West Malvern Podcasts
by sascha on 09/10/11 at 7:00 am
Monty Funk is a small radio production company based in West Malvern. As well as making programmes for the BBC, the company also creates podcasts; mini programmes that can be downloaded and listened to on a computer or an MP3 player. They’ve recently started to create podcasts about local artists and craftsmen. Peter Nash from Monty Funk tells us more.
As well as our programme making for the BBC and the independent sector, we create a lot of ‘high level’ audio tours for different clients. We’re involved, or have been involved in several really interesting projects, including tours of historic towns and cities, and we’re currently busy producing a podcast about the history of the designer of the Titanic.
Since my colleague Susanna Byers joined us, we’ve decided to make a website where you can find all our podcasts in one place. We also wanted to create themes for the material we’ve created; as we’re based in West Malvern we thought we’d start with stories of some of the many creative people who live here. This is partly oral history but its more advanced than that; these are crafted pieces and will remain as a permanent recording of the people who have lived here.
Ultimately we hope to find a way of making the podcasts pay for themselves, at the moment we’re funding it entirely and we’re not sure what the business model will be. We have twenty five programmes on there and more are being added all the time.
I’ve lived in the area for quite a few years. I moved here after my car broke down in Malvern, I spent the day looking around and decided this was where I wanted to be. There’s so much creativity here and lots to say about the Malvern hills. We’re keeping the podcasts to about ten minutes, short enough to listen to and the download is free. You can listen via our website or download via i-Tunes, if you subscribe to them (again for free), they’ll be downloaded automatically.
The website is www.montyfunkpodcast.com
Here’s an edited selection of some of the podcasts.
Paddy O’Dooley, Violin Maker
In his workshop, Paddy is busy putting the finishing touches to another instrument. ‘When somebody uses a saw you get a beautiful rhythm, it makes a lovely sound. I use Spruce for the front, you can see the lines of the grain are very close because it grows high in alpine mountains so it grows very slowly, and its very resonant. This part will be the back, its also symmetrical but with a higher neck and this will be the scroll.
When you’re making an instrument its got to be functional. I make them for specific people, I build an audio picture of what this person wants and then try to construct a physical object that will allow them to produce the sound they want. Its also got to be beautiful.
I was at an exhibition once and an American gentlemen was very interested in my work. He asked ‘Where’s your power tools?’ and I replied ‘There they are!’, waving my hands. He said ‘No come on, you can tell me’ and he just couldn’t believe it! They’re all hand tools and that’s all you need; a saw, a gouge and a scraper, you can make violins very simply.
I run an evening class in violin making, because there are such a shortage of opportunities to learn. I think its an obligation to pass my skills on’.
Paul White, Editor of ‘Sound on Sound’ magazine, and collector of guitars
‘This one sounds quite bright and spiky’ says Paul as he strums on one of his many instruments. ‘There are twelve guitars in the studio, another dozen in here, then in the utility are another fourteen, a few more are at my daughter’s house and I have a few tucked under the bed, and more in the cases behind you!
There are a few I bought because I like playing them. Others are ones I made, or rescued, or reassembled from parts I bought second-hand. I like doing it, my original career was electronics and I like tinkering, getting something more out of what is a basic piece of equipment.
I made the body of this one from swamp ash, a nice American wood used by Fender for a lot of their guitars. This is another one made from a piece of ash, I hollowed out a big chunk to minimise the weight. Making the body is the hard past, assembling the rest is an afternoon’s work.
I’m in a band. We first started playing in the seventies before we got proper jobs, and reconvened a few years later. We have a lot of fun playing in pubs and clubs, its done for fun, there’s no money in it these days, its more like therapy for the inmates of the band!’
Anthony Griffiths,known as ‘Griff’, Artist
‘I guess its in my blood to draw and paint, there’s nothing you can do about it, you either pick up a pencil and sketch and doodle, or you don’t , its something I have no choice with really. I do it because I can’t help it and I love it.
I do two different styles of painting. I do oils inspired cornily enough by nature, mainly sunsets as I’m in West Malvern and every time you see it go down its completely different. The sunsets are infinitely variable so they can never cease to give you something new.
The other thing I do is illustration, inspired by social comment, that’s satirical and mostly political. It constantly changes, a lot seems to be inspired by the unfair things happening to people in other parts of the world. oppressive governments and regime change.
This picture is called Mad Mickey, its a comment about the Iraq war and the part we played in that. This one is a pen and ink picture about having a bad memory. So its a picture of a bloke with a sieve instead of a head. Its called Sievehead and might have been loosely based on my own rubbish memory! This picture is called Dream Induced by Enforced Repetition. Its about a dream my dad had, he was a plasterer and dreamt he had to plaster an endless wall.
Its difficult to make your way as an artist, its very hard unless you get some small pockets of success that might lead to more success. You need a bit of luck really, keep plugging away and you can have a good year. I’ve had a couple of years where I’ve made a bit of money. I’d rather be doing this because I’m not an office kind of person’.
Do you know of somebody who could feature in a future podcast?
Monty Funk would love to hear from you on 01684 891957
