Western Student Gets Me

I hear from students on a fairly regular basis. Sometimes I can tell that a broadcasting pal has mentioned my name in the college or university class they teach because I’ll get a little trickle of emails all at once. I take them seriously and try to be thoughtful in my responses. 

They ask for career advice.  Or they just want to know if they can come for a tour or how to become an intern at Free-FM.  Sometimes they want to talk to me about pop culture for an article they’re writing in journalism class.  One such student took that assignment a little further and asked if we could meet so she could do a profile of me for her next assignment.  I was hesitant but I said, sure.

The reason I had a bit of reluctance comes from an experience I had many years ago with a similar request.  The student – who by the way has been in the business a long time now – really wasted my time. Her finished essay was nothing more than my resume strung together with adjectives.  But I had a good feeling about this student, Lindsay. She was very well prepared for our previous interview so I was pretty sure I’d be in good hands.

Well I was.  She had everything ready to go and seemed to get a real kick out of a tour of our radio station, which I’m only too proud to show off.  It isn’t big – it doesn’t have to be – but it’s state-of-the-art and in a terrific location on Richmond Row. I told myself I’d give her 20 minutes so 45 minutes later we were done!  And she has given me permission to print her finished article here.  I think Lindsay got me.

Little Steps Got Her to The Big Show

The best part of waking up, besides having Folgers in your cup, is listening to Lisa Brandt on air.

Brandt was born in Brantford, Ontario. Although she grew up in the country–living in Grimsby for most of her childhood and moving to a little rural town called Smithville for high school–she loves the city, so that’s where she ended up.

As an editor and newscaster on 98.1 Free FM, Brandt spends her mornings in London, Ontario’s “World Class Rock” radio station, located downtown on Richmond Street.

“My normal day most people would call abnormal,” said the friendly brunette. Sitting in her supervisor’s office Tuesday morning, after having just finished her final newscast at eleven, Brandt described her daily routine, which she confidently admits she has down to an art. Her alarm is set for 3:32 a.m., and she’s out the door by 3:45. The co-host of The Big Show with Botten, Blair & Brandt, the station’s new morning show that was launched on November 5th, arrives at work by 4 a.m. and begins her day looking through newspapers and wire copy.

Separated from her male counterparts for the show, which airs from 5:30-9:30 a.m., the radio veteran settles comfortably in a smaller, private studio to do her first newscast at six. The lovely voice of hers, which she often gets asked to lower in restaurants, can be heard providing listeners with London’s top news stories, with traffic updates in between, every half hour until nine. Brandt usually does one more newscast at ten, and after that, she spends her last hour at the station either doing an interview for a weekend magazine show, writing a blog, or pretending to look busy.

Most of the time, however, the ambitious owner of Lisa Brandt Creative Services doesn’t have to pretend. Whether she’s doing voice work in her home studio, writing for the Toronto Sun, serving radio stations through the talent and writing coaching of their employees, or recording an audio version of her recently published eBook, The Naked Truth, this go-getter is always up to something.

Is there anything Brandt can’t do? Well, yes. Decoupage, apparently. The abstract painter made a solid attempt at decorating an old dresser using pages from the Beatles songbook she bought on eBay, but it didn’t quite “come together” as planned.

Although Brandt spends much of her days creating new pieces of art through different mediums or hard at work at the station, she manages to dedicate some down time to one special guy in particular–her new cat, Spice. “In radio, you watch the clock constantly,” she said, “you’re watching your life tick by, so, every once in a while, to lose track of time is just such a gift.” In order to get away from the clock, that’s literally what she has to do–get away. In the summer, she hops on her motorcycle and drives around for a few hours. Sometimes she goes further…a lot further. She did a motorcycle trip in Arizona, in fact. “I always want to go someplace I haven’t been, see things I haven’t seen.”

Being in radio, however, isn’t something Brandt always wanted to do. “It’s funny because I wanted to be lawyer when I was a kid. And then I realized how much schooling there was.” She remembers sitting in the guidance councilor’s office in high school and having a conversation with the man, who doubled as the football coach and was clearly itching to get out on the field. He told her it was time to make a decision because she was about to graduate. “I literally looked over to the right and saw a whole stack of pamphlets, and one of them said Radio Broadcasting,” she explained. So, she told him she wanted to be in radio, and that’s how it all came together, she said, “by desperation and having a gun to my head, football to my head.”

Making that choice is what led her to where she is today. To make it in broadcasting, Brandt says “it takes a million little tiny decisions along the way.” Her advice is to go with your gut. “Every little step along the way has the potential to get you closer to where you want to go.” Some words of wisdom: “As long as it’s really what you want to do, use every networking opportunity, never throw away a phone number, just continue to sell yourself, and don’t think anything’s beneath you.”

Brandt admits that it takes many years to make it seem effortless. Broadcasting’s a difficult job. “It’s not until you do it that you find out it’s not that easy.” And there have been times throughout her thirty-year career when she has wanted to get out. However, the passionate radio professional compares her relationship with her career to a long-term marriage: “I fall in love with it over again every once in a while.”