Editor's note: BBC local radio has always been pretty close to its listeners. In Manchester they're putting them on the air. We'll keep keep you up-to-date on the experiment - SB
When the marketing department came up with 'Be Part of It' as a slogan for BBC Local Radio, I wonder if they ever imagined we would take it quite as literally?
BBC Radio Manchester is giving over a whole day of programming in the new year to the audience. 'The Takeover' will put up to 24 people with no previous experience on the air.
The idea began when we were looking for ways to demonstrate our unique closeness to our audience. Radio Leeds famously described itself as 'your walk-in-and-talk' station when it launched in 1968. Audience expectations (and a shed-load of new rules) would never allow us to be quite as 'free love' nowadays.But if we could find a simple audition process, that took us all over our two cities and eight boroughs - then pre-record and check a number of hour-long shows, what could possibly go wrong? Well... I don't know yet. As the process is only just beginning.
The Takeover taxi begins its tour today, visiting 42 locations over three weeks. We'll be asking each candidate to record one minute in answer to a random question about themselves pulled from a hat.
The radio station management team will listen to every single one, and rank them. Then we'll invite up to 24 of them to some brisk training, idea gathering - and the inevitable compliance - to come and record an hour with us for transmission on the New Year Takeover. You can hear our debutantes on 3 January.
'Search for a Star' mechanics are hardly new. There are very few genuinely new ideas in a 100-year-old medium. But we reckon this is a new take on an old stunt.
Who knows who we'll find, what stories we'll uncover, and what lasting contacts we'll make with Greater Manchester communities as we go? We'll let you know as the weeks unfold.
John Ryan is Managing Editor of BBC Radio Manchester
- More about the takeover, including the schedule of visits, on the BBC Manchester web site.
- Alan Beswick launched the takeover on his breakfast show this morning.
- The video is the one made by the marketing department for the 'Be Part of It' campaign and the picture shows Alan with his Takeover taxi.
