Today is an exciting day for me and my team as we are launching the . It will bring all the same great features that are in the iOS version together with some further enhancements which utilise the specific navigational paradigms of the Android platform. Features include:

• A touchscreen dial that beautifully shows the breadth of our radio, allowing easy access to all 57 主播大秀 radio stations and their live streams.
• An alarm clock to let you wake up to your favourite 主播大秀 Radio station.
• Access to catch-up content, video and audio clips, podcasts, and for music shows, the details of the tracklist.
• The ability to set programme alerts to tell you when specific favourite shows are on.
• The option to favourite tracks and share them with friends via email and Twitter.

The and via the Amazon app store. This app is also available on Android tablets (not just smartphones), including the very popular Amazon Kindle Fire HD. We are using the which is supported by Android version 3.0 and above. For a more detailed explanation of what devices will support the 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio app, see .

We hope that android users will love the app as much as iOS users do. Since , the iOS app has been downloaded over 1.8 million times and we are seeing significant growth in usage on mobile and tablet. so that we can keep improving the service.

For me, producing this series has been an extraordinary experience; forcing me for the first time to consider the joy and complexity of the sound we make when we open our mouths. In song and in speech, our voices tell the rest of the world how we think and feel. They educate, inform, attract, entertain and offend.

The Voice on Radio 2 will showcase the full sweep of issues relating to human speech and song. The will look at losing one's voice and , as well as exploring freedom of speech and the origin of British accents.

At the end of the week, Jeremy will be inviting the UK鈥檚 best-loved and best-known voices to take part in an extraordinary broadcast. Imagine sharing a drink with The London Underground, Tony the Tiger, Postman Pat, Siri, Big brother, the National Lottery and Mr X Factor all in one studio at the same time. will be at 1pm on Friday 19 April.听

I must say that, having spoken to a number of voice artists, I鈥檝e been struck by their sense of frustration 鈥� sadness, even 鈥� that their field is shrouded in mystery. Their voices are instantly recognisable. By rights, they should be stopped on the street and asked for their autograph every five paces. And yet they are every bit as anonymous as you or me. Such is the nature of their business.

One major insurance company has blocked the actor behind their famous Russian fluff ball from taking part, in fear of bursting their hugely successful marketing bubble. Here is a man with great talent and pride in his art, being refused any public recognition of his notable contribution to pop culture over the last five years. We can assume he is paid handsomely for his work, but imagine enjoying Adele, without ever being able to identify the woman behind the voice. On the 19^th of April, Radio 2 does its bit to right that wrong (for some of our favourite voices, at least).

Looking beyond the Jeremy Vine Show, The Voice Week on Radio 2 spans virtually every programme across the network.

The on Monday will feature the US phenomenon, 15-year-old Jake Foushee. Jake is huge news in America and now he's ready to wow Britain with the amazing voice that's already earning him appearances on US primetime shows and voiceover work in Hollywood:

will be asking people what the voice of God sounds like to them. will make a surprise mystery call to an unsuspecting fan to see if they recognise her voice. will be searching for the country鈥檚 sexiest voice.

Chris Tarrant 鈥� in for Steve Wright 鈥� will be and then trying out his new skills at a Luton Town FC match on Thursday night.听 is bringing back his celebrity Mystery Voice feature for Drivetime, while and Lynne Bowles will read traffic reports in one another鈥檚 accents.

Without the human voice, there would be no radio. This week, Radio 2 finally acknowledges the brilliance of the most peculiar instrument known to man and celebrates those who showcase its range and beauty. It鈥檚 about time, too.

The Voice Week on 主播大秀 Radio 2. Listen to it. Please talk about it. Share it... on Twitter, on Facebook, by email and yes... by word of mouth!

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Andy West is Producer, The Jeremy Vine Show, 主播大秀 Radio 2

• Voice Week runs from Sunday 14 to Friday 19 April - .
• Don't miss on Saturday nights from 6.45pm
• Play along with .

When Radio 4鈥檚 launched an appeal for lost recordings of , last October, no one could have imagined that it would lead to over 620 missing programmes being restored to the 主播大秀鈥檚 archive.

Fortunately two listeners - Roy Whittaker, from Cornwall, and David Henderson, from Warwickshire, heard the programme and contacted Broadcasting House. They both loved listening to Alistair Cooke and recorded Letter from America every Friday night for years.

But unlike other people who got it touch, they had also labelled the tapes with dates, and stored them safely in boxes - one in his attic, the other in his cellar.

Mr Whittaker and Mr Henderson entrusted their collections to the 主播大秀 and as a result helped complete the between the years 1974 to 2004. The recently finished digitising over 600 of their recordings.

To celebrate, we invited them for a special lunch and a tour of Broadcasting House with presenter to say thank you. Paddy sneakily managed to type a brief thank you note to them on , displayed on the first floor of .

Digitising the collections wasn鈥檛 straightforward - some were recorded on long obsolete . Restoring the machine on which they鈥檇 been recorded by David Henderson, back in 1974, proved the only solution. The majority were on cassette tapes 鈥� but the levels varied considerable according to the brand of tape, so it was painstaking work.

And there鈥檚 plenty of more work to do 鈥� the audio needs restoring, descriptions need writing, but one day we hope to find a way to make them available to the public, along with the .

And if you know anyone who recorded Letter from America before 1974, please get in touch.

Zillah Watson, Producer and Curator of the Letter from America Archive

• Visit the on the Radio 4 website
• See
• Gallery:

What is By:Larm?

is a 4 day music event held in Oslo annually. According to an online translation service, the name translates as 鈥楿rban Noise鈥�.

What you will find there are lots of panels, seminars and training sessions through the day, and live performances from a diverse range of Nordic and Scandinavian artists performing at a selection of venues around the city by night.

By:Larm is abundant with networking opportunities for those working both in, and around music, including digital service providers, students, labels, artist managers etc and it鈥檚 also a fabulous showcase for musicians from the region.

Panel Discussions

I was kindly invited to , with the intention of discussing 鈥渆volving radio models and examining how they will affect music marketing, payments, income, and opportunities for labels, artists, managers and other industry stakeholders鈥�. I was joined by delegates from , and , making for an interesting mix of angles on this subject.

The discussion began with each panellist challenged to describe what we thought 鈥楻adio鈥� meant these days which opened a can of worms (or maybe a more fitting analogy would be Pandora鈥檚 box?)听as we talked about two quite different types of service using the name 鈥楻adio鈥� to describe themselves, the more traditional, live broadcast model, and streaming services like , , , , and .

The lines between streaming services and radio are beginning to blur as artists and DJs can easily curate and publicise playlists now. These services are not just about a search box and a big back-catalogue anymore. Like traditional radio, they can host individual personalities and act as a guide to music discovery.

After my panel, I had the chance to explore others. By:Larm hosts a packed agenda of seminars and training sessions, so I could not attend all of them, but certain themes came up repeatedly in those that I did:

• It can appear tough for artists to get themselves well represented on the many streaming, and digital download platforms around now, but it鈥檚 widely agreed that many such services are now proving to be successful businesses with a strong future. Online streaming, rather than purchasing music at all would appear to be a thoroughly mainstream activity now in Norway at least.
• There鈥檚 still work to do for both labels and digital service providers in the highly competitive yet potentially lucrative mobile space, where simple payment models and overall convenience can drive revenues. There was a whole panel on what can be done with (Radio Frequency Identification) for example, explaining that it can offer much more than just the 鈥榖onk to pay鈥� (wireless payment from credit card or mobile phone) we鈥檙e starting to see more now in UK stores.
• We should expect to see more D2C (Direct to Consumer) offerings in the near future as artists and labels leverage the power of the internet to promote themselves, and sell directly 鈥� cutting out the middlemen and maximising their earning potential. Yet in parallel, the streaming sites with huge catalogues grow and grow in reach and engagement. It鈥檚 an interesting time for the evolution of music sales.

By:Larm nights

As well as these industry discussions and presentations, the highlight of By:Larm for a lot of folks is the enormous choice of great Nordic and Scandinavian music on offer each evening. A great networking opportunity, whilst touring various venues around the city, sharing experiences with the people you鈥檝e met in the conferences earlier.

There鈥檚 also some amazing music to be heard.

I had expected to discover extremes of Black Metal and ethereal & melancholic Electronica, and although these two contrasting styles were undoubtedly popular, there were some sounds I was more surprised to hear, including intense Brostep from , and block-rocking hip-hop from the likes of and .

I鈥檝e created (other streaming services are available!) of a lot of the artists performing over the 4 days of the event so you can hear what鈥檚 shaking the speakers of Oslo these days for yourself. Admittedly, I missed out a lot of the metal, but there鈥檚 loads of other playlists available from the event if you dig around.

You can read more about By:Larm including full seminar and artist listings on 听and many thanks and credit to Oystein, Lena and Mena for organising a great event.

So far this month we've seen the , the controller of Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra being forced and .

This isn't exactly what we envisaged when we proposed that February should be Access All Areas month on Radio 1.

The month had 2 clear objectives:

1. To be as open and transparent as possible for our young audience
2. To celebrate and continue the stations digital innovation

We know how much our listeners like to see behind the scenes and get exclusive backstage access, so we are aiming to open up what Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra do across the entire month. The relationship between us and our audience feels close than it ever has. They have access to the inner thoughts of our DJs via Twitter. They can often get to watch, as well as listen to, our regular output. So the challenge for the month is how to bring them even closer.

The centrepiece of our Access All Areas activity has rapidly become Radio 1's first ever intake of interns.

Chosen from close to 900 applicants, the four paid interns have the chance to spend 8 weeks as part of the Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra team. We were keen to recruit the best young creative minds we could find, regardless of their experience or education - so the application process was to submit 2 pieces of content that they had produced - in whatever medium. To find out more about Kae, Alice, Moses and Pete, . We've also set them up with bespoke Twitter accounts (have a look at @firstname_intern).

By being on air, on social media and embedded within our production teams the interns should bring an unmoderated account of what really goes on to the wider audience. We have also tasked them to produce their fantasy radio show - in consultation with the Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra listeners. With no constraints on the playlist, the format or the presenters, it will be fascinating to hear what they come up with. It鈥檚 from 7 till 9pm on Wednesday, 27 February.

The process hasn't been without its bumps. But if we are going to be brave, innovative and open then I think that is inevitable. We may have slightly irked some artists, but it was worth it .

No, we didn't manage to fly a blimp up the atrium of New Broadcasting House, but the month is only half done and there are many surprises still to come.

• Radio 1 and Radio 1Xtra are opening up to audiences throughout February as a part of Access All Areas. To find out more about .听

When I asked to work on听the new adaptation of 听just over a year ago, little did I know how different the production process would turn out, but also how moving and unforgettable our time would be recording it.

So how do the cast fit their lines to the live musical score (in front of a studio audience) with less than three days to get it right?

Day One: The orchestra are in Studio 1 and we are in Studio 3 with Colin Guthrie (studio manager) cueing an electronic version of the music on a laptop. (orchestrator and adapter) motions to the actors and gives notes: 鈥淲hen you feel the urge to go fast 鈥� don鈥檛. When you feel the urge to slow down 鈥� don鈥檛.鈥澨� It鈥檚 an incredibly precise art and a little nerve-wracking.

Day Two: The only played the piece for the first time yesterday. We go in to see them run through 鈥� it is unutterably beautiful and surprisingly loud. The music has both an emotional and visceral effect on me having never sat in front of a full orchestra before nor having heard Neil鈥檚 beautiful music in all its glory.

By the afternoon, the actors are placed in front of the orchestra complete with 鈥楳adonna鈥� microphones attached to their heads, but they simply can鈥檛 be heard over the music. Neil realises that this volume would be perfect for the Royal Albert Hall but is too loud for us.

When we return from tea-break (ushered in and out by the brass section playing carols) several members of the Orchestra have been released of their duties (they are happy, they get Christmas holidays early). We carry on and the storytelling finally comes alive.听 Relief.

Day Three:听The 主播大秀SO and actors run through with adjustments to various sections of the show from director David Hunter, Neil Brand and producer Ann McKay. It鈥檚 unusual having to think of sound for the invited audience and those tuning in at a later date simultaneously.

Stephen Mangan (Toad) is getting really poorly which is a worry, but he still soldiers on. Neil Brand becomes a conductor for the actors and cues them in at exactly the right moment. We are in safe hands.

Performance day:听After several run-throughs everyone is ready for the two evening shows. As the audience queue up outside I place cough medicine under Stephen鈥檚 chair and retire to the cubicle to hear the mix.

Studio manager Neil Pemberton has different characters and orchestra sections assigned to most of the faders on the mixing desk. There are at least 40, which he glides up and down to get the correct sound picture. 听

A second studio manager (whilst reading the score) whispers across "Stay with Mole, Stay with Badger, fade the chimes".听 The actors all give an outstanding performance. Doctor Theatre has worked his magic and Stephen delivers his lines (and two songs which he literally learnt overnight) with full cough-free energy and wit.听

A short break, and another performance which ups the game even more. The audience laugh, clap and look on in awe.

• You can hear for the next 5 days
• View the from the recording.
• More on

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Recent listening figures from suggest around 20% of the UK has listened to radio via a mobile phone. This figure nearly doubles to 37.6% for 15-24 year olds. It's not surprising then that the mobile apps that the 主播大秀 and both launched in late 2012 have proved very successful.

The (iPhone听and iPod Touch) has been downloaded more than 1.4 million times since launch and, along with the , it is being regularly used and driving up overall radio listening. The UK radio industry is all working hard to increase digital listening and mobile has a crucial role to play.

We're getting some great feedback on the design and functionality of the app and trying to make changes quickly to the issues you raise. Please keep your feedback coming to or via the app store.

One of the changes we've just made is to add a link from the through to , helping audiences to more easily access hundreds of other stations from across UK Radio, including some community and student radio too. We hope this link helps 主播大秀 audiences to explore even more of the best of UK radio.

For more information on the iPlayer Radio mobile app, see James Simcock's . 听

"13 February is World Radio Day 鈥� a day to celebrate radio as a medium; to improve international cooperation between broadcasters; and to encourage major networks and community radio alike to promote access to information and freedom of expression over the airwaves."听from The UNESCO website

• You can find out more about the second 听on the UNESCO website.
• The picture is from the 主播大秀 archive and the original caption reads: "主播大秀 Daventry Empire Short Wave Station: 1938. Picture shows - High power transmitter. The control room showing three of the six programme-control positions and telephone switchboard. Left, controlling the volume of the programme; right, checking the anode current of his amplifier."
• 主播大秀eng.info:
• Journalism.co.uk:

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Last week, we re-launched . It contains an archive of , showing who played when, where and what they played.听 Each entry has photographs, and some of the more recent ones have audio and video.

The new site looks great on mobile, and from now on all Live Lounge videos will play on your mobile too.

The Live Lounge is the biggest launch so far on our new events platform, which we lovingly call Eavis (in honour of the man who runs the best festival in the world, ).听

The platform has so far hosted, amongst other things, , , and . We've been developing the new platform throughout 2012, and it represents a big change to the way we manage our events coverage online. Putting the Live Lounge data into the system is a big milestone, and I thought I'd take the opportunity to explain why.

In the beginning there were webpages. People like me wrote them in 鈥� not exactly 1s and 0s, but not far off. They were utterly static 鈥� no better than pages of a book really, except that you could easily click from one page to another. It might surprise you to know that, as recently as last year, large chunks of the 主播大秀 radio websites were still made in exactly the same way. Pretty cumbersome to maintain, and very few opportunities to create useful and interesting journeys between pages. We're trying to phase them out in favour of a more semantic approach.

""听is a concept where information isn't stored as text in pages, but as data in databases, where every single bit of data has meaning 鈥� hence "semantic".听 Instead of building hundreds of manual web pages, we build one web page as a template, and the content spaces are filled with data from the database when you access the page. The resulting web page might seem very similar to you the user, but the power of having all that data is huge.听

At a very basic level, we can start to present the relationship between the various bits of content.听 For example, on the page for , you can see a box suggesting Similar Acts who have performed at recent 主播大秀 events, as well as other Live Lounge appearances by Ben Howard over the last few years (there are two more). We have also connected the Live Lounge database with the database, which is powered by the open source system that gives every single artist in the history of music a unique ID number. That's how come you can see a set of useful Ben Howard鈥檚 web links on the side of the page.

In my mind, this is just the beginning. Many of the 主播大秀's major products 鈥� such as and the pages 鈥� are semantic systems, built in a similar way.听 It's pretty exciting to think of the possibilities of connecting the Events database to other parts of 主播大秀 online, and create interesting, meaningful journeys around 主播大秀 content, on all sorts of devices. Watch this space!

The were announced last night at a ceremony in the Radio Theatre at 主播大秀 Broadcasting House.

The awards celebrate audio drama, on air and online, and recognise the actors, writers, producers, sound designers, and others whose work makes it all possible.

David Tennant hosted the event with the participation of luminaries like Stephen Tompkinson, Maxine Peake, Stephen Mangan and Lenny Henry.

Find details of .

You'll be able to hear some of the 主播大秀 winning audio dramas again, including On It, Do you Like Banana, Comrades? and The Grapes of Wrath on , and from Wednesday 13 February.

• 主播大秀 iPlayer Radio:
• The
• : David Tennant at the Audio Drama Awards: 'radio drama makes me proud to be British'

On Saturday 26 January, the animals of Manor Farm will overthrow Farmer Jones to the tune of 鈥楤easts of England鈥� and will have begun. I know that鈥檚 a spoiler but it happens fairly near the beginning so hopefully I鈥檒l be forgiven! Following hot on the heels (hooves?) of is a new production of on Sunday and the first of on Monday.

Not only does the season include a and the first ever radio dramatisation of Nineteen Eighty Four starring Christopher Eccleston as Winston but it also shines a light on the man behind the writing and attempts to explain the influences and experiences which led Orwell to write his final book.

As an Assistant Producer working on extra content for The Real George Orwell season, I鈥檝e learnt a lot through this project. I didn鈥檛 know that Room 101 (where Big Brother鈥檚 torture takes place in Nineteen Eighty Four) was based on an office in Broadcasting House (only a few floors below where we鈥檝e recorded the dramas). I didn鈥檛 know that (of which we have photos). I didn鈥檛 know that there is no recording of Orwell鈥檚 voice. I knew he had worked for the 主播大秀 and that he had his throat shot during the Spanish Civil War but didn鈥檛 realise that Joseph Millson, who plays Eric Blair, wouldn鈥檛 be able to listen to Orwell himself when researching the role. I didn鈥檛 know that there鈥檚 a letter objecting to Orwell鈥檚 voice in the 主播大秀 archive (along with his resignation letter and other amazing pieces of history!). I鈥檝e interviewed Orwell鈥檚 biographer DJ Taylor who explained to me how Eric Blair chose his pen name and marvelled that this amazing body of work could have been written by 鈥楬 Lewis Always鈥�.

Apart from these discoveries, I鈥檝e had the pleasure of becoming re-acquainted with Orwell鈥檚 writing (which I鈥檓 ashamed to say I hadn鈥檛 read since school). I鈥檝e read ahead of the Book at Bedtime and will never feel quite the same about eating in a Parisian restaurant again! I鈥檝e remembered how great the characters in Animal Farm are, how difficult and confusing all the in-fighting in Catalonia must have been and how moving Winston and Julia鈥檚 relationship in Nineteen Eighty Four is.

The picture shows - 听Standing, L to R: Writer George Woodcock; novelist Mulk Raj Anand; George Orwell and the poet William Empson. Sitting: The critic Herbert Read and the poet Edmund Blunden.

• See also on the About the 主播大秀 blog

Before I start writing about all the great stuff going on at 主播大秀 Introducing, it is probably best to heed the advice of this blog鈥檚 editor and explain what 主播大秀 Introducing is. To quote :

主播大秀 Introducing brings together all the 主播大秀鈥檚 supporters of undiscovered and unsigned music. If you鈥檙e making music, upload your best tracks and your music heard by the 主播大秀.

We have a family of local and national 主播大秀 radio shows staffed by amazing producers and presenters who are hugely driven about discovering new music and playing it to their audience. It鈥檚 been a great past week for these shows.

At 8pm last Saturday 5 January, every local 主播大秀 station in England and the Channel Islands broadcast a 主播大秀 Introducing show at the same time. Over 30 shows hitting the airwaves at the same time was a great way to start the year and the sharing of love through听the hashtag was indicative of the passion that runs through everyone associated with 主播大秀 Introducing, from the presenters and producers to the listeners and music makers.

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You can get a terrific taster of our local shows through our *. Our local shows have selected the artists they expect to make waves in the coming year and you can now listen to all of them at your leisure.

• Get the free
• For the tracklist, head to the .
• You can listen back to your local show, or all of them if you are brave enough, .
• Check out the and
• *If you are viewing this on your mobile, please be aware that the file size is 101MB. Mobile network operators may charge for data used over their networks. If you are unsure how much 3G data costs or what your data allowance is then contact your mobile network operator.

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(Ed's Update: You can catch up with . There's a brilliant with lots of your tweets questions, comments and photos听from yesterday as well as the . You can until 19 December - PM)

Robbie Williams is all over Radio 2 today with an online Q&A听from 5.45pm and a live performance for from 8pm presented by Jo Whiley. Watch it all on the .

Tweet your questions for Robbie to using the hashtag #R2Robbie. More info on the page.

If you do miss Robbie today you have until 19 December to listen to the concert on the .

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With a million users,听two months of anonymous stats data, hundreds of app store ratings and reviews, lots of feedback via twitter, via our blogs and via email, we're able to see some trends that, for me at least, are quite interesting, and are already helping to inform the roadmap for new features and improvements. I've broken out a few of those trends here.

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What鈥檚 your flavour?

iPhones make up the vast majority of downloads, although there are number of iPod Touch and iPad users downloading too.

If you are an iPad user, you need to specifically choose 鈥榠Phone apps鈥� from the app store, as we do not currently have a version of the app built specifically for iPad.

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What's the story, morning glory?

By far the most popular activity from the app so far, is 'waking up with Grimmy'. Whether it's by setting an alarm, or tuning in from home or en-route to work/school/wherever, from 7am each morning, there's a heavy bias to live listening to .

• Interesting fact: 25% of active users listen live to Radio 1 in the app.

and are head-to-head for the position of second most popular morning programme.

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Long train running

By the early evening, and especially during peak commuting hours (5.30-7.30pm) we see a much more diverse range of programmes being consumed via the app. live listening still dominates, but , and are also very popular. We see an increasing number of users digging deeper into the app, browsing most popular or most recent on-demand programmes or video clips for instance, or using the search function to find specific programmes. Comedy shows do particularly well at this time too. A little escapism as people escape from work perhaps?

• Interesting fact: The most popular search in the app is for Comedy.
• Interesting fact: The most popular on demand programme to date is Radio 4鈥檚 .

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Night time is the right time (for on-demand)

When we hit 9-10pm we see another uplift in on-demand listening - Radio 1 dance music specialist shows like and really come into their own during these hours.

Interesting fact: The most browsed music category is Dance & Electronica.

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Pillow Talk

Late in the evening, Radio 4 becomes more popular than Radio 1 in the iPlayer Radio app. We see even more on-demand programmes being consumed. The calming and intimate tones of speech radio stations dominate as people take their phones to bed with them, and overdriven guitars and filthy dubstep basslines are put to bed till the following day. Programmes such as Radio 4鈥檚 are popular and Radio 5 live also starts to outperform Radio 1 for late-night listening.

This is also the time that most alarms are set, and the sleep function (accessed from 'Night Mode' if you have audio playing) gets used most.

As I said in my introduction, these trends are really useful in helping develop new features and improvements in the app, both for iPhones and the work that is already underway bringing the iPlayer Radio app to Android phones in 2013.

As ever, your feedback on the app is appreciated. If you would like to send detailed feedback you can do so via radiofeedback@bbc.co.uk. It helps if you can provide specific information about how you are using this application such as handset type (e.g. iPhone 4/ iPhone 3GS/iPod Touch), connection type (e.g. WiFi/3G) and network operator.

Thanks to everyone who has downloaded and enjoyed thus far.

NB: All data is sourced from comScore | Digital Analytix

Related links:

• 主播大秀 Internet blog: 听and
• The 主播大秀 Radio blog:
• on Twitter

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