As a freelance sound engineer, editor and producer I have worked for diverse and interesting clients in the fields of talking books, audio documentary productions and full-cast audio drama. The work entails being involved at all stages of production from recording through editing, addition of sound effects and ambiences, adding specially composed music and mixing to the final production of a CD master. Primary clients have included RNIB Talking Books, Big Finish Productions (a BBC licensee), and BBC Audiobooks. I was a member of the Audiobook Publishing Association and remain active in the Audio Engineering Society.
RNIB Talking Books
I have produced, directed and edited countless accessible talking book projects within this organisation, with significant projects including:
- Matterhorn (Karl Marlantes/Christopher Ragland)
- Payback (Andy McNab & Robert Rigby / Stuart Crossman)
- A Discovery of Witches (Deborah E. Harkness / Imogen Church)
- Jamrach's Menagerie (Carol Birch / Steve Hodson)
- The Maid (Kimberly Cutter / Karina Fernandez)
- The Rose Garden (Susanna Kearsley / Elaine Claxton)
- I Am The Cheese (Robert Cormier / Alex Daniels)
- Aesop's Fables (Aesop / Giles Abbott)
- Whirlwind (Aubrey Malone / John Cormack)
- The Wrestling (Simon Garfield/Alex Lowe)
- No Mean City (A. McArthur & H. Kinglsey Long/Angus King)
- Storyteller: The Life of Roald Dahl (Donald Sturrock/Andrew Wincott)
- Cary Grant: A Biography (Marc Eliot/Kenneth Jay)
- The Heart of Mid-Lothian (Walter Scott/Jonathan Hackett)
- The Girl on the Landing (Paul Torday/Carolyn Bonnyman & Hugh Ross)
- History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire: Volume The First and Second (Edward Gibbon/Michael Tudor Barnes)
- Look Back In Hunger: The Autobiography (Jo Brand/Felicity Duncan)
- All The Nice Girls (Joan Bakewell/Jane Goddard)
- Entirely Up To You, Darling (Richard Attenborough & Diana Hawkins/Ian
Redford & Diana Bishop)
- A Darkness At Sethanon (Raymond E. Feist/David Thorpe)
- USS Seawolf (Patrick Robinson/Garrick Hagon)
- Marius The Epicurean: His Sensations and Ideas (Walter Pater/Steve
Hodson)
- The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh (Ronald de Leeuw/Paul Herzberg)
- The Jews From Alexander To Herod (D. S. Russell/David Graham)
- The Brighest Star in the Sky (Marion Keyes/Lara Hutchison)
- Six For Laramie (Rick Dalmas/Simon Lee Philips)
- Sovereign (C. J. Sansom/Mark Elstob)
- Chains (Laurie Halse Anderson/Regina Reagan)
- The Complaints (Ian Rankin/Andrew Watson)
- Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything (Elizabeth Gilbert/Laurel Lefkow)
- Bel Canto (Ann Patchett/Joan Walker)
- Parrot and Olivier in America (Peter Carey/Matt Addis)
- Notes to my Mother-in-Law (Phyllida Law/Joanna Mackie)
- Wedlock: How Georgian Britain's Worst Husband Met His Match (Wendy
Moore/Kirsty Cox)
- Cutting For Stone (Abraham Verghese/Garrick Hagon)
- Dali: A Biography (Meredith Etherington-Smith/Joan Walker)
- Michelle Obama In Her Own Words (Michelle Obama/Lachele Carl)
- Must You Go?: My Life With Harold Pinter (Antonia Fraser/Veronica Hyks)
- An Education (Lynn Barber/Jane Goddard)
- Dear Olly (Michael Morpurgo/Damian Lynch)
- The Big Sky (A. B. Guthrie/William Roberts)
- The Glittering Prizes (Frederick Raphael/Graham Seed)
- Very Valentine (Adriana Trigiani/Francine Brodkin)
- The Help (Kathryn Stockett/Adjoa Andoh, Alibe Parsons & Sarah Borges)
- Dead Spy Running (Jon Stock/David Thorpe)
- A Dark Matter (Peter Straub/Mark Elstob)
- The Russian Empire, 1801-1917 (Hugh Seton-Watson/Steve Hodson)
- The Complete Essays of Michel de Montaigne (Michel de Montaigne/Jonathan
Oliver)
- American Prince: My Autobiography (Tony Curtis/William Roberts)
- Desert of the Heart (Jane Rule/Francine Brodkin)
- One Flew Into The Cuckoo's Egg: My Autobiography (Bill Oddie/Kevin
Fuller)
- The Right Stuff (Lori Wilde/Regina Reagan)
- Dreaming The Eagle (Manda Scott/Frances Jeater)
- Dreaming The Bull (Manda Scott/Frances Jeater)
- Dreaming The Hound (Manda Scott/Di Langford)
- Beloved (Toni Morrison/Alibe Parsons)
- Heading Home (Katie Flynn/Suzanne Goldberg)
- Signed, Sealed, And Delivered: The Soulful Journey of Stevie Wonder (Mark Ribowsky/Peter Brooke)
- Z-Rex (Steve Cole/Jonathan Forbes)
- American Tabloid (James Ellroy/John Chancer)
- Adrian Mole: The Prostrate Years (Sue Townsend/David Thorpe)
- The Island of Adventure (Enid Blyton/Lucy Tregear)
- The Castle of Adventure (Enid Blyton/Lucy Tregear)
- The Mystery of the Burnt Cottage (Enid Blyton/Lucy Tregear)
- A Dream of Her Own (Benita Brown/Gloria Sanders)
- The Kindly Ones (Jonathan Littell/Steve Hodson)
- Being Jewish: The Spiritual and Cultural Practice of Judaism Today (Ari
L. Goldman/David Graham)
- Bad Science (Ben Goldacre/Adrian Grove)
- The Story of O (Pauline Reage/Rosie Newton)
- My Shit Life So Far (Frankie Boyle/Angus King)
- Annie Lennox: The Biography (Bryony Sutherland/Carolyn Bonnyman)
- Michael Owen: The Biography (Oliver Derbyshire/Tom Stanley)
- The Angel's Game (Carlos Ruiz Zafon/David Thorpe)
- Doctor Who and the Face of Evil (Terrance Dicks/Louise Jameson)
- The Sleepwalker (Robert Muchamore/Laurence Dobiesz)
- The General (Robert Muchamore/Laurence Dobiesz)
- Sex in the City: London (various/various)
- The Crooked Scythe: An Anthology of Oral History (George Ewart
Evans/Richard Derrington)
- AD 500: A Journey Through The Dark Isles of Britain and Ireland (Simon
Young/Peter Kenny)
- Song of Time (Ian R. MacLeod/Helen Bourne)
- The Devil Rides Out (Paul O'Grady/Peter Kenny)
- The city & The City (China Mieville/Matt Addis)
- The Man Who Lives With Wolves (Shaun Ellis & Penny Junor/Mark Elstob)
- Cardturner (Louis Sachar/Simon Lee Philips)
- Ellis Island (Kate Kerrigan/Maggie Cronin)
- Babylon: Mesopotamia and the Birth of Civilization (Paul Kriwaczek/Paul Herzberg)
- The Dressmaker (Benita Brown/Gloria Sanders)
- Fall Of Giants (Ken Follett/Jonathan Oliver)
- Beware The Demon Headmaster (Gillian Cross/Lucy Tregear)
- The Heart of Mid-Lothian (Walter Scott/Jonathan Hackett)
- Beginners (Raymond Carver/William Roberts)
- Daughters of Fire (Barbara Erskine/Sally Armstrong)
- At The Mountains of Madness (H. P. Lovecraft/William Roberts)
- Doctor Who: Frontios (Christopher H. Bidmead/Beth Chalmers)
- Shakespeare: The World As A Stage (Bill Bryson/William Roberts)
- Pillow Talk (Freya North/Felicity Duncan)
- Voyage: A Novel Of 1896 (Sterling Hayden/William Roberts)
- The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner (Alan Sillitoe/Stephen Thorne & Malcolm Hamilton)
- Fever Crumb (Philip Reeve/ Damian Lynch)
- Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall (Kazuo Ishiguro/Matt
Addis, Peter Brooke & David Thorpe)
- Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters (Rick Riordan/Peter Brooke)
- The Damned United (David Peace/David Thorpe)
- The Lost Symbol (Dan Brown/Stuart Milligan)
- The Caged Virgin: A Muslim Woman's Cry For Reason (Ayaan Hirsi
Ali/Desola Haastrup)
- The Eight (Katherine Neville/Charlotte Strevens)
- The Yiddish Policeman's Union (Michael Chabon/William Roberts)
- This Charming Man (Marion Keyes/Lara Hutchison, Grainne Gillis, John
Cormack & Deirdre O'Connell)
- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (Jane Austen and Seth
Grahame-Smith/Charlotte Thompson)
- Middlesex (Jeffrey Eugenides/Peter Brooke)
- The Diary of Pelly-D (LJ Adlington/Sarah Kants)
- Just Listen (Sarah Dessen/Jennifer Woodward)
- Pippi Longstocking (Astrid Lindgren/Tania Emery)
- The Mister Meddle Stories (Enid Blyton/Lucy Scott)
- Teacher's Dead (Benjamin Zephaniah/Clive Llewellyn)
- Nudge (Richard H Thaler and Cass R Sunstein/Stuart Milligan)
- Goodnight Beautiful (Dorothy Koomson/Adjoa Andoh)
- Double Cross (Malorie Blackman/Emma Noakes & Laurence Dobiesz)
- Engleby (Sebastian Faulks/Stuart Crossman)
...and for audible.com in association with RNIB Talking Books and Rushforth Media:
- The Dark Tourist (Dom Joly/Dom Joly)
- How To Save An Hour Every Day (Michael Heppell/Michael Heppell)
- I Am The Market (Luca Rastello & Jonathan Hunt/Paul Thornley)
Big Finish Productions
Since 2001, an important client has been Big Finish Productions, makers of full-cast audio dramas for CD release (and occasional radio or internet broadcast) and of interview/documentary releases and talking book projects. I have been involved at all stages of audio production from studio recording, through editing, sound design, music composition and mixing to mastering for CD release or broadcast. I have contributed significant creative effort (sound design and music) to over one hundred such releases over the past decade, and technical effort to many, many more. More information... »
BBC Audiobooks / AudioGO
I have produced, recorded, edited and mixed diverse Doctor Who 'narrated soundtrack' releases - an ongoing project for AudioGO (formerly BBC Audiobooks) - in addition to interviewing the narrators for 'added value' material on the CD releases. I also successfully undertook the preparation, research, interviewing and editing of interview material for various BBC Audiobooks talking books releases. More information... »
AudioVisual Miscellany
Clients for various sound design, forensic sound work, editing, mixing, music composition or coding solutions include: War Child, Keane, The Prodigy, BBC Worldwide & 2 entertain, Revelation Films, UKTV Style, Covert Productions for Tenth Planet, Agincourt Productions, Arts Council project Creative Partnerships and many more. This brief summary does not include hobby projects or tasks undertaken for free or at mates' rates, of which there have been many (short films including the award-winning Speechless, voice tapes for actor colleagues, work for school performances, recording of local musical performers, and so on.)
Writing and Interviewing
I have contributed to various publications including Doctor Who Magazine, TV Zone, Shivers, the Licence Denied compilation and the Children in Need Doctor Who: A Celebration 2006 brochure. I was invited by comedians Richard Herring and Stewart Lee to contribute research material on Doctor Who to a show they compiled for BBC2's Monster Night (Reasonably Scary Monsters) in 1998, and to the last edition of the second series of This Morning With Richard Not Judy in 1999. A few pieces originally commissioned by Doctor Who Magazine are online here at this site. I've also interviewed various writers, directors and actors in print, for CD dissemination and on stage.