by Connor Walsh
Our European correspondent reports on the enviable experience of judging one of the world's most prestigious radio competitions (complete with audio links of winners).
The Prix Europa is a broadcasting award that has been running in Berlin for about 30 years. It's the combination of a number of other awards for European TV, radio, fiction and documentary – with radio documentary remaining the prestige category. The venue is the splendid Haus des Rundunks, the 1930s building which now hosts Radio Brandemburg Berlin (RBB) – and, for that matter, a pater-noster. Sadly this year it was out of bounds, for safety.
Individual participation is free of charge, though European Broadcasting Union (EBU) broadcasters who take part may have some financial reaponsibilities. If a programme is selected for participation, a representative is expected to sit on the jury. Many of the 60 or so jurors though, like me, are not affiliated with any programme being judged. More about the programmes anon, but first, the logistics.
The process of listening, discussing, and voting is a key part of the Prix experience. After a jury briefing and reception on Saturday evening, we're straight into judging at 9:30 Sunday morning. First thing is to grab a pack of transcripts – every entry has a transcript in the original language with an English translation on the opposite page, and English is indeed the operating language of the Prix Europa.
By 4:30 you've listened to six features in groups of two or three. There are two subcategories: Documentary, and Investigation.
The programmes are played without continuity announcements before hand, though there is always a printed synopsis or intro available in the paperwork. After a break, the discussions begin. Coordinated by docs units heads from NRK Norway (Kari Hesthamar) and the BBC (Robert Ketteridge), each programme is discussed for about 15 minutes – or as long as it takes. A representative of the production is there to answer, at the end, specific questions that relate to the judging.
After that, jury members vote, one to ten, on the following criteria:
Documentary: Idea; development of idea; production, use of medium and acoustic quality; listenability/connecting with the listener; overall appeal.
Investigation: Relvance of subject; investigative work; quality of information; production, use of medium and acoustic quality; overall appeal.
Later, it's already dark outside and time for the other type of discussions: informal, one-to-one or indeed boozy groups. As with all such occasions, these discussions and the social element add huge value to the process – from ambitions to criticism, tech skills to reflections on our respective radio traditions. And boozy tales of excess.
It continues more or less to this structure until Thursday evening.
Friday evening this year had the awards ceremony for participants. It started with a lifetime achievement award for Sir David Attenborough, who responded to our standing ovation with a perfect speech, paraphrased thus: "Many will say this over the next day or so, but I'll be first: there is no greater privilege than to be honoured by your fellow professionals. Thank you". And so he sat down, assisted from the stage by his counterpart in European radio docs, Leo Braun.
Radio documentary is still the most prestigious category, and so we must wait for all the others – TV fiction,TV documentary, radio fiction, radio music, all the way until the radio documentary awards – of course split into two: investigation, and documentary.
The winner of the investigation was very much as expected, and all us jurors agreed with how we had voted. This is a surprisingly big deal after five days of listening, on crests and waves of emotion and creativity.
"The Girl Who Was Tied Down: Captain Skirt Is Nothing" by Daniel Velasco for Swedish Radio (audio in Swedish here) was a powerful, moving documentary which used hidden microphones to reveal appalling treatment of a rape victim in Sweden. Gripping tape, strong storytelling, and inciting strong responses.
The top prize: Radio Documentary. And it's a surprise! Not, as most people expected, "Camp Sisterhood" from ArteRadio.com; not the underdog "Dear Ulrike" from HollandDoc; not "Wireless Nights" from BBC Radio 4 (series one here). The winner was "Message in a Bottle", by Peter Mulryan for RTÉ Radio 1 (hear it here).
The surprise wasn't mine alone, but shared with every juror I spoke to that evening. Yet, it was us jurors who had voted! People who have sat on Prix Europa juries over the years tell me it's not uncommon for people to feel the best feature doesn't win – though not always by such a margin. The accepted reason is something we've already mentioned above. Voting is daily, and on the merits of each feature alone, not relative to other programmes. But we are human, and perhaps on a day of well-made programmes on grim topics, a very listenable and sweet story maybe gets a boost.
Outside all that, there was also a special event marking the 20th birthday of Between the Ears, a slot on BBC Radio 3 that invites adventurous feature making. This piece was played, specially composed by Between the Ears stalwart Alan Hall and the BBC docs unit creative director Simon Elmes. The raw material for the piece was 50 contributions of no more than 30 seconds for feature makers, many in the room on the night as well. Then the BBC bought us all a drink. Kinda wraps up Prix Europa neatly!
Full rundown of Prix Europa winners here.
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