One of the most memorable childhood pastime is listening to the radio. Summer days were spent lying on my father’s big bed. After the news at noon the radio played theme songs of the latest movies, followed by story-telling and Chinese opera excerpts.
At seven-thirty at night our maid would set up the ironing board in the kitchen. I sat on the low stool while she ironed, and together we listened to our favorite radio show, Diary of a Stout-hearted Husband, a comic parody on family life.
My connection with the radio remains, with live-in partner Dore Stein (Tangents Music Radio, KALW), friends Avotcja and Stephen Kent, hosting shows on KPOO and KPFA. Tomorrow my voice will come out of the radio during Jack Foley’s Cover to Cover show (KPFA, 3pm). I had often wondered what was on the other side of that box that I spent so much time with. Now I know, and it still amazes me.
And on radio you shall be.
(So says the goddess of radio transmissions
and she is correct in this,
though at times she is erratic-y and static-y)
My dear Ms. Hsu (you!),
your charm and your wit
transmit.
Well, it seems the goddess of transmissions was with the recording but not fully with the broadcast.
The sound of the recording KPFA broadcast was far from perfect. We in the control room tried various strategies. The sound wasn’t horrible (the problem was, in fact, mostly in the channel that I was speaking into)but it wasn’t right either.
We discovered after the broadcast ended that the culprit was a faulty CD player. We put the CD in another player and it sounded just fine.
My apologies to Clara and to Cathy Dana and Nanette Deetz.
I plan to rebroadcast the show–this time with good sound.