Sheffield News

Call for television and radio programme proposals

Sheffield Live Television(SLTV), the local digital television channel for Sheffield, is opening a second call for the submission of programme proposals, to join the programmes currently under development for inclusion in our launch programme schedule.

Individuals and organisations interested in pitching programme ideas to SLTV are invited to complete a short programme proposal form.

Please note the deadline for submission of programme proposals in this call is 31 March 2014.

Proposal forms are available online by clicking on the link below.

SLTV – programme_proposal-form [doc]

SKTV – programme_proposal form [text]

Programme proposers should be prepared to contribute their own voluntary time or other resources. Selected programme proposals will benefit from development support, access to production facilities to produce a pilot programme, and potential for inclusion in the SLTV launch programme schedule.

Please return television programme proposals to: SLTV Programme Proposals, Sheffield Live, 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield S1 2BX or email prog@sheffieldlive.org

We’re also open to new proposals for radio programmes on Sheffield Live 93.2FM. To propose a show, just download and return the radio programme proposal form:

Radio – programme_proposal_form [doc]

Radio -_programme_proposal_form [text]

Please return radio programme proposals to: Radio Programme Proposals, Sheffield Live, 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield S1 2BX; or email prog@sheffieldlive.org

Listeners have their say in Sheffield Live! survey

“I’m proud to live in a city that has Sheffield Live! as one of its home-grown radio stations. It is a wonderfully diverse and interesting service with something for everyone.”

Wow! We’re very appreciative of these wonderful words from Sheffield Live! Listeners. The comment above was one of many received in our recent Listener Survey, which we created and ran from December to mid-January to ask listeners specific questions about Sheffield Live! – and give them the opportunity to influence some future programmes.

And we’re really grateful to those of you who completed the survey. We’ve been looking at all of your comments, feedback, suggestions and requests – and we’re looking forward to using your input to help make our output even better.

We promoted the survey on air in mentions across our programmes (our weekly listener figures are about 35,000 – 40,000 adults); online on our website and to our 3000+ twitter followers and 1600+ facebook fans; and respondents had the opportunity to win one of many prizes kindly donated by local businesses (huge thanks to these businesses too, and we know how happy you have made the winners!)

What else did listeners tell us?

Listeners love the “wide range of shows” on Sheffield Live!; presenters’ passion for their music; our diversity and variety of programming; “Interesting programmes, presenters you can relate to”;  our inclusivity; “Eclectic mix of stuff I wouldn’t hear on other radio stations”; “The freshness and the variety.”

Our listeners access the station through FM (about 60%), our internet livestream (about 40%), and podcasts (about 30% of listeners use the podcasts); they do so from home (over 60%), work (over 20%) and in the car (over 60%).

But who are they? Well, they’re varied in age:

Where are they?

How long have they been listening?

As far as preferences for types of show are concerned, we’ve got a schedule that most listeners love; in fact the eclectic and varied schedule was very well commented on.

We asked listeners about our coverage of many genres of music, as well as other programming (eg shows dedicated to mainstream and non mainstream sport, LGBT issues, arts, non-English language shows, film reviews, business, and more). For most of these categories of music and types of programming, most listeners think we have things about right.  And there are really no areas of programming in which a significant number of listeners want us to devote less time to.

But listeners (overall) do want more local music, more comedy, more debate about social issues, more arts, and more Sheffield specific-sports coverage.

The categories where ‘I’d like more than there currently is’ significantly outscored ‘it’s about right’ were ‘Comedy’ ‘Local Music’ and ‘Talk / debate about social issues’ and ‘arts programmes’ and ‘Sheffield sports coverage’.

So we’re working to increase our coverage of these areas. We’ll be appointing a head of news as part of our cross-platform media operation with Sheffield Live Television later in the year and will be able to bring listeners regular news bulletins – on radio, tv and the website.

And we’re opening a new call for programme proposals – so if you’d like to be part of our schedule – and can offer comedy, arts, sheffield sports, local music or debate programming, please get in touch!

You can download a programme proposal form here: Radio – programme proposal form [doc] or Radio – programme proposal form [text].

We found out alot more about listeners in our survey too.

Most get around Sheffield on foot and by car – but buses, trams, bikes and taxis are all used by a significant proportion of listeners.

Listeners are active in Sheffield – regularly eating out, going to gigs, clubs and pubs, going to the cinema and theatre, shopping, exercising, and enjoying Sheffield culture:

How often do you: (results show listeners who participate at least monthly – ie daily, weekly or monthly:

Listeners are hugely loyal to Sheffield Live!, with a clear majority not listening to other stations:

And the ads on Sheffield Live! have demonstrably changed the likelihood of our listeners purchasing – with over 80% of listeners saying YES about whether a specific ad had made them “more likely to purchase from / engage with the advertiser.”

Fantastic news for our advertisers too – so do get in touch if you’d like to find out more about how to reach our amazing audience.

Sangita Basudev, chief executive of Sheffield Live!, commented:

“Thank you to all the listeners who took the time to complete our survey. We’re proud of the schedule of fantastic, diverse and rich programming on Sheffield Live! and we are  thrilled that so many of you expressed such positive comments about the station and our shows. We are addressing all of the comments, constructive feeedback and suggestions that you made – which will help us to make Sheffield Live! even better for you.”

Let’s close this summary of the survey with another of those wonderful listener comments:

“Sheffield Live! is going from strength-­to-­strength with its strong line-­up of programmes, which greatly demonstrate the diversity of Sheffield and its residents. It always provides something new and offers a refreshing break from the local mainstream commercial stations that refuse to break away from the mediocre and mundane. May it long continue!”

New show: Des Pardes

Tune in every Thursday from 9pm to Des Pardes with M Shafaqat.

Des Pardes is a topical show with live calls, covering a wide range of issues regarding the Asian community.

It includes a mix of melodious tunes from down memory lane and studio guests to make a fun packed evening: tackling the issues with hard talk and no nonsense style.

Tune in every Thursday from 9pm – 11pm.

New show: Urban Expression

New show Urban Expression broadcasts every Tuesday from 9-11pm, featuring the best of hip hop underground with Jose Spinola.

Shows feature unsigned artists, shout outs, worldwide hip hop, underground hip hop, news/ rumours, old and new school artists.

What next?

Peace in the Park February Fundraisers

Leave a comment

Two fundraisers for this year’s Peace in the Park festival are set to happen this weekend – Friday the 21st at the Riverside and Saturday the 22nd at the Redhouse, writes festival volunteer Chris Arnold.

As many of you may know, lack of funds meant that Peace in the Park was unable to go ahead in 2013, to the disappointment of many Sheffield locals. The festival is looking a lot stronger financially this year but still needs those all important funds raised from multiple events in the run up to June. Purveyors of all things fun Cool Beans are taking care of Friday night at the Riverside whilst Saturday is being hosted by Sheffield reggae stalwarts Dubcentral, both events incorporating a mixture of live music and DJs.

Friday at the Riverside is £6 to get in and features live sets from:

RENEGADE BRASS BAND
THE BALKAN BANDITS
BONGO & THE SOUL JAR
CARL “ON FIRE” WATKINS

Saturday at the Redhouse is £4 to get in and features live sets from…
STEEL CITY RHYTHM
MOOSH

All profits raised go straight to Peace in the Park and help make the occurrence of this year’s festival a certainty. You can find more info on Facebook for Friday’s event here and for Saturday’s event here.

Adventure film fest back and supporting Sheffield Hospitals Charity

Tickets for the Sheffield Adventure Film Festival go on sale from this week from the Showroom Cinema – and the 9th ShAFF is set to be the biggest yet.

More than 100 films will be screened at this year’s ShAFF, taking place from 4 – 6 April 2014, thanks to additional venue space at Sheffield Hallam University’s Pennine Lecture Theatre and more screenings at Red Bull’s outdoor Cityscape Cinema at the amphitheatre.

Sheffield Adventure Film Festival launched the ShAFF 2014 trailer on BMC TV this week ahead of its cinematic screening at the Best of ShAFF 2013 at the Showroom Cinema on Thursday 13 February and YouTube release on Tuesday 18th February.

There were over 200,000 views of the 2012 and 2013 ShAFF trailers; this year’s was been produced by Peak District adventure and outdoor photographer and filmmaker Lukasz Warzecha and his Polished Project colleague Wojtek Kozakiewicz.  The soundtrack is ‘Life in Glorious Stereo’ by Sheffield band Screaming Maldini.

You can watch the trailer here:

The expanded programme includes more family-friendly Young Adventurer sessions and a dozen feature-length films as well as ShAFF’s popular Adrenaline, Spirit of Adventure and specialist sports film sessions.

It also includes more cycling films as part of ShAFF’s ‘Tour de Cinema’ partnership with DocFest as part of the Yorkshire Festival in the run up to the Tour De France.

A suggested donation of £1 from every ticket sold will go towards supporting Sheffield Hospitals Charity raising the £5,000 that is needed to provide a satellite blood fridge in the resuscitation room of the Emergency Department at the Northern General Hospital’s Major Trauma Centre.

Festival Director Matt Heason said:  “Lukasz and Wojtek have done a cracking job taking over the reins of producing the ShAFF trailer from Alastair Lee and it’s fitting that it opens with Leo Houlding in Al’s new film ‘The Last Great Climb’.

“We’re particularly proud to be supporting Sheffield Hospitals Charity, especially as ‘Risk and Reward’ is a theme that reoccurs in so many of this year’s films.  We’re also grateful to Screaming Maldini for letting us use another of their tracks.  Their energetic, soaring orchestral sound is a perfect backdrop for the incredible footage that we’re privileged to screen.”

Nick Cox from Screaming Maldini said:  “We’re delighted and honoured to be involved with this amazing film festival for the second year running.  Seeing our music set to such incredible feats of human endurance, strength and death-defying bravery makes us feel immensely proud while at the same time immensely physically inadequate!”

Sheffield Hospitals Charity Director, David Reynolds said: “ShAFF is a hugely successful event so I’m delighted that the festival is supporting Sheffield Hospitals Charity this year and the delivery of emergency care. I’d like to urge everyone attending the event to please support our fundraising efforts to supply a satellite blood fridge.  Having immediate access to this facility is vitally important for severely injured patients, who are losing blood. No time will be lost collecting blood from elsewhere within the hospital which means you can be sure that every penny donated will have a direct impact on the care of patients at a time when they need it the most.”

What next?

  • we’re featuring ShAFF on this Friday’s Business Live show – 9am on Friday 14 February – tune in then!
  • visit the ShAFF website
  • watch the trailer above
  • Anyone who wishes to support the fundraising to provide a blood fridge can visit sheffieldhospitalscharity.org.uk or or donate via Paypal
  • There are two more Best of ShAFF 2013 screenings – at 8.15pm on Thursday 13th Feb and Thursday 13th March – details here

Climbing competition: rulers of Foundry ‘wave’ declared

Stu Littlefair climbing in the final of F-BO14. Image: Neil Bentley

Stu Littlefair climbing in the final of F-BO14. Image: Neil Bentley

Some of the UK’s leading climbers competed alongside keen Sheffield participants in the fast-growing sport of ‘bouldering’ in a competition at Sheffield’s Foundry climbing wall this weekend.

F-BO14 (the Foundry Bouldering Open) attracted many of the UK’s top competition climbers, including many current British Bouldering Team members, to test their strength and technique against its famous ‘wave’ bouldering wall.

The competition began with a first round of 25 boulder problems; the 72 competitors could have up to 4 attempts at each one.  The top scoring 6 men and 6 women then went through to a final where they each had to grapple with 4 more tough problems on the famous ‘Wave’ bouldering wall.

Eventual winners were Shauna Coxsey and Martin Smith – who each took home a £350 cash prize.

The winners of the juniors’ competition (aged 10 to 17 years) were Gracie Martin (who also came 5th in the women’s senior final) and Jack Ainscough.

Neil Bentley, the Foundry’s General Manager, told Sheffield Live that the competition had a “great fun atmosphere throughout with some amazing climbing by the determined competitors.”

Results

Men’s Final Results

  1. Martin Smith
  2. Ethan Walker
  3. Stu Littlefair
  4. Nathan Phillips
  5. Thom Arnold
  6. Cailean Harker

Women’s Final Results

  1. Shauna Coxsey
  2. Michaela Tracy
  3. Diane Merrick
  4. Ella Russell
  5. Gracie Martin
  6. Katie Maxwell

Full details of junior results and team results are available on the Foundry website.

What next?

  • Last year we interviewed Sheffield climbers Mina Leslie-Wujastyk and Lucy Creamer in our show ‘Steel Fingers, Steel Wheels’ – details are here

Screenwriting workshops

Unlock your creative curiosity with acclaimed writer, Jan Worth

Whether you:
– have an idea for a screenplay but are not sure how to progress;
– or if you have a work in progress that would benefit from good feedback and a stimulating development environment;

this screenwriting workshop programme will help you to realise your writing potential and develop your script under the expert tuition of a successful writer and script consultant.

This course consists of 6 workshops that will run every Thursday evening from 13 March 2014

Eventbrite - Screenwriting Workshops

Venue: Sheffield Live 93.2fm

Time: 6:30pm – 8:30pm every Thursday

Start date: 13 March 2014 until 17 April 2014

Many script manuals present the issue of writing as a problem of craft. There’s a suggestion that if you know about structure, plot points and narrative arcs that you will be able to produce a good commercially viable script; this in my experience is not the case.

Any good piece of writing in any genre needs to have about it some element of risk and authentic resonance. Authenticity comes from finding the true core of your story; risk comes from having the courage to explore it. Once you begin to connect and engage with your material then learning the craft will follow.

It is amazing how imaginative and coherent you become when you really find the essence of what you want to say.

The first sessions prioritise content development, we then go on to workshop your script with the aim of producing an outline and full treatment and sample scenes. Your script idea is central to the process. In each session the formal workshop topic is taught as part of the process of the script review of your work.

Content development

Through a series of exercises the workshops encourage and enable you to become aware of both location and character; some of these exercises will relate to your lived experience . This work demonstrates how a keener awareness of the space you inhabit and the complexity of yourself and those around you, will spark ideas and give depth and insight to your writing.

Introduction to a structured approach of assessing example outlines, treatments and scripts

In this session we follow the structure of a script report to assess example work, providing an opportunity for participants to take what is relevant to use as a tool to assess their own work.

Characterisation

One dimensional character can kill a good idea. Character development runs through the entire workshop programme.

Story Structure

You will learn how the factors of plot, pace, and credibility of the story should be developed – and harnessed – to effect the coherence of the overall script.

Dialogue

The most common problem is that, often, there is too much of it, it is lacking in authenticity and expositional. You will spend time listening to how people actually speak and discovering the importance of silence and subtext.

Visual Scripting: the centrality of prose description

Film is a visual medium. Prose description is the expression of the visual. A good script uses the power of the visual to create a third layer of meaning; evoking mood through metaphor and subtext.

Course fee: £95 + booking fee.

Please book your place here:

Eventbrite - Screenwriting Workshops

More information about Jan Worth is available at www.janworth.org

Livestream and podcasts

Leave a comment

We’re really sorry that listeners can’t access our livestream at the moment (we are broadcasting as normal on 93.2 FM in Sheffield). The servers at our and other stations’ service provider for livestreams and podcasts have been the subject of a DDoS attack. They and we are working hard to get this resolved – in the meantime, thank you for your patience.

Creative businesses on Sheffield Live

Left to right: Richard Smith and Paul Brown

Left to right: Richard Smith and Paul Brown

Today’s Business Live show featured two successful creative Sheffield businesses sharing their advice and tips (as well as national and local business news).

Presenter Jamie Veitch was joined by illustrator Richard Smith and animator Paul Brown. Both shared their experience of setting up and running their businesses as well as their opinions on the state of the economy, business confidence – and how online and real-world networking have been beneficial to them.

Richard’s illustration, cartoon and caricature business encompasses work for corporate and individual clients – he’s even creating some comic book cover art for the new album by Down ‘n’ Outz – fronted by Sheffielder Joe Elliott of Def Leppard fame.

Paul is an animator, digital artist, consultant and tutor, and runs Flycheese Studio, teaching digital art specialising in working with people who need support to live their lives. His students’ work is entered into film festivals and competitions and his social enterprise, which like all businesses earns its own income, also creates hugely positive benefits for its clients.

Today’s show also featured figures about Britain’s economic growth and from the British Film Institute about the state of the UK film industry and news about a £14million investment into the Sheffield City Region, which was announced this week.

You can listen to the podcast of today’s show featuring Paul and Richard (available for 60 days) here.

You might also wish to listen to the podcast of last week’s Business Live show, which featured communications, marketing and networking experts Faye Smith and Alan Fenn answering listeners’ questions. Podcast here.

More about the Business Live series here.