Working in radio was an accident that happened to me before and after a year of travel in Europe. My passion for jazz and non-western music (now called "world music) saw me doing an occasional programme for the radio station at the university where I studied. The station was called Radio 6nr at what was then the WAIT campus in Bentley where I had just completed a degree in English and in 1976 I was also working in the Music department at Churchlands Teachers College and doing some part-time tutoring at what was now called Curtin Uni. I never fancied myself as a broadcaster. I definitely knew a lot about my subject matter, but hated hearing my voice played back on radio and didn't particularly relish the challenge of operating broadcastingl desk at the same time. It all felt clunky and distracting. A few brief and ephemeral progams of what I'd describe as inconsequential 'fill' and that was it, I thought - the end of my radio days. I then went off to Europe for a year to get over it all... and to see the world.
As destiny would have it, on my return to Perth in 1978, I found myself working in the School of Business Administration on the same campus (Cutin Uni where I had studied) - a job that fitted me like a straight jacket. The SOB was located on the floor directly above Radio 6NR and after a year of doing what I felt was lacklustre research in my role as Personal Assistant to the Dean, I managed to convince my boss that the school needed a megaphone to promote its activities on campus. That megaphone was a radio program I produced under the tacky title: "It's Your Business" and it was a vehicle to work in work in an environment that felt much more me.
TBC...