Same city, different sport, different medium

I managed to commentate on 2 spots from the same city just days apart. On the Wednesday night I was commentating from Madrid as Real Madrid completed a remarkable turnaround against Manchester City. By the weekend I was commentating from the same city, this time on the Ladies European Tour’s Madrid Ladies Open.

The "video" below (give it a click) is Real Madrid’s second goal that remarkably took the game to extra time. It is radio commentary. As you will note from the picture, I wasn’t in the Bernabeu. Commentating “off tube” brings its own required skills but the point of this post (apart from giving me the chance to post a nice bit of comms) is to show the contrasts between broadcasting on certain sports and between radio and tv.

In the picture, taken while that goal was going in, I am standing up (and pulling a strange face!). Standing can help with the power of your voice. As you can imagine, golf and football commentaries rarely reach the same fever pitch. Apart from the need to stretch my legs, I very rarely stand while commentating on golf. The tone required for the two sports is very different. There are peaks in golf but the general tone is one of calm compared to the high points in a fast-paced discipline like football. I sometimes wonder if people know it’s the same person when I am commentating on these different sports. And I quite like that.

The football was for UEFA via IMG Media. The golf was on Sky Sports and elsewhere around the world, so on television. In tv, the role of the commentator is to enhance the visuals. In radio, its more descriptive and about the geography. Where the players are on the pitch plus the scoreline, which you can never give out enough. In tv, it’s ok not to talk. Let the pictures breathe. In radio, it’s constant, acting as the eyes of the listener. Different skills for different medium in the same city.