News

Media Trust and Vintage Radio - new project

 

On Wednesday 30th June agroup of Vintage Radio members including the chaiman - Gordon Nicholas, met with Sarah and Jodie from the Media Trust at the Old Quay in Parkgate to discuss one of their latest projects with the Vintage Radio team.

"The Media Trust - www.mediatrust.org - is currently running a scheme called Community Voices. Community Voices aims to inspire, engage and support disadvantaged and isolated communities across England to make a meaningful difference to their lives with the help of digital media.

Twenty six grassroots run projects have been selected to receive a small amount of funding and resources to support a project that will increase community engagement through digital media. As part of the project, the Media Trust production arm will make a series of short films about some of the projects which will be broadcast on Channel FIVE and the Community Channel.

Vintage Radio is one of the groups that has been awarded a Community Voices grant and they have also been selected to feature in the broadcast television series. Vintage Radio's Community Voices project will focus on creating a series of radio programmes with Residential Home members in the Merseyside area."

CD's wanted

 

We are building up our own music archives and we would love to have those CD's you don't want or no longer listen to.

Contact us via info@vintageradio.org.uk or drop them in at reception at the YMCA in Whetstone Lane in Birkenhead. But if you drop them in at the reception please mark them for attention of Vintage Radio.

Internet Radios

 

The Vintage Radio internet service is now listed on some new internet radio directory web sites, these include http://www.reciva.com/ and http://www.wifiradio-frontier.com/. We will be adding to these lists so watch this space.

In addition if you buy a Roberts Radio or Pure Evoke internet radio we are also on those manufactureres lists as well.

We have started to compile a list of Internet Radios that do not require a PC or any other computer to work. Our list can be found in our Radios page which you find by selecting Internet Radios via the Technical menu or by clicking here.

Studio update

 

We have just re-installed our studio back at the YMCA so we can do live broadcasts and also use teh studio to make recordings for transmission. Click here and this will take you to our technical page to the update if you want a few more details. The update section also gives a few more details about our internet streaming technology.

Apple Mac and Linux users can now hear our internet broadcast via ListenLive

 

We have just changed our audio player for our ListenLive service so Windows and Apple users can hear our internet broadcasts. We have also tested the players with the latest version of Ubuntu Linux 10.04 and all work well. Please let us know via email or our guestbook if you have problems.

We started broadcasting on the net from Monday 5th April 2010

 

We are now broadcasting on the internet.. We are offering a daily 3 hour programme starting at 9am GMT and repeating every three hours throughout the day till 9pm. The programme will be changed daily. We actually started broadcasting from 1st April.

Annual General Meeting - 2pm, 29th March at the YMCA , Birkenhead.

 

Attention all Vintage Radio members

Do not forget to come along to the AGM on 29th March, 2pm at the YMCA in Birkenhead. We will be choosing and voting in the new committee. You will also hear about the plans for RSL3 and internet broadcasting. Your attendance is important so please make every effort to attend.

Putting on an RSL and internet broadcasting is not just about presenting and producing programmes. If you think you can help Vintage Radio please come along and volunteer, please do not wait to be asked.

There is a lot of help required to get the station up and running and get it all organised. For example, we could do with some people who are good administrators to help the VR Secretary, who are very well organised and have a couple of hours a week to help us sort out our paperwork; we also need a very well organised but IT literate administrator to manage our ever increasing programme archive.

Our new fundraising venture for Vintage Radio

Marj goes large! - January 2010

 

Marj, one of Vintage Radio's presenters, has just had one of her soundbites featured on the front of a new advertising campaign flyer for the Media Trust charity. The charity recently awarded a grant to Vintage Radio to help support their work in reaching out to the older community by means of radio and the internet. Click here to download the flyer.

"Vintage Radio is a community radio station in Birkenhead set up and run entirely by older people for older people. “Since my husband died I didn’t really want to go out. Vintage Radio helped me to find my feet. There’s so many nice people here – and you get to interview people too!”.

Vintage Radio will be back in 2010

 

We have received some funding that will allow us to buy some additional equipment but we are still not quite there yet. We have been awarded some funding to take us part way towards going back on-air later this year probably around May but we are still short of funds.

If you would like to make a donation to Vintage Radio to help get us on the air then please contact us by email. We hope to get a donate button available soon. We are planning to start broadcasting via the Internet from early April. This is not set in stone but watch this space for more details.

Vintage Radio is now off-air until the New Year

 

At 8pm on 28th November we succesfully completed our second RSL after a 3 week and a day long run. We hope to be back sometime in 2010. Because of OFCOM rules we have to wait at least 6months before being able to broadcast on the radio (on 87.7 FM) but we are looking to see if we can broadcast on the internet. Watch this space.

We've broken the 100K hits barrier for our web site - updated 15th December 2009

 

Here are the latest statistics up to the end of our RSL at November 2009. As you would expect there was peak during RSL1 in February 2009 but we have now finished our second broadcast (RSL2) and we had a total of 122,383 hits.

Vintage Radio is on Twitter and Facebook

 

Kim Townsend of the Media Trust, who came up to see us at Vintage Radio, was amazed at what we had achieved. As a result we are now on the Community Voices Facebook and Twitter sites! Kim's Community Voices blog about Vintage can be found at http://communityvoicesuk.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/vintage-radio/. Her Twitter page - "Community Voices", can be found at http://twitter.com/CommVoices

Late Night shows introduced by popular request

 

We are introducing a number of late night shows by popular request. Go to our Late Night page in our programmes menu or click here.

RSL2 supported by Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council

 

This broadcast (RSL2) was brought to you with the generous financial support of Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council.

Vintage Radio on BBC Radio Merseyside

 

Vintage Radio were featured in an interview with Claire Hamilton on her Drive Time show on BBC Radio Merseyside on the 6th October. To listen to the interview click here or go to our Archive page.

Runners Up in Best Radio station category

Click image to expand

 

We’ve come runners up in a prestigious national award given by the charityCounsel + Care, in the category Best Radio Station, for our portrayal of older people in the media. The competition was called Older People in the Media Awards. We were told that the competition was "extremely tough". The winners were BBC Radio Ulster - a professional radio station. We collected our award from Michael Heseltine in London early in September '09. To read a more detailed report click here.

RSL2 starts in November 2009 - watch this space

 

We recently set up a new management team to take Vintage Radio forward to our next broadcasting slot which we hope will be during November this year, subject to OFCOM licence approval.

Our current plan is to extend our broadcast duration from the 9 days of our first RSL (Restricted Service licence) held in February this year to 21 days. This is dependant on getting sufficient funds and programme content. We have applied to OFCOM for a licence and are waiting to hear from them. We are also seeking funds from a number of sources. Watch this space for more news.

Successful 2009 Vintage Radio conference

 

On the 25th June 2009 we had a conference in Birkenhead Town Hall to discuss Vintage Radio and the lessons learnt and shared our experiences with interested parties in the community. There were a number of hands-on workshops including Getting Started, Radio Drama, Technical Issues, Creative Writing and Bridging the Generation gap. Initial feedback from the delegates was very positive and a lot of excellent contacts were made. We hope to be publishing a report about the conference later.

Vintage Radio video

 

We now have a fantastic new video about Vintage Radio. It was produced by Bert Schroeder. Click here or go to the Video page.

A report about our first RSL by a 3rd party consultant

 

After we had finished RSL1 in March 2009 a report was written, canvassing the views of various people involved. It can be read by clicking here.

Granada web site video link

 

The Granada web site is being redesigned so we have lost the link to our news video. We hope to have it back soon.

Click here to see us on the TV. We were on Granada news on Monday 23rd February 2009 at 6-20pm.

The link will take you to the Granada TV web site. The video clip will load after a few seconds in a video player at the top of the page. Please be patient, as you have to wait until the advert finishes before you get to see the Vintage Radio clip. (You do need broadband to see this)

We are on the Clatterbridge Hospital web site

 

We also have a mention on the Clatterbridge hospital radio station web site. Click here to read it.

Interviewed by the BBC

 

We were interviewed by Lianne Harper of BBC Radio Merseyside during RSL1.

Kind words for Vintage Radio launch

 

They’ve said some nice things already! Support for Vintage Radio

“Good luck with this project”, Alan Crawford

“It’s a great project – absolutely fantastic!” Paul Bates

“Sounds unbelievable!” Jane Reynolds

“A great initiative!” Chris Ball

“Great to see it up and running” Kate Adams

“I’m extremely pleased that someone has finally made the first step to turn this excellent idea into reality” Alexandra Rogacewicz

“It’s always great to hear stories like this” Claire Routley

“I think this is really amazing” Liz Stacey

“A fascinating project…” David Sinclair

“This looks brilliant….” Sue Mann