Draft Audio Story

Kathleen · Full Interview Draft 2 Mixdown

Meet the Elliotts. This story is a description of what happened to the family on June 11, 2019.

Frank, pictured here, is 92. Frank, who would tell anyone who would stop to listen fascinating stories about his Wiggly Adventure life, suffered a stroke earlier this year and now cannot speak.

I recorded in a quiet room, using lapel microphones wirelessly connected to a receiver plugged into my iPhone 13. I let Charles talk, uninterrupted, through his portion of the interview. I re-recorded my part multiple times to get clean phrases and the intonations I wanted.

I cut Charles’s segment due to “um,” clearing his throat, and general phrases that I felt changed the meaning of the overall message. For example, I think saying “but” can sound dismissive, so I took the “but’s” out.

I raised the voices in the first 2 sections and lowered it in the 3rd due to the 2 first tracks being ‘louder’ music. I added at least one key frame to the end. I faded music in and out at the beginning and end of each section.

I learned how to delete unwanted empty tracks for a cleaner board to work on, and zoomed in and out repeatedly, cutting sometimes very minute waves. I merged preferred segments into final ‘blocks’ to make them easier to move. I added silences using the “add silence” feature, but also simply moved segments away from each other.

The story idea did take a fair share of time to create, although in the end it just “came together.” I hope the 1st portion created anxiety and interest, a question for the listener to wonder about. The 2nd part offers an explanation and resolution, and the 3rd closed the context leaving the listener with a strong message. I researched quite a bit on Dave Isay and enjoy and appreciate his expertise.

The music I used was from the source suggestions given for in this assignment.

https://www.joshwoodward.com/song/TheNest

https://www.tribeofnoise.com/DamianoBaldoni

https://www.tribeofnoise.com/Mullets

8 responses to “Draft Audio Story”

Erin Leahy

March 15, 2023 at 5:30 pm

Frances, first off thank you for sharing the tragic story of your mother in law’s death and your personal experiences with loss. I can see how you are setting up your ending question by interviewing your husband on his experience losing his mom and then sharing the experiences you have had both personally and in your profession as a nurse. The different music you have used throughout the story is also very fitting and you kept it a good volume in the background. I would consider presenting listeners with that question of, “how do you want to live?”, in the beginning of your story in addition to the end. I think listeners need that perspective to think about from the start to really engage them until the end of your story. I also think you could set up the story more in your blog post, so we know more about the why. Great work!

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Old Travel Nurse

March 16, 2023 at 11:03 pm

Thank you so much for your kind thoughts and suggestions!

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spencergregory

March 20, 2023 at 9:16 pm

Kathleen, first off, this is such a powerful story that you are telling. Thank you for sharing this! I really like how you have an intro and conclusion of you talking. What a horrific event. You really captured the real emotion from Charles. Really powerful what you’ve been able to do here. I feel like the music at the start is perfectly balanced with the audio so it doesn’t overpower the story. I think one piece of advice that would give is that it’s a little hard to hear both the audio and the song with the lyrics at the end. I know this would be hard to cut because I absolutely love the lyrics to the song and feel like it captures the story so well. However, I feel like it’s ultimately hard to hear both the lyrics and/or the audio story at the same time. I found myself trying to listen again and could only focus on one sound at a time. Overall though, this is incredible work and thank you for sharing your perspective on life!

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Old Travel Nurse

March 20, 2023 at 10:21 pm

Thank you so much! Thank you for giving me a change that I can make in my story, too (for the assignment!) I feel like everyone has done such a great job that I had almost zero criticism as far as changing things up–such as your story–it’s perfect just like it is!! Thank you again for your thoughts and praise, I appreciate it!

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kyleeburleigh

March 21, 2023 at 7:43 pm

OH MY GOSH, KATHLEEN!!!! Your audio was SO DANG GOOD. You beautifully took a tragic story and gave it a positive outlook that provoked serious and meaningful thought in listeners. Very well done.

It truly felt like a podcast I listen to on a regular basis… It might have been the topic and background music… (Crime Junkies, anyone?) You hooked me from the beginning with your intro. Your voice is so soothing in the intro and the background music you applied was at the perfect volume. My feedback would be to lower your husband’s voice a bit when he first starts talking. It startled me a bit following your low and soothing voice. This is SEARCHING for critiques because I was so impressed with your audio story, but my only other feedback would be to use audio without vocals in your outro – I found it to be a bit distracting.

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Old Travel Nurse

March 21, 2023 at 8:38 pm

Thank you so much for your compliments and suggestions! I really appreciate it and will definitely look at ways to manipulate the audio!

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Stephanie Stephenson

March 21, 2023 at 11:56 pm

I think that the message was pretty clear and the introduction and interview sounded well-paced rather than rushed which makes it more appropriate for the type of information being presented. Some things that may be a topic of approach is that the ending sounds a little repetitive. To give the same importance to the idea of how we want to live, it may be better to add it in the start and rephrase the ending to make the audio a little more cohesive. Another thing could be adjusted is the song at the end of the recording. I think the song suits the audio, but rather than it is increasing in volume, it may be better to keep it faded out until the end and then increasing it for maybe 5 seconds after you finish to give a closure. Overall, it is a very somber piece and the choice in audio put together is congruent with the overall message.

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Old Travel Nurse

March 22, 2023 at 12:02 am

Thank you so much for your thoughts and suggestions! I appreciate your input!

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