For my Storycorps analysis, I listened to “He Took Me Under His Wing”: The Father Figure Who Mentored Aspiring Black Surgeons featuring Fred Gilliam and Jerry Harris and “A Columbine Survivor On Going Home To Teach” featuring Paula Reed and Mandy Cooke. The first story tells the story of Dr. Vivien Thomas from the perspective of two of the people who he mentored. Meanwhile, “A Columbine Survivor On Going Home To Teach” tells the story of a columbine survivor’s relationship with the columbine shooting throughout her life and her decision to go back to Columbine to teach.
There are a few things I found similar with both stories. One of the main things I found similar was how both of the clips were structured. They both began with a small blurb from the interviewer, summarizing what the interview was basically about so that the listeners could jump right in. After, the interviewee began speaking and telling the story they wanted to tell. Neither of these clips included any actual questions from the interviewer. Afterwards, there was a short clip of music with no dialogue (long considering the length of the entire clip), which concluded the story.
I do have a few questions regarding the actual production process of these two clips. For example, what from the interview process got cut? In class we discussed how to make our interviewee comfortable and how to ask questions to them. But in both of these clips, the only time we hear the interviewer is when they give their blurb at the beginning. Still, I have a hard time imagining they just went right into their story without any prompting, meaning that if the interviewer did ask questions, they probably edited that part out. I think if that were the case, it would be to create a more conversational piece–like as if instead of talking to the interviewer, the people were talking to us.
One of the other things I noticed was the music they used in the end. In my opinion, the music went on a little long. I kept expecting someone to like start speaking, for example, like having someone advertise storycorps or something along those lines, but it never came. I think it did do a good job of tying up the clip. For example where the one for “He Took Me Under His Wing…” the music was hopeful, whereas for the columbine story it remained bleak.