THE Frome Talking Newspaper has proved to be a “lifeline” during the Covid-19 pandemic – not only for its listeners but for the person recording it, solo.
To ensure the service continued when lockdown restrictions were introduced in March, the Frome Talking Newspaper team moved the recording of the newspaper – which uses stories from Frome Times and the Frome Standard – from the studios of Frome FM at the Town Hall, to Liz Andrew’s dining room.
From her home and using equipment lent to her by Frome FM, Liz – who is the chair of Frome Talking Newspaper – has recorded weekly 28-minute programmes that have been broadcast on Frome FM three times a week.
“It was daunting at the beginning, thinking I was going to have to do this every week,” said Liz, talking to Frome Times. “I have a life and a family and other things going on, but as lockdown slowly unravelled, I realised that I didn’t have very little else to do. Apart from a fortnightly shopping trip, there wasn’t much else in my diary!
“So having a weekly job like this was also a lifeline for me – I knew what day it was for a start! I stuck to the routine of recording on a Thursday morning – the main challenge was hoping my dogs wouldn’t bark or interrupt!”
Prior to the pandemic, as well as broadcasting the Frome Talking Newspaper on Frome FM, copies of the programme on a memory stick were sent, free of charge by post, to listeners who are registered blind and partially sighted.
However, this service was temporarily put on hold due to Covid-19 restrictions, with regular listeners encouraged to listen to the programme on Frome FM or listen on-demand via the website.
“For people that use it,” explained Liz, “they want to know what’s going on in their town and they don’t want to feel left out – so it was important that we kept the service going throughout lockdown.
“It’s their link to the community – they can hear national news on mainstream radio, but it’s more difficult to hear news about your local area. It’s nice to hear what Fair Frome have been doing, or what’s been happening at the college, and stay connected to the community.
“However, we had to cut the show down from an hour to 28 minutes – in the height of lockdown there wasn’t really an hour’s worth of stories to use!
“But when the Frome Times was not being printed, the Frome Times website was a godsend to help find all the latest stories – it really helped to keep us going, especially during April and May when nothing much was going on!”
At their recent AGM, the Frome Talking Newspaper decided to continue with solo recordings of the programme whilst the Frome FM studios remain “out of bounds”, but there’s a break on the horizon for Liz.
Liz said, “We will be solo reading on a rota, so I have to train some of our readers on how to record the newspaper at home.
“The Frome Talking Newspaper team of volunteer readers are very committed and have been giving up their valuable time for many years – we are looking forward to the time when we can all get back to reading in our groups as before.”
The Frome Talking Newspaper is broadcast on Frome FM (96.6FM) on Mondays 12pm, Saturdays 12pm and Sundays 7am.
To listen to the Frome Talking Newspaper on-demand, visit the website: www.frome.fm/programmes/talk/frome-talking-newspaper/
