Later in its CHSR carnation, Melodies in Mind started having music interviews and reviewing folk shows in Fredericton. The first music interview Ryan ever did was a phone interview with the Toronto artist Ronley Teper that was largely inspired by her weird sense of humor and the song Yamaha, a love song she wrote for her guitar. It was a personal favorite tune. Ryan will always remember the heart felt thank you he got after the interview. It helped a lot towards his understanding of how much this kind of thing means to the up and coming artists. It was a good positive reinforcement.

Then there was a forgetable phone interview after that also. Of whom we forget who it was. But the first live in studio guest was Gordie Johnston of Big Sugar, and that will never be forgotten.

Ryan was just writing out some questions when Gordie Johnston arrived. He was early. It ended up being a very random unprepared sounding interview, but it was cool. It was Gordie Johnston! Most of the time the interview consisted of Gordie asking Ryan, Do you know this artist? This artist? This artist? And Ryan saying yes, to perhaps 1 in 10. Gordie a big big music fan and quite an outgoing guy.

He was promoting Big Sugar’s 2001 album ’Brothers and Sisters are you ready?’, of which Ryan was playing to death the single ’All Hell for a Basement’. In the interview, Ryan will never neglect to tell you, he suggested they release that single because it will go to 1. Ryan will want you to know, because they later did do that, and it did go to 1. Whether or not he had anything to do with it, he will never know, but he will always tell himself he did.

Another notable interview was with the Newfoundland band, ’Buddy Wassisname and the Other Fellers’, they are a very comedic farsical group that is deeply loved across the country. For this one Ryan prepared questions and then realized when they arrived, that they don’t need prompting. They started talking from the moment they arrived and didn’t stop until they walked out the door. It wasn’t long before Ryan knew he didn’t need questions. Everyone had fun, and he later got a nod from them at their show that evening.

There were not many local musicians and interview opportunities in Fredericton, but there were some good ones. Ryan’s confidence in being allowed to sound like an idiot was growing, and, as you know, he has invited many more musisians on to the air since then.

The most fun Ryan’s ever had in radio was doing live on-site interviews at the annual Highland Games events in Fredericton. It is a weekend long Celtic Fest that CHSR takes part in every year broadcasting live before its audience. 

Ryan spun tunes and the people sang and danced. He interviewed whoever he saw, and made people laugh, it was very encouraging. A couple of moments will always stick out for him about the event. One was not related to music but doing play by play broadcasting for the strong man compitiitions.

He went to interview the winner of the competition who just finished tossing a huge caber to a great length and breaking a record (not a cd). When he started the interview, Ryan ran up to him and accidently jabbed him with his pen. It went unnoticed, but Ryan (and now you), will always know it happened.

Here is this guy who just exerted a huge amount of energy at great physical risk to entertain a crowd, and then someone runs up to him and jabs him with a pen!

Thanks a lot!

Anyway,

Another highlight was miking a huge piping band for the radio. There were 200 odd bagpipers marching in a great line across the festival grounds and Ryan was following them with a microphone so that the radio audience can hear it. There was one point where Ryan got in front because he was told that that was where they are going to turn around and head back the other direction. He remembers sitting there watching the huge mass of marching bagpipers heading towards him, hoping and praying that his sources were right and that they were indeed going to turn around and not trample all over him!

In day to day matters, it is worth mentioning a change in timeslot that occured. Due to being a student, Ryan ended up changing the air times of Melodies in Mind often, but for its last year and a half in Fredericton, the time was Wednesday afternoons, 3:30 to 5:00. This was the best possible time for the show because the most popular show on CHSR was on just before him. It was ’According with Camen’ an old time country music show that was hosted by an endearing and knowledgable senior citizen named Carmen.

It was to Ryan’s great fortune that Carmen liked some of the songs he played because Carmen began promoting Melodies in Mind to his large audience, encouraging them to stay tuned for the next show. There was a notable difference, Ryan got a lot more feedback about the show since then, he guesses that his audience probably doubled after Carmen started doing that. Ryan catered to the audience too, starting the show with the older, more traditional of his selections in order to not loose his older listeners right away. By the time he got around to the stuff you would scarcely even call folk, like the Big Sugar selections, that audience, he knew, may be tuning out.

Thank you for reading this far! And stay tuned for the next edition of Melodies in Mind, his story.