A few years ago I started writing about lessons I have learned while presenting on the radio. A friend suggested I should bring them altogether in one blogpost, so here you are. Looking back there’s some hilarious moments here, as well as some instructive ones. This isn’t a ‘how to’ guide, possible more of a ‘how not to’ one. But the various experiences I relate here do go some way to showing the kind of challenges you come up against while presenting a live news-based talk radio show. For instance, I never thought I my tongue would get so tied that I would introduce Justin Welby as the Archbishop of Cunterbury – that’s No 5. It made page 4 of the Daily Telegraph. Well if that doesn’t whet your appetite to click on the links below, nothing will!
- Abusive emails
- Dealing with a shouty guest
- Being recognised
- Reacting to a guest’s faux pas
- Turbulent priests
- Reluctant guests
- Beware of breaking news on Twitter
- Interviewing at short notice: Tia Sharp’s grandmother
- Handling breaking news of a terror incident
- Freebies
- Interviewing badly briefed MPs
11b. Winning radio presenter of the year - When a minister won’t answer the question
- Should you have gone to Specsavers, Prime Minister?
- When the RMT lies to you
- Going national, new imaging music & Rajars
- Losing a star producer
- Avoiding the N Word
- Winning a Silver Sony
- A veritable feast of loose tongues
- Rajar – What goes up, may come down
- The perils of outside broadcasts
- When a caller turns the question back on the presenter
- The power of talk radio
- Hosting an election debate
- Breaking the Official Secrets Act & protecting an an interviewee
- Reviewing the Jon Gaunt podcast
- Getting off to a good start on election night
- Should you ever disagree with a fellow presenter on air?
- When a caller says Jews should get over the Holocaust
- Hosting a Labour leadership hustings
