A dining table DJ in tune with the world
I WAS interested to read about Deke Duncan, who has broadcast his radio show from a shed at the bottom of his garden for 40 years to an audience of just one — his wife (Mail). This is a quaint and quirky story about a quintessential English eccentric, but if he had really wanted to be a radio presenter, there are so many different outlets he could have used to broadcast to a much bigger audience. I started in broadcasting 20 years ago. Much to the disapproval of my wife, I set up a radio station on our dining table, but rather than do the show just for her, I decided to broaden my horizons and broadcast on the internet. All I had to do was plug into a streaming service and the show was not only going out on air in my local town, but all around the world. My show played the same style of music, Northern soul/Motown, as Deke champions. For six years I broadcast from my home and in that time the audience built up to more than 100,000 listeners a month. This success helped me to get radio shows on community radio stations and eventually a weekly show on BBC Radio Northampton. The essence of radio broadcasting is to show your presenting skills, music and programme to the widest possible audience, not just one person a few feet away in the same house. There are so many opportunities Deke could have used over those 40 years, such as hospital radio, community radio and internet radio. Most of these stations are desperate for volunteer broadcasters. He could even have recorded his shows and broadcast them as a podcast. It is difficult to get onto the BBC even at local level, but if he really wanted it, there were plenty of other radio openings he could have explored. I work in community radio six days a week, all thanks to that first show broadcast from my dining table.