All the Empire Will Be Listening...

New Zealand Listener, Volume 22, Issue 547, 16 December 1949, Page 9

All the Empire Will Be Listening...

ADIO’s part in the 1950 Empire Games in Auckland will be the longest sustained coverage ever attempted by the NZBS. Commentators from Australia and the BBC will assist the New Zealand team of experts, who will arrange for daily news of the «results to be flashed through radio-telephone channels and the shortwave station Radio New Zealand to all parts of the Empire. Apart from radio, a concentration of 59 pressmen — the largest group of topflight journalists ever to assemble in New Zealand-will gather in Auckland to give a complete press coverage of the Games, among them representatives of over a dozen leading overseas papers as well as agents for Reuters and the rest of the world’s major wire news services. The sole film rights of the Games are in the hands of the National Film Unit under the direction of Stanhope Andrews, from whom newsreel shots of the Games will be sent to the world’s leading movie companies. Peter Hennessy, the J. Arthur Rank cameraman at present in New Zealand making a documentary for the This Modern Age series, will also incorporate some shots of the Games in his film. Behind this all-out effort by the authorities to ensure that the world gets as complete a picture as possible of tne Games, lies a story of complex organising within the NZBS itself which has been going on since before Winston McCarthy, the chief NZBS sports commentator, went to South Africa with the All Blacks last April. Last week a final round table discussion was held in Wellington between Broadcasting Service officials and Laurie Cleal, organising secretary to the Games Committee. At this meeting last minute details of the broadcasting coverage were thrashed out. Tep Commentetors Although at that stage it was still not certain what the number of competitors in each event would be, it was arranged that the main New Zealand coverage would be given by Station 1YA, Auckland, which will handle all the major events completely, from first heats to finals. At certain times during the day all the YA and YZ stations will be linked to give either actual commentaries on or results of important events, or more general surveys with eye-witness accounts of the day’s highlights. The commercial network of the NZBS will be concerned mainly with giving results and broadcasting biographical interviews with world-famous competitors. Some special. events may be broadcast from the commeréial stations at later dates. The shortwave station Radio New Zea-

land, which is normally beamed to Australia and the Pacific, will broadcast the same amount of coverage as the YA and YZ stations. To handle this mass of work the NZBS has called on its best radio commentators under the leadership of Winston McCarthy. The Service has also been able to draw on some of the top Australian commentators who are being sent over-men such as Talbot Duckmanton, who covered the Maori Rugby tour of Australia last winter, and F. Carlile. McCarthy will probably deal with the rowing, athletics, and boxing events, J. S. King of 1YA with wrestling and athletics, Duckmanton with rowing and boxing, and Carlile with the swimming. These men, equipped with microphones and mobile »recording apparatus, and assisted by staffs of technicians and walkie-talkie operators, will give running commentaries on the actual events, whether they are at Eden Park, the Olympic Swimming Pool in Newmarket, or on the distant waters of Lake Karapiro. But commentary in each event is only half the job. All commentaries have to be recorded, partly for posterity, and partly so that a continuous news service can be maintained to other countries by radio telephone or shortwave-news ‘that is interspersed with highlights from the actual events. For this purpose an edit‘ing staff is being assembled in Auckland, including Patrick Jubb and George Looker of the BBC, and Bernard Kerr of the ABC. At the newly-completed recording studios of 1YA a central organisation point is being established where all recordings of events will be sent as soon as they are made. Results will also be sent there by telephone, and during the day, probably at every hour, a summary of results collated at this nervecentre will be broadcast. At a set time each evening. a summary of the day's activities, together with highlights and snippets from, recorded commentaries will also be heard. The BBC bulletins will be sent to London by radio. telephone twice daily, in the afternoon and evening, and ABC bulletins will be sent to Sydney every two hours until midnight, also by radio telephone. South Africa and Canada are not sending their own radio representatives, but bulletins of results wNl be sent on to them by the assembled team of broadcasters. Night and Day Athletics, swimming, boxing, cycling, road cycling, wrestling, and rowing will be covered by running commentaries, except that the road cycling will be covered only by start, finish, and progress reports. Diving, fencing, weightlifting, and lawn bowls will be covered

by results only, and the water polo by a brief review. Where events go on into the night the coverage will be kept up as results come to hand, until shortly before midnight, when an Empire Games Stop Press or late results programme will be broadcast. The athletics will start on the afternoon of Saturday, February 4, and the swimming and wrestling on the evening of the same day. From then on, the broadcasting marathon will continue until, the last cycling event on Saturday, February 11. Arrangements are being made for the Empire Games ‘church service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Sunday, February 7, to be broadcast, while the official | opening and closing ceremonies will also be broadcast in full. During the week that the Games are in progress, over 50 hours of broadcasting time will be devoted to them by the National stations alone, but in addition to this a considerable number of preliminary broadcasts will be made. J. S. King, the 1YA sports announcer, will go out to the Ardmore Camp (where the athletes are being housed) as soon as the teams arrive in the country, and he will conduct radio interviews with the members of each team before the Games start, discussing such matters as their fitness, hopes of winning and so on. He will also conduct short biographical interviews with the more famous figures among the competitors, and these will be broadcast in pre-Games radio sessions. é Radio Previews Every Thursday evening at 7.0 o’clock 1YA is at present broadcasting up-to-the-minute news about the Games in its Empire Games News session. This broadcast is being kept as topical as possible, and is thoroughly up-to-date. with news about details of organisation and the latest reports from the competing nations. Bernard. Kerr, the ABC’s acting federal sporting supervisor, who will direct the Australian coverage of the games, is well-known in Australia for his coverage of Sheffield Shield cricket, and his Rugby League, soccer, and Davis Cup tennis commentariem When Jack Kramer, the world’s professional tennis champion, visited Australia last year he invited Kerr to do the loudspeaker work at his big night exhibitions played in Sydney. George Looker, who is helping Patrick Jubb, the BBC’s representative in the Pacific, to cover the Games for the BBC,\is a former Australian who in 1949 became organiser for the Pacific and South African services of the BBC. He left London en route for New Zealand . towards the end of November.