Tag: "The New York Times"
Aaron Klein Takes Breaking News and Investigative Talk Radio to a New Level
By Jeff McKay
TALKERS
Special Features Correspondent
NEW YORK — Aaron Klein simply breaks all of the stereotypes of today’s talk show hosts. He’s just 34 years old. He does not lean liberal or conservative, nor does he speak in political talking points. He does not love or hate President Obama, or stand on the ground of anyone’s political party. He’s an accomplished author of six books with another blockbuster on the way. His radio show doesn’t just talk about the news – in many cases it breaks the news – broadcasting half a world away.
Klein grew up in a tight-knit community of orthodox Jews in Philadelphia, and eventually moved to New York City where he attended Yeshiva University. It wasn’t long before he joined the student newspaper, and became editor. If he wasn’t hooked to the media by that time, a powerful report in the college newspaper led to the school removing issues of his newspaper. That action led to the threat of a lawsuit against the university. The school backed down and discontinued their practice.
Like many people in radio, Klein never really planned on the media as a career.
How to Be a Talk Show Host
By Bob Lonsberry
WHAM, Rochester/WSYR Syracuse
Talk Show Host
MOUNT MORRIS, NY — Let me tell you how to be a talk show host.
Step one: Ignore anybody who tries to tell you how to be a talk show host
This is fundamentally a solo business and the more you try to be like someone else, or the more closely you follow the consultants and the bosses, the less effective you will be.
Certainly, there are general rules of the business, ways to hold listeners and maximize ratings, to move through a clock and broadcast professionally. You must know and execute the formatics, but you must be their master, not their slave. They give you structure, but you give yourself voice.
Somewhere, down deep, you either have it or you don’t, and the key to your success will be being true to yourself. Likewise, the key to the continued success of the form will be the quality and variety of rising hosts.
