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Losing Their Voices!;
Topic Started: Oct 13 2012, 06:38 PM (876 Views)
Mobson
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"Familiar voices are leaving Radio 4 and Radio 2 in alarming numbers" writes Paul Donovan the radio critic of the ST Culture this week.

Charlotte Green, Harriet Cass, Fran Godfrey and Fenella Fudge are all taking voluntary redundancy. Rosalind Adams, who has played Carrie in The Artchers for 25 years is leaving the famous radio soap to spend more time with her grandchildren. Robin Lustig, presenter of The World Tonight for almost as long, is going back to reporting; the announcers Charles Nove and Ricky Salmon are being 'reduced' and Colin Berry has already gone!

Now comes another departure. For some listeners, it will be the unkindest cut of all - Peter Donaldson, Radio 4's longest serving newsreader is also leaving next year. A so familiar voice that is calm, authoritative, friendly and beautifully rhythmic...every word stressed as it should be. It is the voice of someone who loves our language. Being human he has made the occasional slip - once he call the Daily Telegraph - the Daily Torygraph and on another occasion, he referred to the White House as the White Horse, his local pub in Sussex! He does have unmistakable gravitas, which is why he was asked to record the BBC's Armageddon broadcast. For 15 years, he was also R4's chief announcer and has helped train many others - although not Neil Nunes, who has the most magnificent voice on R4 at the moment, which sounds like he is auditioning for Othello rather than imparting programme information....

Peter Donaldson is leaving because of the move back to Broadcasting House from White City of Today, PM and all the other news programmes. When this is completed at the end of the year, R4 will no longer need its presentation team in two separate places....the newsreaders in W12 and the continuity announcers in W1. Once they are all back together, it only needs a team of 10, two fewer than at present, and the newsreaders, R4 says, "will continue to provide backup to continuity as and when needed." In other words, they will no longer be able just to read the news, as Green & Donaldson so now. Charlotte Green, as a staffer, has shrewdly (& sadly in my opinion), opted for redundancy. Donaldson, a freelancer, has made it plain that he has no wish to dabble in continuity - links, trails, shipping forecase etc, and so at the age of 67 has decided to call it a day.

R4 says its 10-strong team will consist of Chris Aldridge, Alice Arnold, Carolyn Brown, Corrie Corfield, Rory Morrison, Caroline Nicholls, Neil Steat, Alan Smith, Zeb Soanes and Diana Speed. No mention of Nunes, Kathy Clugston or Susan Rae. They are all freelance and as R4 has axed two staff posts to save on salaries, it is also likely to cut down on freelances. "It is not possible to say" is all that R4 will say.

Going back to Donaldson, Green and Cass, many will miss them as much as I will I'm sure; they have provided exemplary service. "Every announcer has his day but eventually gets faded out" says Donaldson last week "I'm only as good as the words in front of me and it's best to go when you might still have some place in listeners' affections."

This is one decision I wish the BBC would reconsider or would renege on and where I wish, as the Licence Payer, we all could have the final say!
Edited by Mobson, Oct 13 2012, 06:52 PM.
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