So, I was a runner-up at the 9th Annual KCRW #RadioRace...
An independent audio piece I made for KCRW's 9th annual 24-hour Radio Race was chosen as runner-up among more than a hundred submissions from across the world.
Well, the TCHP podcast is on a long-ish hiatus at the moment while I figure out what to do with it next, but an independent audio piece I made for KCRW's 9th annual 24-hour Radio Race was chosen as runner-up among more than a hundred submissions from across the world. Here's the announcement on the KCRW website: https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/special-programming/radio-race-2021-winners and here's a screengrab of their announcement on twitter (or so I think).
(Did I screenshot just the part with my name for posterity? Heck, yeah!!)
...and here's the piece on SoundCloud:
This is my first "American" story and my first international recognition as well, so I'm rather happy with the outcome!
The 24-hour radio race starts with a theme being given to all participants at 10 AM PST (that's 11:30 PM IST) and participants are expected to create a four-minute audio piece around teh theme within 24 hours. This year's theme was "Won't You Be My Neighbour?" and I decided to take it literally and look at the housing market for people in the US, specifically San Francisco and contrast it with that in Mumbai. The twist was that the characters in both these locations were technically minorities in their respective geographies - my brother an Indian immigrant in the US, and an interfaith-couple in a city that claims to be progressive but still clings to majoritarian identities.
While this piece was made in 24 hours like every other submission for the race, my race actually started out inverted. While everyone else got to gather tape in clear daylight, I had to begin by sleeping on my idea! Fortunately, I had the good sense to quickly draft out rough ideas for the piece and roped in my brother to record some tape but while he was doing that I was asleep!
So, I woke up to tape that I had asked for but hadn't collected live, just over 12 hours of time until deadline, and only a vague notion of what my overarching idea was. I think the absence of alternatives (or time to look for more of them) actually forced my hand into ensuring that this story was the only story I ended up focusing on, I guess.
Actually, I did a whole-a** interview about the process with David Hooper of "Build a Big Podcast" earlier in January 2022 and I think you should really listen to it. :)
Do let me know what you thought of it - the piece itself and the interview with David on my twitter @shrikant.
I'm also working on something a little more 'formal'-ish in terms of an identity that I hope to deploy soon. Sometime this week or over the weekend hopefully. Watch this space! :)