‘The ECHO BOOM show’
I’m Julia and apart from being a lab assistant at Mediazone, an outdoor reporter for The Social Media Show at Sigma, and a student at the University of Nicosia in my final year, I am also one of the hosts for the Weekend Warm-up show which is on U Radio every Friday from 6pm-8pm.
It all began when my first co-host Victor and I had an idea for a radio show and soon after were given a chance to create our own show for U Radio. We began by creating a demo in the Radio Lab at Mediazone where we got the first idea of what it is like to interact with each other live, as if we were live On Air. We invited a Pop Rock Band called ‘Flirt’ to join us for our Demo recording of the show and we got to ask them some interesting questions and even had them sing live on the show.
Two weeks after the demo was given to the Radio Producer of U Radio, Marios Achas, we were officially granted permission to go to the studio and begin our live show! It has been an exciting experience so far, getting to learn how a radio station works and what it takes to host a radio show. We started trying to find a name for the show and it was tricky. At first the show was called ‘The ECHO BOOM show’ and was aired live every Thursday from 6-8pm. Some people asked us why we named the show ‘Echo Boom’ and I really can’t remember what lead me to it but I remember reading that the generation before mine is known as the ‘baby boomer’ generation and that my generation ( born in the 80’s-90’s) is the ‘echo’ of that boom also known as the ‘echo boom’ generation.And then that became what we have today the “Echo Boom Show”. We then continued by setting up a Facebook page to promote our show which we post on daily. We also had a chance to record a trailer for our show at U Radio which was played on U Radio 99.6 throughout the week before our show was aired.
So the day of the first show arrived and on that Thursday around 17:50 I was nervous but as soon as we were Live On Air all that went away and it became all about having fun and getting the audience to have a great time with you, keeping a conversation flowing and creating a nice atmosphere for listeners to enjoy even if they are in their car or at home listening to us. Every week has been more and more fun!
On our first show we invited the Head of Mediazone, John Ioannou to come in and talk about Media 5, the week of Media Culture held at the University Of Nicosia in November. On our second show we had Ourania Michaelidou, a volunteer at Cyprus Red Cross and Pam Dube, a student at the University of Nicosia come in and talk to us about a program called UniCares which is a project set up by Pam Dube, in association with the Cyprus Red Cross, for one of her courses at the University which is all about giving to the needy. Since the start of our show we have also had CR the Rapper guest on our show, the President of the organization called ‘Freedom Dolls’ and a few well known Cypriot DJ’s and local artists.
After the Christmas Holidays we were given a new day for our show (Friday) and I now have a new Co-host, Tommy Ioannou who is also a student at The University of Nicosia, since Victor had returned to the USA. The Weekend Warm-Up show is all about getting people prepared for their weekend. We talk about Unic Events that happened or are goingto happen, we also talk about other local events happening around Cyprus, what’s hitting the Box Office, Night Life, Restaurants and other interesting topics that are trending on Social Media. The most important thing about hosting a radio show is being prepared and doing your ‘homework’. Once you have everything organized there is no way your show will not go well 🙂
So Tune in this Friday from 18:00-20:00 and get to know ‘The Weekend Warm-Up’ on U Radio 99.6 Fm Nicosia and 102.1Fm in Larnaca.
LISTEN ON LINE!
Julia Antoniou – Mediazone TV & Audio Lab Assistant
