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An on-going daily 24-hour capture of RNZ National.
The following presenter information is sourced from http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/presenters (1/2/16):
Presenters & Newsreaders
Alison Balance (Our Changing World):
Alison Ballance is a zoologist, wildlife filmmaker, writer and radio producer. She joined Radio New Zealand’s weekly science and environment programme Our Changing World in 2008, after 18 years producing and directing wildlife documentaries for Dunedin-based production company NHNZ. She produced films for international broadcasters on subjects as varied as kakapo and tigers in locations as diverse as Mongolia, Ecuador and Whenua Hou-Codfish Island. Before that she spent four months (in winter) on subantarctic Campbell Island studying feral sheep for her Master of Science degree.
Kakapo – Rescued from the Brink of Extinction was Alison’s 28th book and it won the Royal Society of New Zealand’s Science Book Prize in 2011. Southern Alps – Nature and History of New Zealand’s Mountain World was a finalist in the 2008 Montana Book Awards. Her essay ‘Touchstones’, a personal look at the issue of climate change, won the inaugural non-fiction Royal Society of New Zealand Manhire Creative Science Writing Prize in 2007.
Alison combines her search for great location-based radio stories with her passion for islands, remote wilderness and natural history, and despite getting seasick this quest has taken her to the four furthest points of New Zealand’s compass: Kermadec islands to the north, the Chathams to the east, Scott Base to the far south and West Cape in Fiordland to the west. She’s now working to fill in the gaps in between! She loves meeting and interviewing passionate people, and sharing their knowledge and stories on-air, and what she really enjoys about radio as a medium is its intelligence and immediacy.
Bryan Crump (Nights):
Born in 1966 in Thames. Early years in Ngatea coincided with discovery of crop circles on the Hauraki Plains. There is no link proven. As a toddler, had a tendency to wander. Often found playing with toy grader in middle of state highway two, or dropping stones into nearby Piako River. Early interest in Doppler effect.
Moved to Auckland in 1969. Discovers the tape recorder. Began producing variety programmes and radio plays with friends in bedroom studio. Destroys first tape recorder. Exposure to stereo technology at high school lead to more ambitious projects, such as a remake of the Hunchback of Notre Dame, as the Hunchback of K Road. School hi-fi out of commission.
Became a fully certified radio journalist in 1993. Sent to Dunedin to cover rural issues for Radio New Zealand. Subsequent posting in Wellington producing and presenting Saturday rural programme from 1995 to 99. Also works in news, Parliament, and produces documentaries. Third tape recorder dies in trenches at Gallipoli. Also trains fellow journalists in how to wreck tape recorders.
2001; decided to explore the Australian Outback. Convinced the ABC to hire him as rural reporter in the Northern Territory town of Katherine, despite lack of any sheep for 10,000 square kilometres. Mini disc recorder expires during monsoonal downpour. Helps to wake up the city of Darwin as Breakfast presenter.
End of 2004, began pining for a New Zealand summer. Returned to Wellington to host Summer Nights on National Radio. Nine months later Radio New Zealand decides to make weeknight evening presenting a permanent affair. Hires Bryan Crump on understanding he supplies own tape recorder.
Bryan lives in Wellington with his partner and their young son. He also arranges pop songs for the Doubtful Sounds, a choir he started to keep himself out of trouble at the weekends.
Caitlin Cherry:
Caitlin Cherry began her journalism career as an intern with Radio New Zealand in 1997, after training at the New Zealand Broadcasting School in Christchurch.
After working as a general reporter she moved into producing, and spent several years working on the flagship programme, Morning Report and became one of the show's deputy editors. She has also worked as a chief reporter for Radio New Zealand News.
For the past six years Caitlin has worked as a senior producer on Radio New Zealand's current affairs programme, Nine to Noon, and is currently a presenter on Summer Report.
In 2011 she travelled to Antarctica with Nine to Noon presenter Kathryn Ryan, where they recorded a series of interviews with scientists working on the ice.
She has also had stints in television, as a reporter and director for the arts programme Backch@t, and has written for a range of magazines and newspapers.
Carol Stiles (Country Life, One In Five):
Producer and presenter of Country Life and One in Five. Listening to National Radio runs in Carol’s family. She grew up listening to My Music and My Word beside her father, and her 18-year-old son recently surprised medical staff by requesting the radio be tuned to 101FM during an MRI scan.
Carol trained to become a journalist after completing an arts degree at Victoria University. Her first investigative radio interview was with the deputy prime minister. The fish and chip shop across the road from the Beehive was closing and it was Carol’s job to find out what he usually ordered (two fish and a scoop of chips).
Since then Carol has worked in news, rural news and for the past 14 years in features. She feels privileged to have a job that takes her down quiet country roads and into some of the most remote and beautiful spots in New Zealand to gather stories for her role with Country Life.
Carol is also a producer for One in Five, Radio New Zealand’s programme on the issues and experience of disability.
She has also worked as a journalist in London and in the Turks and Caicos Islands.
Catriona MacLeod (newsreader):
Newsreader, producer and presenter of Christmas Day. Catriona started working in the Radio New Zealand newsroom in the days of typewriters, lots of paper, reel to reel tapes and a constant cigarette smoke fug in the newsroom. She quotes a line in a Leonard Cohen song "born with the gift of a golden voice" to explain how she was lucky enough to be sponsored by Radio New Zealand to do a journalism course. There was a guaranteed job at the end of it – but no choice of destination, so it was off to Radio Caroline in Timaru, then several years at 4ZB in Dunedin. After that the wide world beckoned, and Catriona spent several years based in the UK doing a wide variety of jobs and a great deal of travelling.
Both her parents come from the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, and she frequently visited the isle while she lived over there to escape the rat race of London and big European cities. She also credits her lineage as to why she doesn't have much of a Kiwi accent, and can roll those rrrrr's in te reo Maori.
On her return to New Zealand she worked for a while as a journalist in the 2ZB newsroom, before working for several years as a producer on Morning Report, presenting and compiling Late Edition and then her current job as newsreader for Radio New Zealand National. She says she loves the immediacy and intimacy of radio – no two days are the same because of changing world and national events – and she values the anonymity of radio for those behind the microphone.
And away from the microphone Catriona enjoys entertaining friends at dinner parties, reading, music, movies, walking and going out for the occasional boogie.
Colin Peacock (Mediawatch):
Producer and presenter of Mediawatch. After his postgraduate diploma in journalism from Canterbury University, he went to London and joined BBC World TV. He moved to the BBC's 24-hour news network 5 Live just in time for Princess Diana's fatal accident on his first night shift in the studio. He produced 5 Live's international programme Global in 1999, then moved to BBC World Service the following year to work on news programmes such as Newshour and World Update, a co-production with Public Radio International in the US. He returned to New Zealand in November 2002.
Cynthia Morahan:
Newsreader, producer and presenter on Radio New Zealand Concert. Radio New Zealand Concert is the culmination of two of Cynthia Morahan's great loves: music and talking.
Cynthia first joined Radio New Zealand in 2002 from a career on the production side of the film and television industry.
She has since spent seven years in Ireland working for RTE, Ireland's national broadcaster, and returned to New Zealand in 2013.
"Because we wanted our children to know the joy that is wearing jandals all summer and raising the end of their sentences when they speak," she says.
As well as Radio New Zealand Concert, Cynthia can also be found reading news on Radio New Zealand National, swimming, reading and listening to a lot of music.
David Steemson (Spectrum):
Producer and presenter of Spectrum and Auckland Stories. David Steemson has worked for Radio New Zealand since before the coming of mankind. Working for Spectrum for the last ten years, though, has helped make him young again.
“Spectrum is about New Zealand tales, and the people I meet are so passionate as they tell their stories. I love it.” And that’s despite nearly every Kiwi’s first response on being told by David he wants an interview: “Oh, there’s nothing special about me.” (exasperated sigh).
David Steemson is based in Auckland. For Spectrum, he covers the North Island north of Lake Taupo.
Emma Smith (Music 101):
Producer and presenter of Music 101. As a child, Emma always had her tape deck on pause/record, ready to record songs off the radio, or straight out of the TV speaker for her mixtape series, which featured such underground classics as Mega Mix 3 and Hit Mix. She hated it when the announcer talked over the end bit.
Since becoming one of those announcers at Dunedin bNet station Radio One, Emma's life has been filled with sublime musical experiences, and increasingly surreal interpersonal ones- from dap dipping with Sharon Jones, to being the worst “lucky charm” Ben Harper ever took to a casino.
Emma tweets @radionzmusic
Guyon Espiner (Morning Report):
Presenter of Morning Report. Guyon has a 20 year career in journalism and has worked in both print and broadcast media. He has a proven track record in political reporting, having been political editor for Television New Zealand and, earlier, the Sunday Star Times.
He has reported on trade from China, on war from Afghanistan, on politics from Washington, on international relations from Papua New Guinea and on climate change from Antarctica.
Most recently he worked for TV3 as an anchor and journalist on 3rd Degree and The Vote, and continues to write a political column for The Listener.
Ian Telfer (Summer Report):
Ian never knew what he wanted to be, so he just followed his nose through physics, church volunteering in the Pacific, Aboriginal land rights activism, gardening, and desk jobs in wood-panelled offices at Otago University.
But along the way he returned time and again to his underground passion, the radio. On community and student radio stations, he hosted Swedish jazz festivals and current affairs shows, and read the midnight news.
Ian joined Radio New Zealand seven years ago and has been based in Dunedin as its Otago reporter since 2011. He has also served as the forestry and environment reporters. He led Radio New Zealand's coverage of the Victorian bushfires, the Pike River mine disaster and most recently, enquiries into the death of prisoner, Jai Davis.
Ian's roots are in Adelaide, South Australia, but he has also lived in Melbourne, Tahiti and Wellington before settling down south.
In summer, he can often be found barbequing on the deck in the drizzle or wading in an estuary if it's nicer.
Ian lives with his partner and two sons in an old house overlooking the Botanic Gardens. His sons call him Tom
Jesse Mulligan (1–4pm)
Jesse joined Radio New Zealand National in 2015 but spent almost ten years as a commercial radio announcer earlier in his career. Since then he’s worked in public relations, television, live comedy and print. He has a strong interest in food, as weekly restaurant critic for NZ Herald Viva, and regular culinary correspondent for Travel. He was a core cast member on 7 Days, a presenter on Seven Sharp and host of TV One’s Best Bits.
Jesse grew up in Hamilton, where he was educated from kindergarten through to Bachelor of Laws at University of Waikato. He now lives in Grey Lynn with his wife Victoria and their three children.
Jim Mora (The Panel):
Jim Mora has worked across media, and has won national awards as a television journalist and as a columnist. He has also made and narrated a number of TV documentaries, and presented various television series. He is the author of children’s books, and successful TV animations for children, which have screened in many countries around the world. Jim lives in Auckland with partner Mary Lambie, three children, a cat, and numerous bikes and scooters.
John Campbell (First Person, Checkpoint):
Award-winning journalist and presenter John Campbell began his career at Radio New Zealand in 1989. He went on to work in TV3’s press gallery before stints on the current affairs show 20/20, presenting 3 News and, in 2005, starting Campbell Live.
Between 2000 and 2002 he was also the host of RNZ’s Saturday Morning programme. Campbell re-joined RNZ in September 2015 to host a revamped Checkpoint.
He has won a Qantas Media Award for best investigative current affairs and two awards for best presenter.
Justin Gregory (Standing Room Only):
Justin Gregory has been a features producer for Radio New Zealand National since 2005. His time at RNZ has seen him recording on icebergs in the South Pacific, alongside humpback whales in Tonga, from inside the world’s oldest observatory and while standing outside the Pope’s bedroom.
He received the NZ Radio Award for Best New Broadcaster in 2007, won the award for Best Documentary in 2014 and was a finalist in that category in 2009. Along with Sonia Sly he reports on the arts for Standing Room Only.
The Underarm, a play Justin co-wrote with David Geary about that infamous incident in a cricket game in Melbourne in 1981, had seasons in Auckland, Wellington and Palmerston North, toured for nearly three years to festivals around New Zealand, and irritated every Australian cricket fan who saw it or heard about it.
Justine Murray (Te Ahi Kaa):
Ko Tauranga te moana
Ko Mauao te maunga
Ko Ngai te Rangi me Ngāti Ranginui oku iwi
Ko Ngai Tamarāwaho me Ngai Tukairangi oku hapu
Ko Huria me Hungahungatoroa oku marae
Ko Mataatua me Takitimu oku waka
Tenei te mihi ki a tātou katoa.
Growing up in Rotorua during the late 1980s and 90s listening to radio set the tone for a career in broadcasting when Justine became addicted to making dedications on Radio Te Arawa. There was something amazing about hearing a DJ say your name on the radio, and on top of that, the DJ said your shout-outs and played your song request!
So began a keen passion for radio. In 1996, Justine graduated from the Māori Journalism course at Waiariki Polytechnic, tutored at the time by Chris Webber and Rawiri Wright. In 1997, after a quick stint at McDonalds manning the cheeseburger and hamburger stations, she got a job at Moana AM 1440 KHZ located in her hometown of Tauranga. From 1997-2008, Justine did a bit of everything – she produced the daily news bulletins, was the on-air announcer of the drive show, helped set up a youth radio station, produced a breakfast show and became programme director. Aside from work, Justine carried out studies in radio programming, business practice and mātauranga Māori.
In 2008 she started her current role as producer of the Māori kaupapa show Te Ahi Kaa, a job she shares with Maraea Rakuraku.
Kathryn Ryan (Nine To Noon):
Kathryn Ryan grew up in the South Island is now based in Wellington. She has a BA degree in History and Education, a post-graduate diploma in journalism, and has also completed university study in business and economics.
A journalist for twenty years, Kathryn began in print, and joined Radio New Zealand in 1999.
She spent six years reporting on Parliament in Radio New Zealand's Press Gallery office, the last three as Radio New Zealand's political editor.
She became host of Nine to Noon in May 2006.
Kathryn has covered the last seven general elections in various roles, including co-hosting Radio New Zealand's election night programmes.
Kathryn has travelled widely throughout New Zealand and visited around 20 countries in Europe, Asia and the Pacific, as well as the United States and Antarctica.
Her interests include reading, movies, good food and wine, the great outdoors, tramping and sea swimming.
Katrina Batten (newsreader):
Katrina has worked in most areas of radio since she began her career as a studio operator in Wellington’s Broadcasting House in 1987. To date she’s worked in commercial radio in Wellington and New Plymouth, produced and presented New Zealand Forces Radio for three and a half years, a show broadcast on Radio New Zealand International several times a weekend for NZ Defence Force personnel stationed overseas, produced Wayne Mowat’s In Touch with NZ and several Outside Broadcasts, and took up presenting with Late Edition, the All Night Programme and Sunday 4 ‘til 8.
She also produces and presents the weekly podcast Best of the Week and manages to read the news on occasion. Every Christmas morning you’ll hear her and newsreader Catriona Macleod turn into the faeries “Sugar and Spice” for fun entertainment to kick start your holidays.
Katy Gosset (One In Five, Spectrum):
Producer and presenter of One in Five, Spectrum and New Zealand Society. Katy always wanted to be a journalist. Each morning in her family home started with the theme tune to Morning Report. (Still does.)
As a student she read the news on 98 RDU in Christchurch and soon became a DJ, hosting breakfast, brunch and drive shows.
Fast-forward a few years (OK, make it 20) and she now co-presents and produces One in Five, as well as Spectrum and New Zealand Society on Radio New Zealand National.
In between, Katy spent many years as a news journalist, covering numerous court cases, public meetings, industrial disputes, not to mention earthquakes. She was judged Individual Radio Journalist of the Year in 2009 and was a finalist again in 2013.
Katy started presenting the Christchurch Story segment on Afternoons with Jim Mora in 2006 and joined One in Five in 2012. She was a finalist in the Radio Awards Best Documentary or Spoken Feature category in 2013.
Along the way, she's worked in television, print, PR and publishing and lectured in journalism. She's also pulled a few pints, folded wontons in a takeaway shop and performed as a children's clown. (And can still twist a mean balloon animal!)
She's never found anyone who doesn't have a tale to tell and still feels excited (and frequently moved) when she hears a compelling piece of audio.
Kim Hill (Saturday Morning):
So what is Kim Hill, unquestionably one of New Zealand's finest current affairs interviewers, really like? The answer, if you listen to her programme long enough, turns out to have been obvious all along. I think I’m just like the way I am on the radio. I mean, you haven't got time to put on a face, you haven’t got time to pretend to be anything other than you are - otherwise, you’d drive yourself bonkers! So, in essence, what you hear on the radio is what you get in real life? Yeah, yeah. With a few expletives deleted.
She was born and raised in Shropshire, the English county bordering Wales, but her father was actually Irish – a veterinarian – and her mother was Scots, a physiotherapist and nurse. The family (Kim also has a younger brother, Iain) used to spend their holidays in Ireland, until an epidemic of foot-and-mouth disease in England prompted her parents to emigrate to New Zealand. Kim was just 15 when the family arrived in Otorohanga, and for a while, it was a bit of a culture shock. But gradually she adjusted, taking a BA in French and German at university (Massey and Otago) and then becoming a masseuse. A what? Those were the days when it was legit, therapeutic, she once explained in an interview: "nobody believes me!".
Kim was working as a barmaid, at the Sir George Grey hotel in Tairua, when she learned she'd been accepted for Canterbury University's Postgraduate School of Journalism. Oddly enough, it wasn't an easy choice for her to make – she'd enjoyed being behind the bar.
But off she went, joining Radio New Zealand in Gisborne after completing the Christchurch course. A stint in Greymouth followed, as did a period writing for the Nelson Evening Mail, before Kim arrived in Wellington to brandish her acerbic skills on the current affairs show, Checkpoint. Next came Morning Report, with Geoff Robinson, where she quickly gained a high profile for her probing, persistent style of questioning.
When Kim became the host of the daily morning programme Nine to Noon in 1993, it quickly became essential listening. In the nine years she was host, she interviewed thousands of people, and probably read as many books. Among her guests were the famous (the Dalai Lama, Nelson Mandela) and the infamous (Jeffrey Archer, Monica Lewinsky).
Kim began hosting the Saturday Morning show on April 20, 2002. This programme gives her the opportunity for expansive interviews with her guests – be they scientists, historians, theologians, psychiatrists, novelists, or just characters or high achievers – while also taking in some leisurely interests: food, classic literature and poetry, children's books and music.
In 2012 Kim Hill won the International Radio Personality of the Year (Association for International Broadcasting).
Judges described Kim Hill as: "an experienced and warm broadcaster exercising full control of her content whilst coaxing her guests to reveal more of themselves; really enjoyable live and sparky content that demonstrates what is great about radio and illustrates how important lightness of touch is in speech content."
Lloyd Scott (All Night Programme):
Lloyd's broadcasting career began in Greymouth as a radio technician in 1963. Then followed a period in Nelson and two years as a drama operator in Christchurch.
After a couple of years OE Lloyd became an announcer with the NZBC in 1970 and spent seven years in Wellington as a 2ZM DJ before becoming a professional actor.
Since then he has performed on stage all over NZ and overseas, and kept up an association with radio. He has been a broadcaster on Radio New Zealand National since 1989. From 1983-1987 he took over the presentation of Video Dispatch on TV, and was Crumpy's mate Scotty in a series of TV vehicle commercials from 1982-1996. Currently he is one of the all-night hosts.
Lynda Chanwai-Earle ( Voices):
Multi-talented writer and performer Lynda Chanwai Earle is a fourth-generation Chinese New Zealander. Born in London in 1965 she spent her early childhood in Papua New Guinea before completing her education in New Zealand. She studied creative writing with Albert Wendt and graduated from the University of Auckland with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1990 and a Diploma in Drama, 1994. Lynda also graduated with a Masters of Arts in Creative Writing at Victoria University’s International Institute of Modern Letters in 2006.
Lynda represented New Zealand at the inaugural Hong Kong Literary Festival in 2001, the 2002 Philippines Asia–Pacific Poetry Conference, was Trans-Tasman writer at the 2003 Queensland Poetry Festival and attended the Shanghai Literary Festival in 2005 as guest writer. Lynda was short-listed again for the Bruce Mason Awards, 2010. Lynda began working at Radio New Zealand producing Asian Report in May 2011. She lives in Wellington with her two young daughters.
Lynn Freeman ( Standing Room Only, The Weekend):
Producer and presenter of Standing Room Only and The Weekend. Fill-in Presenter for Nine To Noon. Lynn Freeman has spent the best part of 30 years working at RNZ, starting as an intern before being appointed chief reporter of the Dunedin News Room – just in time to helm the Aramoana shooting tragedy. After a stint in regional TV, Lynn returned to RNZ, this time working out of the Wellington office. She moved from executive producer for Nine to Noon to senior producer for Morning Report, before being appointed to her current role: presenter and co-producer of Standing Room Only. Lynn is also Kathryn Ryan’s fill-in on Nine to Noon, and hosts summer programme The Weekend, as well as having produced award-winning features and documentaries.
Outside of RNZ, Lynn has been a theatre critic for Capital Times, judge of the annual Chapman Tripp Theatre Awards, and a kitten fosterer.
Marty Duda:
Marty Duda moved his family and his record collection to New Zealand in 1994. It wasn’t long before he became involved in the local music scene… writing for Real Groove and Rip It Up and eventually producing music programmes for Radio New Zealand.
Marty is a regular contributor to Radio New Zealand’s Nine to Noon with Kathryn Ryan, where, every Wednesday morning, he presents a different musical artist… offering up a career overview peppered with personal opinions and assorted non-relevant ramblings. Marty also runs The 13th Floor, a website chock full of music and film reviews, interviews and the occasion book, theatre and DVD review. He also has just begun hosting 13th Floor Music Trivia nights where his extensive trivial knowledge is put to some good use.
Melody Thomas:
Presenter of Summer Music 101. In the lead-up to her birth, Melody Thomas’ parents decided to call her Megan. It wasn’t until after she arrived, when a suggestion of ‘Melanie’ was misheard by her father, that her real name was chosen. While devastating for 5 year-old Melody, who had come so close to sharing a name with the main character of the original My Little Pony series, this turn of events would later prove serendipitous - ensuring a career and life surrounded by music.
Advised to ‘channel her creativity into ad writing’ while at the New Zealand Broadcasting School, Melody decided instead to find a place where she would never have to write, listen to or think about an advertisement for the rest of her broadcasting life. From producing her first feature for Spectrum in 2007, Melody was signed on to co-produce the first year of Summer Noelle, later acting as a floating producer for everything from Afternoons to Saturday Morning and eventually making her way to Music 101, where she has happily remained ever since.
Mike Hodge (newsreader):
Mike Hodge is further proof that radio remains in the blood. A former Radio New Zealand Tonight Show host and commercial network newsreader, Mike migrated his communications skills to public relations, economic development and running a regional tourism organisation. For the past decade, he has been assisting businesses in New Zealand and overseas to bring their brand stories to life.
When he’s not busy writing or back reading the nation’s news, Mike is inclined to pick up his paintbrushes or disappear into the Hauraki Gulf to make small dents in the local snapper population.
Nicola Wright (newsreader):
When Nicola first joined the Radio New Zealand presentation team in 1998, she received a steady supply of letters from people asking if she is the Nicola Wright they remember from years ago – whom they read to sleep under a truck in Kuala Lumpur, whose family they holidayed with in a bach up north, or who they lived down the road from and whose parents they would like to get in touch with again. Curiously enough, Nicola says no. Two letters have referred to the same person, and none of them have been her – disappointingly so in some cases, such as the phone call from a man asking if she was the Nicola Wright whose parents he knew from earlier filmmaking days, and that if she was would she be interested in joining his upcoming African documentary trip. Apparently, "No, but can I come anyway?" was not the answer he was looking for.
So in the interests of avoiding further disappointment...
This Nicola Wright was born and educated in Christchurch. Her radio career has ranged from midnight-to-dawn shifts on a Classic Rock station (Black Sabbath and Queen in the wee small hours!) to creating commercials and launching the breakfast prize balloon at Radio Wairarapa in Masterton. In her time at Radio New Zealand she has worked in commercial news, sport, the Pacific-focused international service and National news programmes. But her focus has always been news presentation, which she has always found challenging and highly enjoyable.
Phil O'Brien (Matinee Idle, Saturday Night):
Phil O’Brien returned to New Zealand radio after a lengthy broadcasting career in Australia and the United States. He’s been a part of Radio New Zealand National since 2002 as an occasional newsreader and a midnight-dawn host. He started Radio New Zealand National’s summer schedule feature music show, Matinee Idle, the following year. Since then, this programme has become a hugely popular summer feature for a lot of listeners at home and abroad. It now turns up on public holidays as well as the summer schedule and has developed a dedicated (some may say obsessive) fan-base! But wait there's more...Phil also hosts the Saturday evening show from 7pm through to midnight. Tune in to hear your requests and wander through some musical memories and nostalgic moments.
Philippa Tolley (Insight):
Philippa is currently the executive producer of Radio New Zealand National’s award-winning weekly current affairs documentary Insight, where she both makes documentaries herself and commissions and oversees the work of others.
Before taking on that role, she worked at Radio New Zealand International covering events and stories in the Pacific region. At the same time she also compiled and presented World Watch for part of the week. Prior to that, Philippa worked in London for the BBC as a senior producer on national news programmes in both radio and television after starting out at Radio New Zealand straight out of university.
Philippa is also an experienced trainer and has delivered courses and workshops for international organisations such as the Asia Broadcasting Union, the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association and the Pacific Islands Forum
Simon Morris (At The Movies, Matinee Idle, Standing Room Only):
Producer and presenter of Matinee Idle, Standing Room Only (previously Arts on Sunday) and At The Movies. Simon Morris is paid to go to the movies, which sounds rather more fun than it often is. Not every film is a timeless classic, and every Oscar-winner stands on the shoulders of midgets. When he’s not going to the cinema and reporting his findings every week on At The Movies, Simon produces the rather more improving Standing Room Only (previously known as Arts On Sunday), and the entirely less improving Matinee Idle in the public holidays.
Simon Morton (This Way Up):
Producer and presenter of This Way Up. Simon Morton is a curious person who's easily distracted. He established the award-winning weekly consumer/science technology programme This Way Up in 2005 and is a regular contributor to the BBC World Service Click programme. He's won a few gongs along the way including a Gold Medal for best social issues or current affairs programme at the New York Festival Radio Awards 2012 for the programme Broken River.
He's presented and co-produced a number of TV shows: Why We Buy (TVNZ One), Use As Directed (TVNZ 6/7) and Tales From Te Papa (TVNZ 6/7 with a book version and educational DVD published), Along for the Ride (TVNZ One) and Forensics: The Science behind the truth (Prime).
Before moving into radio in 2001, Simon had a varied and disjointed 'career'. His first proper job was a three-year stint for Bungy pioneer AJ Hackett. Before this he worked as a recruitment consultant in London, repaired skis in France, cleared tables at a Palm Beach country club and was MC of a weekly talent night in Majorca.
Simon's worked at the BBC World Service in London producing the weekly technology series, Click (Digital Planet) and has also produced work for National Public Radio in the US, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
Outside work he enjoys riding his bikes, cooking, eating, skiing and having fun with his family based in Wellington.
Susan Murray (Country Life):
Susan Murray accidentally started her radio career splicing tapes and timing commercials with an after-school job at King Country Radio in Taumarunui. Since then, radio news reporting or feature programme-making has been her main interest. She has had the joy of working for Country Life since 1999, meeting a vast array of stimulating people in far flung areas. She hopes the programme reflects the diversity, skill, knowledge and personality of those people living and working outside of the 50km zone. Susan is shepherd to 20 ewes, one young ram lamb and one old ewe at Sheep Heaven, a lifestyle block at Ngahinapouri in Waikato. She also has one useless sheep dog, and a superior set of sheep yards.
Susan Murray is based in Hamilton, job sharing her role with Carol Stiles. Together they cover the North Island.
Susie Ferguson (Morning Report):
Presenter of Morning Report. Susie worked in Britain for broadcasters including the BBC and ITN. She has reported and presented from around the world including Iraq, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Lebanon, Mozambique and the Balkans. Stories she's covered include the Iraq War and the Boxing Day tsunami.
She emigrated to New Zealand in 2009 and after presenting Summer Report and filling in on Checkpoint, she now presents Morning Report.
Teresa Cowie (Summer Report):
Presenter of Summer Report. Growing up in a farming family in Hokitika has prepared Teresa well for a life in journalism. While training at the BBC in London she spent much of her time filming surgeons wearing their white wellies in theatre, or donning her own green gumboots as she chased pigs around the countryside for the programme Jimmy’s Farm. You might think writing obituaries for people who hadn’t even died yet might be a gruesome task. Not so for this sturdy farm girl, who spent one summer unearthing the career highs and lows of Westminster politicians for Sky News.
Teresa has a degree in English Literature and Social Policy from Victoria University, and worked as a Producer for BBC Television News in London before taking up a role as a Reporter for Radio New Zealand.
She enjoys theatre, ballet and riding her highly impractical, but delightfully traditional, bicycle.
Trevor Reekie:
Producer and presenter of Access All Areas and Hidden Treasures. Trevor Reekie was the guitarist of seminal eighties electro group Car Crash Set, has two ambient solo albums under the name Cosa Nostra, and over ten years recorded four albums with the Greg Johnson Band. Trevor founded two Auckland based record labels, Pagan and Antenna. He is a freelance writer and broadcaster.
Veronika Meduna (Our Changing World):
Producer and presenter of Our Changing World
Veronika Meduna joined Radio New Zealand in 1999 and spent much of her first year as a science broadcaster reporting on the Royal Commission on Genetic Modification. With that completed, she joined the Features department and has been producing and presenting science and environment programmes ever since, telling hundreds of radio stories.
Apart from her role as a science broadcaster, Veronika has also contributed to a science column in the New Zealand Listener, writes for science publications in New Zealand and overseas, curates and writes science exhibitions and has five books to her name.
Her latest book, Science on Ice: Discovering the Secrets of Antarctica, explores what the frozen continent tells us about past and future climates, survival in extreme conditions and the evolution of life. It was a finalist in the 2013 Royal Society of New Zealand Science Book Prize.
Her most recent exhibition, Antarctic Time Travel Exhibition, takes visitors on a journey through Antarctica’s changing climate from 50 million years ago to the present. In 2006, Veronika co-curated an exhibition for the National Library of New Zealand about the history of science in New Zealand, which was subsequently published as Atoms, Dinosaurs and DNA: 68 Great New Zealand Scientists by Random House (2008), winning the Elsie Locke Award for non-fiction at the 2009 LIANZA awards.
Veronika trained and worked as a microbiologist before becoming a science journalist and writer. As part of her work, she has travelled to Antarctica twice and spent a term at Green College at Oxford University as a Chevening David Low Fellow, studying the media’s role in communicating scientific risk and uncertainty.
One frequent query Veronika receives from listeners is about her accent. People have placed her in many countries, from South Africa to Samoa to Peru, but the truth is that there are two other languages coming through in her English: Czech from a childhood spent in what used to be Czechoslovakia and German from the country she lived in after her family’s escape.
Vicki McKay (All Night Programme):
Presenter of the All Night Programme
Vicki entered radio via a circuitous route after career starters in the travel industry, nursing, and being a restaurateur for number of years with her husband, the Chef.
Years of speech and drama, both on and off the stage, was the ideal foundation for an announcing audition at Radio Lakeland in Taupo. She took to the tandem breakfast announcing like a duck to water and could not believe you could have so much fun and get paid for it!
"It was the best training ground you could ask for." Vicki says " It was frenetic, challenging and exciting. We were constantly out in the community doing station promotions, fundraisers, news and weather reports, and sometimes, all of the above, on the lake or a mountain!"
Vicki credits this early training, interspersed with courses at the Radio New Zealand training school, as being the key to coping under pressure as a network newsreader in Radio New Zealand's commercial years; for the start of the first Gulf War and the Aramoana tragedy.
A decision to study media law in 1995 saw her choose to host the All Night Programme, which subsequently broke the news of the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York and more recently the September 2010 earthquake in Christchurch and Mount Tongariro's eruption in 2012.
"Your brain becomes a sponge for detail and the mind zones in on the facts and figures. Radio is such an immediate service industry and it is so important to deliver such news as accurately and quickly as possible. As the official National Civil Defence Radio Station, we also have a responsibility to do this without alarming our listeners unnecessarily. So it is a delicate balance." Vicki says.
Vicki has worked for Radio New Zealand for almost three decades. "I have worked here alongside an army of professional broadcasters and journalists who ensure our listeners are informed to the very best of our ability. How lucky am I to have chosen a career that I love?"
Wallace Chapman (Sunday Morning):
Presenter of Sunday Morning
Graduating with a degree in English and Education from Otago University, Wallace left the halls of academia and a proposed Masters, to head into media as Creative Director of Radio One 91FM Dunedin, where he also hosted popular arts and current affairs show The Saturday Late Breakfast.
A phone call and a job offer in 2001 from radio 95bFM saw Chapman back in his home town of Auckland to head up the bFM Creative Director role for 5 years, penning many classic ads.
After a time as fill in host for Russell Brown’s Wire, a year as 95bFM Breakfast host cemented Chapman’s name as someone who brings a depth and context to discussing issues, combined with an engaging, informed and idiosyncratic style.
Chapman has been the breakfast show host on KiwiFM, and since 2011, a host on Radio Live. He started his television work reporting stories on media satire show Eating Media Lunch, and is the host of the unique ‘pub politics’ show Back Benches. Now in its seventh year, Back Benches is described by Time Out, NZ Herald as a ‘sort of Top Gear for politics.’
“Fearless, but never mean,” is how his interviewing style was described in a Listener article in January 2012. “He’s disarming because he asks that very hard question in a very simple, direct way. And he’s not mean, so his questions don’t upset people”.
Warwick Burke (newsreader):
Warwick was born and raised in Christchurch where he auditioned for the then New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation and was posted to Greymouth for six months in 1967.
He worked in Christchurch for 3ZB and CHTV3 from 1968 until 1975, then fronted the Television One local News until 1977 when he was transferred to TVOne's headquarters at Avalon, Lower Hutt.
He spent thirteen most enjoyable years there working firstly as a reporter and presenter in the network news until Television One went to Auckland, whereupon he worked on various feature programmes such as Fair Go and Country Calendar.
Warwick began his present work as a newsreader for Radio New Zealand National from 1990 and for a number of years has hosted the New Year's Eve programme.