Author: Andy Harper

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Sounds of the South

 

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Work continues in the Kinard Audio Studios on the pilot series for a new radio program called “S

ounds of the South”. All semester, MPD intern Nelson Griffin has worked with producer Joe York to create ten 3-4 minutes radio spots based on entries from the New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture Music Edition. 

Aside from providing production experience and internship credit for Nelson, the spots he’s creating will be the basis of what we hope will be MPD & UM;s widening presence on Mississippi Public Broadcasting. 

Check back later in the semester for examples of Nelson’s completed radio spots on such varied southern musical icons as Jelly Roll Morton, Mississippi Fred McDowell, Southern Culture on the Skids, and many, many more.

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Rise and Shine

You have to get up pretty early to get the best of Southern Studies Students Matt Hopper and Jen Lawrence. Above is a rough cut of their short documentary about erstwhile Oxford politico Shine Morgan. Matt & Jen are producing the documentary for Dr. Justin Nystrom’s SST 402 class. MPD producer Joe York has worked with Dr. Nystrom and his students all semester helping them produce short documentaries for MPD’s ongoing Oxonians Oral History Project.

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Handel Handled

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Here’s a still from the video we shot last night in the Ford Center of Handel’s Messiah, performed by the University of Mississippi Concert Singers with Orchestra. Pictured is guest conductor Dr. Dennis Shrock.

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Intensive English

IEP Korean Session Green ScreenMatthew Graves is in the studio today with students from the University of Mississippi Intensive English Program. He is producing a series of web videos for prospective students in their native languages. Stay tuned for the finished series.

IEP Korean Language Session

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Another Piece of the Puzzle

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Today, producers Joe York and Matthew Graves traveled to Columbus to interview District Attorney Forrest Allgood for Joe’s upcoming documentary on the Mississippi Innocence Project. Pictured is Allgood going over some court documents with York. Check back for more information and updates on this ongoing project.

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Kinard Studio Up and Running

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Producer Micah Ginn is in the studio today filming student interviews for an upcoming virtual campus tour for Enrollment Services. Pictured is Ole Miss student Gloria Howell. Check back for more updates on this new project.

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Shad Attack

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Here are a few pics from today’s shoot with recent Ole Miss grad and Rhodes Scholar recipient Shad White. Shad is participating in a video we’re producing for the Ole Miss Momentum Campaign as well as a new “Are You Ready?” spot featuring the Honors College. Be sure to check out our other “Are You Ready?” spots here and let us know if you think of other people or programs on campus that should be highlighted.

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Senator Thad Cochran in Kinard Studio

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In this blurry picture you can see U.S. Senator Thad Cochran sitting down for an interview in our studio. Senator Cochran was here to give a short P.S.A. about the Center for Natural Products Research on campus. In addition, we were able to ask him a few questions about  the Presidential Debate that happened last September. We’re working on a documentary about the event and Senator Cochran’s interview will be a nice addition to the project. Check back for more news and info about the upcoming Debate Documentary.

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Class Dismissed

 

Here’s the final cut of the short film that Matthew Graves produced last weekend for the student film workshop. As a side note, if you were able to catch “Slumdog Millionare” you might recognize the low-rent version of their credit sequence used at the end. Jai Ho!

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The Shooter

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This morning, Micah Ginn and Matthew Graves went on location to the Oxford High School gymnasium to shoot footage for an upcoming basketball training video.  This afternoon will be spent in the newly renovated studio to finish the shoot.

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SROW Off!

This past weekend, the University of Mississippi hosted some 1,500 student orientation leaders for the Southern Regional Orientation Workshop (SROW). Micah Ginn and Andy Harper were there to record their Song, Skit, and Dance competition at the Tad Pad. It was a lively bunch and they showed tremendous spirit and sportsmanship (first time we’d seen other SEC schools doing the gator chomp in support of Florida!).

Micah films SROW
Micah Films Ole Miss Orientation Leaders
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Coffee anyone?

 

The Media and Documentary Projects Center is proud to present “Coffee Mate”, a short film by former Ole Miss student Hunter Palmer. “Coffee Mate” tells the story of Redman. Born from a freak coffee accident, Redman must find his way in a strange new world where danger lurks behind every corner. The film was produced here at our Kinard Hall offices and represents hours and hours of work on the part of Hunter as he prepares to apply to film schools in the fall. Best of luck to him and we hope you enjoy his film.

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And They're Off…

This semester Joe York and Andy Harper are helping teach SST 554, Documentary Fieldwork, with Dr. David Wharton. The class has been divided into five groups and each group will produce a ten minute short documentary focusing on the intersection between local food and culture. In this short video student George Ray discusses the project he and students Ben Guest and Katrina Hayes will be producing.

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Outstanding in his Field…Recordings

Dr. David Evans, professor of ethnomusicology at the University of Memphis, delivered the keynote address at the recent Blues Today Symposium here at the University of Mississippi. Highway 61 Radio producers Joe York and Eric Feldman were there to record the proceedings. Check back for more from the Blues Symposium later this week and be sure to visit highway61radio.com

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5…4…3…2…1….Thacker Mountain Radio Documentary Picks Up Steam

marywarnerblogThis evening Media & Documentary Projects Center graduate assistant Mary Warner is down in the delta filming interviews for her documentary film about Thacker Mountain Radio. Over the past three months, Mary has worked with producer Joe York to shoot over a dozen interviews for the film, which will serve as partial fulfillment of her thesis requirement for a MA in Southern Studies.

Just last week, Mary, Joe, and MDPC’s own Matthew Graves filmed Thacker Mountain Radio in beautiful high definition video, covering the show from top to bottom with four cameras filming simultaneously. 

Check back later this semester to see the final cut.

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Students take a "shine" to documentary work

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This semester students in Dr. Justin Nystrom’s Southern Studies 402 class are doing short documentary projects in support of the Media & Documentary Projects Center’s “Oxonians Oral History Initiative”. Jen Lawrence & Matt Hopper, pictured here, are both in the class and are working together 0n a short documentary about the late Oxonian appliance store owner and politico extraordinaire, Shine Morgan. Just today Jen and Matt were in Studio B interviewing Linda Morgan for their project.

But Jen and Matt are just two of many students in the class and their project is just one of several in production. Check back throughout the semester for more from these up and coming oral historians.

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Knock! Knock! Who's there? Wisconsin Public Radio!

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If it seems like only last week that local author Jack Pendarvis paid a visit to the Media & Documentary Projects Center, it’s becasue it was! We used our trusty Zephyr ISDN line to connect Jack with the good people at Wisocnsin Public Broadcasting who produce the nationally syndicated radio show To the Best of Our Knowledge. Jack will be featured on an upcoming episode of the show reading his article “The 50 Greatest Things That Just Popped Into My Head” which was originally published in The Believer.

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Mutton but a Thing

The UM Media & Documentary Projects Center is proud to announce that Joe York’s short film “Mutton: The Movie” will headline the opening night gala at the 2009 New York Food Film Festival.

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If you can’t make it to the Big Apple for the big night (June 13) you can see “Mutton: The Movie” right here, right now….

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RIP – Bluesman Willie King

williekingliberateHighway 61 Radio was sad to learn this morning that Mississippi bluesman Willie King passed away this past weekend. Over the years Willie has been a great friend of the show and we have featured him on the program many times. He will be greatly missed.

A few years back Highway 61 producer Joe York and Preston Lauterbach produced a short film about Willie called “The Real Baptizing”. We hope it brings back good memories for you as it does for us and we ask that you keep Willie, his family, and friends in your thoughts and prayers.

For more information visit highway61radio.com


The Real Baptizing from Highway61 on Vimeo.

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Keeping the Reunion on Track

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This weekend, producer Micah Ginn directed the video content for the Ole Miss Black Alumni & Family Reunion held at the Inn at Ole Miss. The evening was a great success honoring several distinguished alumni. Pictured is Ginn at  the computer and grad student Noah Bunn operating the video switcher. Check back this week for more info about this memorable weekend.

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Documenting the Blues

Highway 61 Radio producers Joe York and Eric Feldman kept busy last week documenting all the activity surrounding the latest Blues Today: Living Blues Symposium. Throughout the coming week we’ll be posting videos of all of the events and panels from the symposium, beginning with this video of the dedication of a Mississippi Blues Trail Marker honoring the University of Mississippi’s commitment to “Documenting the Blues”.

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Howorth/Schultze

Earlier this week, Lucy Schultze of the Oxford Eagle interviewed Oxford Mayor Richard Howorth at the Overby Center for Southern Journalism & Politics. The Media & Documentary Projects Center’s newest team member, Noah Bunn, was there to record the mayor’s thoughts on his past eight years in office.

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School Days

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This Saturday, producer Matthew Graves instructed a film class for a few Ole Miss Law School professors’ kids. In the 3 hour class they went over a few principles of filmmaking like composition and storyboarding, focusing on the art of a chase scene in a movie. The class then produced a short film using the techniques they learned. Here’s a pic from the short. Check back next week to view the finished film.

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Fixing it in Post

The Documentary class is starting to heat up. The class has been divided up into five groups of three and we have begun training in interview and editing techniques. Production begins when we return from spring break. Check back for updates.

Producer Joe York instructs the documentary class on the art of editing.
Producer Joe York instructs the documentary class on the art of editing.
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Brown Bags and Powder Blue Helmets

MDP Producer Micah Ginn enthralled those assembled at the Southern Studies brown bag this week with his lecture entitled “Football Flashbacks: Classic Film Footage from the Ole Miss Archives.” Micah is going through all of the Ole Miss football films, restoring them, and transferring the film to digital format. Along the way he has come across many gems, some of which he shared in his brown bag.
Micah discusses his film transfer work.
Micah discusses his film transfer work.
Micah points to the War Eagle.
Micah points to the War Eagle.
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Attack of the Clay!

 

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Here’s a still from an upcoming short claymation film that we’re working on with former Ole Miss student Hunter Palmer. Hunter has been working tirelessly on the tedious art of claymation; recording one frame at a time and adjusting the movements of the characters on each frame to create fluid motion. Needless to say, we’re impressed with his work and we think you will be to. Check back next week to view Hunter’s final film.

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Hooray! for Drake and Terry

blue-ribbon-180x300Remember the James Meredith documentary by two students from Madison Middle School that we blogged about last week? Well, it went over like gangbusters at the National History Day competition this past week, winning everything in sight! Here’s an email we received from Drake and Terry’s teacher Tom Watts at Madison Middle School:

Andy and Joe, Drake Terry and Jerry Lee Ainsworth won the over all “Best in Show” (for all five categories) at the State level National History Day at the University of Southern Mississippi. Also, they won the Group Documentary at Senior Division; received a special award for the best Oral History Project; and won the History Quiz Bowl for the second year in a row, beating a team from Crystal Springs, 19 – 3. I know you are as proud of them as We are. But they could not have done it without ya’lls tremendous help!!! We will be going in to the University of Maryland for the National History Day to represent Mississippi. No Mississippi project has won in any of the catagories in the 28 year history of National History Day. We are hoping to be the first. Again, God Bless ya’ll and thank you from the bottom of our hearts!!! Tom Watts, Madison Middle School, Madison, MS
If you missed the now award winning documentary by Drake and Terry when we posted it last week, here it is again:

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"Are You Ready?" Campaign in the Tad Pad

Momentum continues to grow with the Media and Documentary Projects Center Ole Miss “Are You Ready?” campaign. And while the Rebels couldn’t hold off the Crimson Tide’s hot shooting, the crowd enthusiastically welcomed David Huertas on the big screen.

David Huertas "Are You Ready?" in the Tad Pad
David Huertas "Are You Ready?" in the Tad Pad
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Blues Trail Marker Dedication

MDP production “Highway 61” was represented at the UM Blues Trail Marker ceremony. “Highway 61” host and former Living Blues editor Scott Barretta served as the master of ceremonies, welcoming former magazine editors and blues enthusiasts alike.