Hey! I’m Sumaiyah, a new intern at Jazz 88. I was offered this oppurtinity from a teacher in my audio production class and I couldn’t be more grateful. I used to listen to a lot, and I mean a LOT of radio when I was younger, so to be given this hands-on approach of learning about its inner workings has been really fun. I’m a pretty big fan of music, especially rock and electronic, though I haven’t been too exposed to jazz before. So not only is this a really awesome internship opportunity, but it’s also a chance to hear more music from a genre as influential as jazz.
Most of the work I’ve done so far is voice tracking for Jazz with Class. This mainly consists of me introducing tracks by either backselling or frontselling them on the radio. Which sounds pretty simple, but it was kind of nerve-wracking at first. It takes a lot to get used to hearing your own voice. I’m sure everyone’s had that experience of hearing your voice in a recording and thinking, “Wow, I sound weird.” And that’s exactly what it was like for me!
Now, I’ve (somewhat) come to terms with the weird sound of my voice along with all of the other eccentricities that come with voice tracking and recording newscasts. Newscasts were definitely tough on my first go around, but the thing with radio is that no matter how many mistakes you make (well, as long as you’re not live) you can always start over again. And the more you do it, the easier it gets.
