Joe Frank died on January 15th 2018, finally succumbing to one of the illnesses that plagued him throughout his life.
We are long past the 1980s and 90s when Joe Frank's voice was a national presence on many public radio stations around the country, but anyone who heard even one of his programs then was not likely to forget the experience. His shows are absolutely hypnotic.
Joe was a brilliant writer who bridged the era between historical "radio drama" and the massively popular storytelling shows of today like This American Life, Snap Judgment and The Moth Radio Hour. It's hard to imagine now, but prior to the rise of downloading and streaming, syndication of spoken word programming to public radio stations was the only place outside of libraries that material like this could be heard, unless you mail-ordered cassette tapes of programs directly from the producer.
The platform for the emergence of singular talents like Joe Frank was non-commercial radio, in particular the Pacifica network of stations: KPFA-FM Berkeley, KPFK-FM Los Angeles, WBAI-FM New York City, WPFW-FM Washington D.C. and KPFT-FM Houston.
Pacifica attempted nothing less than exposing the entire spectrum of serious news, music, art and commentary. In Berkeley, the Drama & Literature department was run by the estimable ERIK BAUERSFELD, who encouraged the emergence of singular artists like Joe Frank, and supported robust experimental spoken word programming of all kinds. [Disclosure: Hearts of Space got its start at KPFA-FM Berkeley in the 1970s, thanks to the also estimable CHARLES AMIRKHANIAN.]
Joe began his career in radio as a volunteer at WBAI-FM in New York City. His eventual home station KCRW Santa Monica was an obscure community college station until it evolved into the powerhouse it is today under the enlightened management of former Pacifica execs RUTH HIRSCHMAN SEYMOUR and WILL LEWIS. Among other smart moves, they invited Frank to come to LA in 1986 and base his show there.
So-called "radio drama" was invented during the golden age of radio in the 1920s, and gave rise to radio plays, mystery serials and soap operas—syndicated, scripted, episodic dramas which were mainstream entertainment in the U.S., Great Britain and Europe for some 40 years. The rise of television in the 1960s began a swift process of marginalization. Pacifica carried the torch well into the 1980s and 90s with radio drama departments and syndicated programming on their stations.
Frank cast a darkly comic film noir vision on the tradition of "radiophonic" dramatic content, simplified it to monologue or dialogue, and saturated it with the surrealistic imagery and hypnotic focus of psychedelic experience. Other writer-producers like TOM LOPEZ of ZBS Media followed a similar path, but employed actors and stayed closer to the traditional drama model while exploring radically new subject matter.
Joe deepened the tradition of previous radio monologists, and brilliantly exploited our illicit fascination with overheard phone conversations. These strategies allowed him to produce a riveting series at minimal expense beyond his own time, vocal performance and production skills, and commissioned trance/ambient music.
This format, I submit, became the inspiration for carefully produced storytelling shows like This American Life and Snap Judgement, where compatible music and precision editing are integral to underscoring and deepening the mood, continuity, and emotional impact of the story. This American Life founder Ira Glass says as much:
"The very first National Public Radio show that I worked on was Joe Frank's. I think I was influenced in a huge way...Before I saw Joe put together a show, I had never thought about radio as a place where you could tell a certain kind of story."
Frank's shows are still being syndicated to KPFA Berkeley, WNYC New York City and several other NPR stations. Downloads and CDs are available at https://www.joefrank.com.
Stephen Hill, Producer
HEARTS of SPACE :: slow music for fast times
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