Task 3

I am going to analyse two radio dramas one Post-modern and the other
Traditional. A traditional Radio drama is one which is realistic and old. Whereas
post-modern radio dramas have more wide spread of genres such as Sci-Fi and
Fantasy. I am going to be looking at The Archers first for my Traditional Radio
drama and then followed by The Old Mans Confession for Post Modern Radio
Drama.
Traditional Radio Drama
The Music at the start is already telling us that this Radio Drama is of the
Traditional genre, this means they have thought about codes well and chosen
that song for their radio drama because it seems very traditional. Music is a key
part to both Traditional and Post Modern as it sets the pace to a drama and is
another way of telling us what is going on as there is no images, it is a very
clever technique which I will follow when making my drama. The words spoken
by the characters to each other arent very formal which shows the first two
people we hear must be relatives or friends, their conversation flows and it isnt
awkward whatsoever they also dont speak to impress they are relaxed in what
they say.
Ambridge is a made up place where The Archers live, from what we hear of their
voices they sound like farmers and therefore live on a farm in the countryside. A
persons speech or accent distinguishes where they are from in Radio Dramas as
we do not have pictures to see where we are. Most Radio dramas choose to have
accents when recording. Silence doesnt occur a lot in this radio drama and
doesnt occur a lot in Radio Drama in general as people are often quick to
change station on radio if there is too much silence therefore they have done
right not to have too much of it. The only silences are between changing scene.
Even then there is still small sounds to let the viewer know its meant to be
there.
Aural signposting is a common used technique in Radio Drama. It is the
technique to use sound effects to create an image in someones head whilst they
are listening to the drama. For example in this Radio Drama they used it in the
first scene as the sound effect of a door opening suggesting they are in a house,
telling us they are in a house. A very simple yet effective way of portraying an
image in someones head used both in Traditional and Post Modern Radio Drama.
Another technique often used in Radio Drama is Cliff-hangers. They are a good
way to keep the audience entertained and makes them want to watch the next
episode. This production company used this technique at the very end to let us
find out whether Henry will be adopted.
Between scenes you have to have a nice flow to each so therefore you use fade.
The Archers have used use of Fade well between scenes by fading out the
speech and the music at the end of each scene. Fade is used a lot in Radio
dramas as it is the only way they can show the scene is changing without saying
scene 1 scene 2. When listening to this Radio Drama we start to understand
relationships between characters this is called characterisation and the way the
narrators speak in their roles. The first two women we hear we know are two
country women who are nice and know each other well whereas the second
scene we hear the man and the woman and they seem hesitant to one another
meaning their relationship isnt stable. Chronological Development also took

place in this radio drama as there was no flashbacks the drama was in the
correct order.
The drama itself does not include any narration besides the actors speaking their
lines. In other words there is no narrator telling the story. The lines of the actors
is still called narration but in a very different form of narration were used to
hearing. Its just normal speaking, a lot of traditional dramas do this as it is an
old fashioned technique compared to the modern voiceovers making it effective
as it distinguishes it is traditional. All of the speech in the drama is direct as
there is none in the background this means that the production company wanted
to keep their focus on whats going on in the script so the audience can clearly
hear whats going on. Titles and Credits are obviously a key part to any
production but clearly not to this one they only had music to come in and out.
So far I have talked about the Codes of a Radio Drama and the Conventions Im
now going to move on to talking about Styles and how they differ between Post
Modern and Traditional Radio Drama's. When making a Radio Drama you must
take into account your TA and who is going to want to listen to your production.
This Dramas target audience reaches out to that of the older generation and
therefore has a traditional feel to It, with the farm location and the countryside
accent we can tell this is the aim and they have made it relevant to the target
audience well.
As this was a traditional radio drama not a lot was going on it was quite plain and
old fashioned. I mean to say that it had no Dramatic Reconstruction. This is when
noises and things in the studio make the play very dramatic. This Radio drama I
noticed should have used some Dramatic Reconstruction. The traditional drama
kept their traditional drama styles and didnt use any modern techniques like we
would see in Post-Modern Drama for example Narration and Flashbacks would be
used whereas they werent used in this keeping its drama style old. This means
that it is relevant to the target audience as it appeals to the older generation.
The mood can change with both the drama and within the drama. The mood in a
horror play would be different to that in a Sci-Fi. But moods can also change of
course within the play for example, at the start of this drama the mood was
smooth until we met the other two characters where their relationship was
strange and made the mood quite awkward.
Audiences always consider how long a radio drama is going on for when they are
listening to it which is why Duration needs to always be considered when
producing a Radio Drama, It cant be too long or too short otherwise the
audience will quickly change. 12 minutes is the duration of this Episode of the
archers and I think that it is of a perfect length.
There is three parts to this Radio Drama or three scenes. The first with the two
women the second with the man and woman and the last one finally was two
other women. We just heard conversation and then fading to another its
Narrative Structure wasnt really showing as the conversations were completely
irrelevant. When making Traditional Radio drama you must use old fashioned and
formal narrative structure, it creates more originality. The plot also wasnt great
as it didnt flow, a Radio drama must have a plot or it sounds a bit shambles like
this Episode.

Post-Modern Radio Drama

The Blinds mans confession is a Horror story, the start shows scary music how it
should which links well when talking about Target Audience and relevance to the
genre. The music at the start is scary and this is a horror story so the two link
nicely and is an obvious but good technique to this Post Modern Drama. The
audience of this Horror Story is going to be Horror fans so they will also like the
scary music gaining attention to the company. The music fades out and we begin
to hear a story being told by a man with a fierce but quiet voice this makes the
atmosphere of the drama better as it is what you would expect from a Horror
drama. Post Modern Dramas use a lot of different techniques when producing
such as sound effects. For example at the start along with the man speaking we
hear car tyres screeching and a car engine these are two very modern sound
effects you would rarely find in Traditional Radio Drama compared to them being
so commonly used in post-modern. From this we can also see that the man is
explaining a story of him in a car, otherwise known as a flashback. We see this
here in The Blinds Mans Confession but not in The Archers showing that
Traditional and Post-Modern drama techniques are very different. There is
absolutely no silence at the beginning of this Drama keeping the audience
entertained as the action develops even more as we hear the character start to
drown when he crashed the car. The ambience around helps us hear whats
going on in the drama.
Another way of using sound effects is formally known as Aural Signposting. This
Drama used lots and lots of effects. Most Post-modern radio dramas will use a lot
of aural signposting and it is a very clever technique as I was really drawn in to
listen to these interesting sounds. There is no cliff-hanger ending for this Drama
which is a shame as Horror always is good with sequels. Post-modern uses this
more than Traditional because they are a new technique used in writing.
Because the Narrative Structure of this Post Modern play is quite simple it means
that Use of Fade doesnt occur a lot. Use of fade is a technique used in all
production to make it flow and sound or look better. Narrative Structure is also
very important when writing a Radio Drama as it shows that you want it to sound
professional. We only know of two Characters throughout the whole of the Drama
that is the boy and the Old man. The boy sound quite young and therefore has a
reason to be going fast in his car as we heard. Characterisation happens
throughout a Drama and is the relationship between characters and what they
are like. We never actually hear the old man speak we just hear him being
spoken about which makes him even more scary. A very clever form of
Characterisation. The Chronological Development was very good as you can hear
the Drama was spoken in order and had a real story feel to it. There was a
spoken Title and Credit at the start and end of the Drama this lets the audience
know what they are about to listen to and what they have just listened to. Most if
not all Radio Dramas will have both Title and Credits.
Post-modern Radio Dramas are famously known for having cool sound effects.
This Radio Drama has lots and lots of Dramatic Reconstruction using sound
effects to create a dramatic feel to this Horror Genre. Drama styles are also
something that must be picked up on when listening to Radio Drama this drama
used a lot of Horror Conventions such as a scary music to bring the target
audience to listen to their Drama. Good continuity means good recognition. I
think that what we can gather from the very start throughout what the mood to

this Drama is and that is scary and traumatic. I say Traumatic as the noises going
on makes it seem like there is a lot f nasty things happening to this boy nothing
seems to be going his way. There seems to be a trend in the duration of Radio
Dramas both Traditional and Post-Modern as this one like The Archers is 12
minutes long the perfect time to keep a viewer tuned. Not too long and not too
short. This comes with the plot, you must think about what the plot is to be and
how much time you are going to have to fit that in before the listener changes
channel. This is why it is important to think of a good plot before doing anything
like The Blinds Man Confession have achieved to do here and created a lovely
Post Modern Drama.
In summary I think that Post Modern and Traditional Dramas are two very
different things which both have to be thought through very carefully. They use
the same codes and conventions but in two very different ways fitted to their
Drama styles and Techniques.