to her current lifestyle in the UK. But whicj location does she prefer?
Broadcast Highlights - 9th November 2023
Join me and my father as we uncover my Dad'a past memories of Dorset (in areas including Durdlie Door alongside Lulworth Cove,) relates his experience adn style of Karate; and tells the treuth behind why he goes to Henry Tyndale to volunteer there per week.
Broadcast Highlights - 2nd November 2023
We've all heard of Disneyland, but have you ever wondered what it's actually like there, behind all the glits and glamour! Well, you can find out here! Also broadcast on this 02/11/2023 were Lil's guide to cheerleading, and her interesting experiences of acting.
Broadcast Highlights - 26th October 2023
Join me and my interviewee, Millie Harrison - for a heartwarming and emotively touching story on what horses mean to her, and how she views friendship.
Broadcast Highlights - 19th October 2023
Join me and the Cypriot-born Achilleas Economou for an insight into Astrophotography and a debate into the existence of alien life.
Farnborough College of Technology Broadcasts
December 2021 to June 2023
The Beginnings of 'Matthew's Blast from the Past':
Towards the start of 2022, something even better happened: Farnborough College of Technology hired a new Media Trainee called Jordan Foley, who used to study music at said college. Now recruited back, he was reopening the Radio Studio again - a space which had been closed for a while, at least since the year before my initial studies at FCOT in 2019 (and back then, it was FCOT FM, not FCOT Radio). It was a ghost of the busy, lively initiative it used to be. I found this out the hard way when after signing up for FCOT Radio in September 2019, it was cancelled and nothing was ever heard abut again.
However, this time it worked out and went ahead. In my first year of shows, I was radio producing and presenting mu own show every Thursday - at one point, during peak times. This was great as Thursday lunchtimes were always the busiest time of the academic working-week. Plus, it gave me the chance to do two hour shows at first, and make radio production a spare-time hobby. Then in my second year of Radio Show, it changed to Wednesdays, from 16:00 to 17:00 (the quietest day and time of the week).
Despite no longer broadcasting at peak times, what FCOT Radio had given me was a show format, an an ideology of what my identity was when it came to my Radio Content, and how it translated into a full-radio show. I had chosen to play music from the past because my musical taste have always been gravitated towards artists such as Queen, The Beatles and a variety of genres from the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s. I also began playing some more modern songs as time went on to keep the show relevant. However, it was this passion for yesterday's music which inspired the title of "Matthew's Blast from the Past".
In the first few shows I had interviewees. However, many students were either in lesson, unwilling to commit to my show, or (when I moved to Wednesdays) back home and unable to do my show completely. Hnece, I would often use occasions such as Open Events to diversify my dialogue.
My college shows now ending in June 2023 to follow my end of studies at Farnborough of Technology, I would nw boradcast to Nerve Radio in a mere month . I had a formula for a radio show called "Matthew's Blast from the Past" - all I needed to so now was expand it.
Radio Practice:
Towards the start of 2022, something even better happened: Farnborough College of Technology hired a new Media Trainee called Jordan Foley, who used to study music at said college. Now recruited back, he was reopening the Radio Studio again - a space which had been closed for a while, at least since the year before my initial studies at FCOT in 2019 (and back then, it was FCOT FM, not FCOT Radio). It was a ghost of the busy, lively initiative it used to be. I found this out the hard way when after signing up for FCOT Radio in September 2019, it was cancelled and nothing was ever heard abut again.
However, this time it worked out and went ahead. In my first year of shows, I was radio producing and presenting mu own show every Thursday - at one point, during peak times. This was great as Thursday lunchtimes were always te busiest time of the academic working-week. Plus, it gave me the chance to do two hour shows at first, and make radio production a spare-time hobby. Then in my second year of Radio Show, it changed to Wednesdays, from 16:00 to 17:00 (the quietest day and time of the week).
Despite no longer broadcasting at peak times, what FCOT Radio had given me was a show format, an an ideology of what my identity was when it came to my Radio Content, and how it translated into a full-radio show. I had chosen to play music from the past because my musical taste have always been gravitated towards artists such as Queen, The Beatles and a variety of genres from the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s. I also began playing some more modern songs as time went on to keep the show relevant. However, it was this passion for yesterday's music which inspired the title of "Matthew's Blast from the Past".
In the first few editions of "Matthew's Blast from the Past, I had interviewees. However, many students were either in lesson, unwilling to commit to my show, or (when I moved to Wednesdays) back home and unable to do my show completely. Hence, I would often use occasions such as Open Events to diversify my dialogue.
My college shows now ending in June 2023 to follow my end of studies at Farnborough of Technology, I would now broadcast to Nerve Radio in a mere month . I had a formula for a radio show called "Matthew's Blast from the Past" - all I needed to so now was expand it.
Upon studying Level 2 CTEC Extended Certificate in Media from September 2020 to May/June 2021, I had to re-sit GCSEs in Mathematics, and English Language as I only had a Grade 3 i both subject from secondary school at that current time. The progress made during my re-sits is truly remarkable because whist I passed Mathematics at Grade 4, English Language saw me achieve Grade 8 in my re-sit - an indication that my personality was now the creative type with a lot of subjects focused around storytelling through different medium of artistry. Not only this, but it saved me having to redo Mathematics and English Language GCSE when progressing onto Level 3 BTEC National Diploma in Creative Media Practice.
Instead, I was part of a group of people doing stretch - a replacement for Mathematics and English at GCSE (providing you've passed both subjects) which teaches extra-curricular subjects related to your course. The most influential and next time during Stretch was in the first Semester (September 2021 to December 2021) of this course, because at last... I was finally studying Radio! This was led by Alan Horner, a former Radio Presenter and alongside Radio Theory, we eventually managed to practice within the Radio Studio.
Sadly, this only lasted for one college-term; but it was great!
Disclaimer:
This poster was created on Canva by Jordan Foley, Farnborough College of Technology's Radio Technician,
