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Jim McKee, René Auberjonois, Erik Bauersfeld, and Millicent
Dillon (left to right),
photograph by David M. Allen, 1999
Project Title: Locations
Recipient Organization: Bay Area Radio Drama
Lead Artist: Millicent
Dillon
Genre and Date Awarded: Literary Arts, January 1998
Premiered: KPFA Radio November 28-December 19, 1999
Lead artist Millicent Dillon, along with poets
Helen Cline, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and Gary
Soto, collaborated
with Bay Area Radio Drama. its producer Erik
Bauersfeld, and sound
designers Jim McKee and Randy
Thom to create four half-hour programs
exploring “locations.” Each
writer selected a Bay Area site of significance to them as a dramatic
setting and then examined and transformed that location through a
radio play that incorporated acoustical elements from the chosen
site. Professional actors and the writers themselves were featured
in the recordings. Writer Irene Oppenheim served as the project’s
creative consultant.
The “Locations” series was completed in fall 1999 and
broadcast over a number of stations, including KPFA-FM in Berkeley,
California, and KQED-FM and KALW-FM in San Francisco. Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s
piece was distributed internationally through German Radio (WDR Köln),
Studio Arts Akustica, as well as Finnish Radio. This was the second “Locations” series
produced by Bay Area Radio Drama: the first primarily featured collaborations
between sound designers and playwrights.
The writers selected for this series represented
a wide variety of literary genres and styles—creative nonfiction, fiction,
and poetry—and each selected a distinct environment to explore.
Biographer, playwright, and fiction writer Millicent Dillon was the
only writer among the four who previously had worked with Bay Area
Radio Drama (on the first “Locations” series) to create “By
The Water.” Dillon wrote, “As a writer of fiction and
biography, I am ordinarily isolated, and the chance to collaborate
with other artists in other media was very gratifying to me.”
For this second “Locations” series, Dillon created “Inside,” an
original radio drama, performed by actor Rene Auberjonois with sound
design by Jim McKee and music by Wieslaw Pogorselski. “Inside,” takes
place in a man’s interior soundscape, as a cacophony of urban
sounds assaults him from outside and pervade his inner world. Listeners
meet him in his room; follow him through the streets of a city, commuter
trains, and places such as highway and street tunnels where cars
blast their horns. Noise dominates his thoughts and personal life.
Driven to deafening himself, he substitutes the sounds of his own
physical interior for those outside. He searches but finds no understandable
cause for his loss of control over these sonic onslaughts.
In “The Soul of a Bell,” sound designer Randy Thom recorded
Helen Cline, an 80-year-old blind poet, accompanied by her guide
dog, at one of her regular locations, a Berkeley supermarket. She
tells listeners how she finds her way in her sightless world. They
follow her on the course of her daily errands, encountering the people
she meets. At the animal farm at Skywalker Ranch she then recalls
her rural childhood and love of animals. At these chosen locations
and in a recording studio, Cline recited and discussed her poetry.
Cline wrote, “I always know where I am by the sound. I like
the great supermarkets… the echoes, ambiance, footsteps, voices… people
say their shopping lists to themselves… but I hear them mumbling
the items! And, of course, the smells. The sounds and smells tell
me everything I need to know….” Helen’s guide
dog, Lady, became a major and unanticipated acoustical element in
the piece.
Poet and fiction writer Gary Soto’s “Teaching English” explored
the sounds of the site of his volunteer work—teaching English
to Latin American adults—at the High Street Presbyterian Church
in Oakland. Soto worked closely with sound designer Jim McKee to
create the piece, in which Soto describes his efforts to make English
useful to his students—to help them get jobs, and to help them
understand the ways of the United States. In the piece, listeners
often overhear the Guatemalan church choir rehearsals in the background,
but the voices of Soto’s students and his lively interactions
with them provide the principal sound element.
In poet and visual artist Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s “One
of these Days (or Nights),” a man and his dog wander up a mountain
and observe the solitude above and the worldly disasters below. Gunfire
and explosions shatter visions of “Paradiso”. Nightingales
and “the beating of wings” compete with army aircraft
and bombing. An oceanic tidal wave sweeps across the globe and wipes
out civilization. The two apocalyptic disasters, fire and water,
clear the earth for a new and better Paradiso. Listeners also get
to follow Ferlinghetti at two of his favorite locations—the
Saturday morning Farmer’s Market on the Embarcadero and the
neighboring Café de Stijl. To create the piece, San Francisco’s
first Poet Laureate collaborated with sound designer Jim McKee and
symphony musician Wieslaw Pogorzelski. Location recording was provided
by Maria Gilardin.
While the writers were the “lead artists” for this project,
their collaborative process depended upon working with two talented
sound designers—Jim McKee, of Earwax Studio and Academy Award
winner Randy Thom—and with Bay Area Radio Drama director, Erik
Bauserfeld. Erik Bauersfeld wrote at the project’s end, “On
each individual program, writer, sound designer, creative consultant,
and producer participated collectively in each stage of the work.”
Bay Area Radio Drama (BARD) is a radio drama
production, training, and consultation group, established as a
nonprofit organization in 1986. Its mission is to keep alive and
develop the art of radio, particularly radio drama, in this country.
Bay Area Radio Drama works in close association with KPFA-FM, in
Berkeley, California, where its president Erik Bauersfeld was Director
of Drama and Literature for 30 years. With funding from the National
Endowment for the Arts and other sources, Bay Area Radio Drama
has produced several series of original radio dramas, works by
such writers as Sam Shepard, Susan Griffin, André Codrescu,
Ed Bullins, and others. BARD also did the sound production for the
29-part dramatization of Sinclair Lewis’s Babbitt and
produced The Eugene O’Neill Radio Series, seven plays
under the direction of José Quintero, including Hughie, with
Jason Robards and The Emperor Jones with Joe Morton.
Millicent Dillon
Book Publications
- A Version of Love, a
novel, Norton (3002)
- Harry Gold, a
novel, Overlook Press (2000)
- You are not I: A Portrait
of Paul Bowles, University of California Press (1998)
- The Viking Portable Paul
and Jane Bowles (editor), Viking Penguin (1994)
- The Dance of the Mothers, a
novel, Dutton/NAL (1991)
- After Egypt: Isadora
Duncan and Mary Cassatt, a duobiography, Dutton/NAL (1990)
- Out in the World: The
Selected Letters of Jane Bowles (editor), Black Sparrow
Press (1985)
- A Little Original Sin:
The Life and Work of Jane Bowles, Holt, Rinehart and Winston
(1981)
- The One in the Back is
Medea, a novel, Viking (1973)
- Baby Perpetua and Other
Stories, Viking (1971)
Magazine Publications
Stories, essays, and reviews in Southwest Review, Threepenny
Review, The Nation, Times Literary Supplement, PN Review, Washington
Post, Ascent, The Chicago Tribune, The New Yorker, and others.
Plays
- “She is In Tangier” (1989)
- “Prisoners of Ordinary Need” (1991)
- “By the Water,” radio play commissioned
and produced by Bay Area Radio Drama (1995)
Honors and Awards
- Finalist,
PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, for Harry Gold (2001)
- Fellowship,
Guggenheim Foundation (1994)
- Independent
Study and Research Grants, National Endowment for the Humanities
(1993, 1977)
- O’Henry
Awards for the Short Story (1992, 1991, 1989, 1987, 1980)
- Story
included in Best
American Short Stories (1991)
- ROLM/Siemens-Michole
W. Nicholson Fellowship in Literature, Djerassi Foundation (1990)
- McGinnis
Award for Fiction, Southwest
Review (1990)
- Visiting
Scholar, Bellagio Study center, Rockefeller Foundation (1987)
- Travel
Grant, National Endowment for the Humanities (1986)
- Visiting
Scholar, Center for Research on Women, Stanford University (1985,
1986)
Employment
- Freelance
writer of fiction, biography, and drama (1983-present)
- Academic
writer, Stanford University (1974-1983)
- Instructor
in English and Creative Writing, Foothill College (1968-1973)
- Staff
Assistant, Association of Scientists for Atomic Education, Einstein
Emergency Committee (1948)
- Associate
Physicist, NEPA Project, Oak Ridge, Tennessee (1947)
- Technical
Assistant, Standard Oil Company of California (1946)
- Junior
Physicist, NDRC Project, Palmer Physical Laboratory, Princeton
University (1944-45)
Professional Experience
- President
and Director of Projects, Bay Area Radio Drama (BARD) (1986-present)
- Director
of Special Projects, Pacifica KPFA (1991-1996)
- Director of Drama & Literature,
Pacifica KPFA (1962-91)
Selected Productions
- “Locations,” a
series of original works based on recorded and specific acoustical
locations featuring Ellen Sebastian, John O’Keefe, Ed Bullins,
Millicent Dillon, Irene Oppenheim, and Randy Thom. Co-Produced with
WDR Köln, Funded by the NEA (1996)
- “Eugene O’Neill
Radio Project,” Lazarus Laughed, NEH Funding (1995)
- “Eugene O’Neill
Radio Project,” Hughie with Jason Robards, Directed
by José Quintero, NEH Funding, Broadcast NPR & BBC
(1992)
- Bay Area Radio Drama Series,
adapted and produced “The Horia,” (De Maupassant);
Object Piece, by Drury Pifer (Sound Design by Randy Thom); sound
pieces for radio co-produced by WDR, Cologne, NEA Funded (1992)
- “Eugene O’Neill
Radio Project,” The Emperor Jones, directed by
José Quintero,
Sound by Randy Thom, Joe Morton as Jones. NEH Funded. Broadcast
NPR. (1991)
- “Hörspiel/USA
Project,” Produced and directed Houses by Jurgen
Becker. Broadcast Pacifica Radio and WDR Köln (1991)
- “Art on Film Conference” (Metropolitan
and Getty Museums) Moderated panel on sound in relation to art
(1991)
- “PrixItalia,” represented
National Public Radio, President of Radio Drama Jury, Perugia,
Italy (1990)
- European
Broadcasting Union, represented NPR at conference, Florence,
Italy (1990)
- “Eugene O’Neill
Radio Project,” The Hairy Ape, directed by José Quintero,
Sound design by Randy Thom, NEH Funded, Broadcast NPR and BBC
(1989)
- “Hörspiel/USA
Project,” directed and produced Centropolis by
Walter Adler, broadcast Pacifica and WDR Köln (1989)
- Sound Design Conference,
In association with Randy Thom and Lucasfilm’s Skywalker
Sound Studios presented a conference for 50 radio producers (1989)
- Eugene O’Neill
Radio Project,” SS Glencalm (four plays of the
sea), Funding from the NEH, NEA, SPDF, Skaggs, WDR Klön
(1988)
- “Hörspiel/USA
Project,” production of Ophelia by Gerhard Ruhm,
directed by Klaus Schöning (1988)
- “Mind’s Eye Theatre,” adapted,
directed, and produced a three hour version of Dracula by
Bram Stoker (1988)
- Babbitt, sound
production for KCRW and LA Classic Theatre, 29 half-hour installments
of Sinclair Lewis’s novel (1987)
- European
Broadcasting Union, represented NPR at conference in Cologne
(1987)
- “Hörspiel/USA
Project,” production of three plays translated from the
German (1987)
- “Tales from the Shadows,” adapted
and produced a series of 13 bizarre classics by Dostoyevsky,
Gogol, Poe, Lovecraft, Kafka, Bierce, and others. (KPFA, KCRW and
NPR), Distributed by NPR and Pacifica (1987)
- Bay
Area Radio Drama Series (2), original works for radio by Sam
Shepard and seven other Bay Area writers (1986)
Helen Cline lost her sight at the age of three. Sixty years later,
after raising five children, she decided to make a poetic record
of her stay on the earth.
She attended the school for the blind in Berkeley, California and
studied writing at the Braille Institute in Los Angeles as well as
in Laney College in Oakland, California.
She studied music and became an accomplished pianist.
Cline’s poetry has been printed in Out
of Site, Out of… published
by the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department; and she has performed
readings of her work on KPFA-FM.
Cline reads Braille fluently. She writes with the use of a voice-activated
computer and currently is attending classes in computer science.
She lives in Berkeley, California, with her guide dog, Lady.
Poet Helen Cline (left), photograph by David M. Allen, 1999
(Excerpted from the City Lights Bookstore web
page—www.citylights.com/CLlf.html)
A prominent voice of the wide-open poetry movement
that began in the 1950s, Lawrence Ferlinghetti has written poetry,
translation, fiction, theater, art criticism, film narration, and
essays. Often concerned with politics and social issues, Ferlinghetti’s poetry
countered the literary elite’s definition of art and the artist’s
role in the world. Though imbued with the commonplace, his poetry
cannot be simply described as polemic or personal protest, for it
stands on his craftsmanship, thematics, and grounding in tradition.
Ferlinghetti was born in Yonkers in 1919. Following
his undergraduate years at the University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill, he saw service in the U.S. Navy in World War II as
a ship’s commander.
He received a Master’s Degree from Columbia University in 1947
and a Doctorate from the University of Paris (Sorbonne) in 1950.
In 1953, with Peter D. Martin, he founded City Lights Pocket Bookshop,
the first all-paperbound bookshop in the country, and by 1955 he
had launched the City Lights publishing house. The bookstore has
served for half a century as a meeting place for writers, artists,
and intellectuals.
Ferlinghetti was named San Francisco’s
Poet Laureate in 1998. His paintings have been shown at galleries
around the world, from the Butler Museum of American Art to The
Palace of Exhibitions in Rome.
His A Coney Island of the Mind (1958) has been translated
into nine languages and there are nearly 1,000,000 copies in print.
His most recent books are A Far Rockaway of the Heart (1997)
and How to Paint Sunlight (2001), published by New Directions,
New York. He also published two novels, Her (1960) and Love
in the Days of Rage (1988).
He has received many awards, including the Los Angeles Times Robert
Kirsch Award, the Bay Area Book Reviewers Association’s Fred
Cody Award for Lifetime Achievement, the National Book Critics Circle
Ivan Sandrof Award for Contribution to American Arts and Letters,
and the ACLU’s Earl Warren Civil Liberties Award, along with
several others in Italy. In 2003, he received the Authors’ Guild
Lifetime Achievement award, the Poetry Society of America’s
Robert Frost Medal, and was inducted into the American Academy of
Arts & Letters.
René Auberjonois (left), shown with producer Erik Bauersfeld,
recording the narrative for “Inside,” a radio drama
by Millicent Dillon, photograph by David Allen, 1999
Profile
Jim McKee is currently an active owner of Earwax Productions Inc.,
San Francisco, which he co-founded in 1983. He received his Master
of Fine Arts form The Center for Contemporary Music at Mills College
in Oakland, California, and his Bachelor of Music Education from
Shenandoah Conservatory of Music in Virginia. In addition to his
sound design work, he has lectured at YLE Radio in Helsinki Finland,
Western Public Radio, San Francisco State University, California
College of Arts and Crafts, and The College for Recording Arts.
Experience
As a sound designer, composer, engineer, and technical producer,
McKee works primarily with computers and tape, using concrete sound
elements and human voice to build impressionistic and abstract sound
environments. Works are generally designed in collaboration with
film producers, playwrights, radio producers, and performance artists
using multi-track recording, samplers, digital editing, computer
synthesis, and a wide variety of studio processing techniques. His
experience includes engineering and sound design for national broadcast
television, radio, commercial and drama, research and production
for interactive, multimedia and CD-Rom. Feature film credits include: Hanna’s
War, American Ninja 4, The Dolls, the Color of Honor, Vegas in Space,
The Motorist, Yellowstone for Destination Cinema; special effects
sound design for Bram Stoker’s Dracula; and design
and effects with American Zoetrope for The Secret Garden. He
also supervised and did effects for the IMAX film Whales.
Awards
As a partner in Earwax Productions Inc. since
1983, Jim McKee enjoys, along with two other partners, the reputation
of having been voted best sound design team in San Francisco. earwax
has also won honors in The Bay Area Critics Circle awards, Northern
California Broadcasters, Association of Independents in Radio,
along with grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and
the Academy Award for Francis Ford Coppola’s production of Bram Stoker’s Dracula for
which Jim contributed design concepts and sound effects along with
the sound team of Columbia Pictures and American Zoetrope.
Selected Clients
American Zoetrope, LucasFilm LTD, Pathe/MGM Entertainment,
Sega, Cannon Films, Destination Cinema, Apple Computer Inc., MTV,
Colossal Pictures, Banana Republic, Goodby Silverstein & Partners, Landor & Associates,
Magic Theater, Simon and Schuster, West German Radio, National Public
Radio, Royal Viking Lines, Visible Interactive, CAPS Software, Finnish
Broadcasting, Mondo Media, National Wildlife Federation, Hotwired,
Meta Design, Sea Studios, and many others.
Jim McKee recording poet Gary Soto, photograph by David Allen,
1999
Born and raised in Fresno, California, Gary Soto is the author of
nine poetry collections for adults, most notably New and Selected
Poems, a 1995 finalist for both the Los Angeles Times Book
Award and the National Book Award. His recollections Living
Up the Street received a Before Columbus Foundation 1985 American
Book Award. His poems have appeared in many literary magazines, including The
Nation, Ploughshares, The Iowa Review, Ontario Review and Poetry, which
has honored him with the Bess Hokin Prize and the Levinson Award
and by featuring him in “Poets in Person. He is one of the
youngest poets to appear in The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry. He
has received the Discovery-The Nation Prize, the U.S. Award
of the International Poetry Forum, the California Library Association’s
John and Patricia Beatty Award (twice), a Recognition of Merit from
the Claremont Graduate School (for Baseball in April), the
Silver Medal from The Commonwealth Club of California, and the Tomás
Rivera Prize, in addition to fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation,
the National Endowment for the Arts (twice), and the California Arts
Council. For ITVS, Soto produced the film, The Pool Party, which
received the 1993 Andrew Carnegie Medal. He also has developed the
opera Nerdlandia for the Los Angeles Opera. Taken together,
his books for adults and young people have sold over a million copies.
Soto lives with his family in Berkeley, California.
Poetry Titles
- One Kind of Faith, Chronicle
Books (2003)
- Junior College,
Chronicle Books (1997)
- Canto Familiar/Familiar
Song, Harcourt Brace (1995)
- New and Selected Poems, Chronicle
Books (1995)
- Neighborhood Odes, Harcourt
Brace (1992)
- Who in Religion, Chronicle
Books, San Francisco (1991)
- A Fire in My Hands, Scholastic
Inc. (1990)
- Black Hair, University
of Pittsburgh Press (1985)
- Where Sparrows Work Hard, University
of Pittsburgh Press (1981)
- The Tale of Sunlight, (University
of Pittsburgh Press (1978)
- The Elements of San Joaquin, University
of Pittsburgh Press (1977)
Prose Titles
- The Afterlife (2003)
- Pacific Crossing (2003)
- Nickel and Dime, University
of New Mexico Press
- Buried Onions,
Harcourt Brace (1997)
- Summer on Wheels, Scholastic
(1995)
- Jesse, Harcourt
Brace (1994)
- Crazy Weekend, Harcourt
Brace (1994)
- Local News, Harcourt
Brace (1993)
- Pieces of the Heart:
Recent Chicano Fiction, Chronicle Books (1993)
- Pacific Crossing, Harcourt
Brace (1992)
- Taking Sides, Harcourt
Brace (1991)
- A Summer Life, University
Press of New England (1990); Dell (1991)
- Baseball in April, Harcourt
Brace (1990)
- California Childhood (editor),
Creative Arts Book Company (1988)
- Lesser Evils, Arte
Publico (1988)
- Small Faces, Dell
paperback reissue (1993)
- Living Up the Street, Dell
paperback reissue (1992)
Picture Books from G.P. Putnam’s
Sons
- Chato and the Party Animals (1998)
- Snap Shots from the Wedding (1997)
- Old Man and His Door (1996)
- Chato’s
Kitchen (1995)
- Too Many Tamales (1993)
Play
- Novio Boy, Harcourt Brace (1997)
Honors and Affiliations
- Received
the Academy Award for The Right Stuff
- Nominated
for seven Academy Awards, Best Sound: The Right Stuff, Never Cry Wolf, Return of
the Jedi, Wild at Heart, Backdraft, Forrest Gump (Best Sound,
Best Sound Editing)
- Nominated
for an Emmy, Best Sound: Ewok’s Children’s Special
- Nominated
for a Grammy, Best Spoken Word Recording: War of the Worlds, 50th Anniversary
- Member
of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
- Member
of the British Film Academy
- Staff
Sound Designer/Mixer at Lucasfilm (1983-1989)
- President
of Ear Circus, a sound art production company (since 1989)
- Author and director, “Dream
Train,” a Dolby Inc. Promotional Film
- Author
of Audiocraft,
textbook used in over 100 universities
Film Credits
- Sound
Designer, Starship
Troopers, Paul Verhoven
- Sound
Designer, Mimic, Guillermo
Del Toro
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Contact, Robert Zemeckis
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Mars Attack, Tim Burton
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, The Frighteners, Peter Jackson
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Jumanji, Joe Johnson
- Sound
Designer, Nine
Months, Chris Columbus
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Species, Roger Donaldson
- Re-recording
Mixer (Effects), Disclosure, Barry
Levinson
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Forrest Gump, Robert Zemeckis
- Supervising
Mixer, Saint
of Fort Washington, Tim Hunter
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Wild at Heart, David Lynch
- Supervising
Mixer, Cry
Baby, John Waters
- Re-recording
Mixer (Effects), Always, Steven
Spielberg
- Re-recording
Mixer (Dialog), Tucker, Francis
Coppola
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Colors, Dennis Hooper
- Re-recording
Mixer (Dialog), Gardens
of Stone, Francis Coppola
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Spaceballs, Mel Brooks
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, Latino, Haskell Wexler
- Supervising
Mixer and Sound Designer, The Grand Canyon, Keith Merrill
- Re-recording
Mixer (Music), Indiana
Jones, Steven Spielberg
- Production
Mixer, Re-recording Mixer (Music) Return of the Jedi, Richard
Marquand
- Re-recording
Mixer (Effects), Principal Effects Recordist, The Right Stuff, Phil
Kaufman
- Production
Mixer, Never
Cry Wolf, Carroll Ballard
- Production
Mixer, Rumblefish, Francis
Coppola
- Principal Effects Recordist, Apocalypse Now, Francis Coppola
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