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This year, our charity the Prison Radio Association was nominated for a six awards across five categories at the Audio UK’s Audio Production Awards (APAs) and at Wednesday night’s ceremony we added three more trophies to our cabinet.
We won two Gold awards: one for Life After Prison podcast presenters Zak and Jules, and one for National Prison Radio Producer Arthur Hagues, and one Bronze which was awarded to our Life After Prison Producer Beth Madden.
The Audio Production Awards is sponsored by Audible, and on the 20th November 2024 it returned for its fourteenth year. Celebrating the people both behind the scenes and in front of the mic, the awards celebrate audio right across the board – from podcasts to radio, audiobooks to sound design, production to presenting.
Zak and Jules were crowned Best Ensemble Cast and Arthur Hagues was awarded Best Arts and Culture Producer at the Audio Production Awards at the BFI London, Southbank on Wednesday evening.
The judges said of Zak and Jules entry:
“The powerful hard-hitting podcast has great handfuls of empathy. The generous, intuitive hosts ask questions that are never intrusive, big give the interviewees a door to walk through. ‘Life After Prison’ succeeds in making another world feel completely relatable.“
Life After Prison is a podcast series and online community for people affected by the criminal justice system. It is created by the Prison Radio Association, a registered charity that has revolutionised communications in the criminal justice sector.
Zak and Jules are two people who are part of the community themselves, having both been released from prison in 2019. Their personal experience of the resettlement journey is crucial to the success of Life After Prison.
Life After Prison aims to pick up where National Prison Radio left off for tens of thousands of people who are resettling into society after a sentence.
This award is yet another award to add to the mantelpiece, as since Life After Prison’s launch in 2022 the podcast has picked up multiple highly recognised awards, against some of the biggest names in the audio industry.
Prison Radio Association staff member and audio whizz Arthur Hagues also picked up yet another award to add to his collection. Over the years, Arthur has produced endless spellbinding audio for National Prison Radio listeners, and this year he was awarded for his work on Takeover Tuesdays. The Judge’s said of Arthur’s Gold entry:
“Powerful storytelling. You have clearly made a safe environment to allow people to share their deepest thoughts and be recorded. We were hearing the creation of art in progress. Inspirational audio that we wanted to rewind and listen to again.”
And in the Best Lifestyle and Society Producer category we had another winner – Life After Prison producer Beth Madden who took home the Bronze.
Beth has led on the production of Life After Prison since it’s very inception. She’s organised interviews with incredible guests, she’s offered guidance, insight and patience on set and behind the scenes, and she has helped to record, produce and release audio content that has not only celebrated lives, but changed them too.
Last week, the team released the first episode of Life After Prison Series 7, which features an interview with Kate Fraser, Head of Practice at Women in Prison. Tune in here.
The APAs was also attended by other Prison Radio Association nominees, including our Outside In team who were nominated in The Grassroots Production Award category.
Outside In is our brand new podcast which showcases the skills and talents of prison leavers who learnt their craft while working at National Prison Radio during their sentence.
For the Outside In team to be nominated at these awards is truly a testament to the talent that lives behind bars. It is living proof that giving people from marginalised backgrounds, such as those part of the criminal justice system, an opportunity to foster creativity and to become successful creatives leads to people thriving on release.
We want to play a part in changing the narrative around people in prison, we want to show that with the right support, people can absolutely thrive in prison and on release.
We are highly thankful to Audio UK for this recognition.
Receiving these awards and getting this industry recognition is so important to us because it continues to prove that we are not just a small charity doing our thing in isolation, we are a registered charity that produces the highest quality audio work alongside some of the most talented presenters and producers, who just so happened to have spent time in prison.
Listen to all episodes of Life After Prison here or watch episodes of ‘The Sit Down’ here.
Listen to all episodes of Outside in here.
Life After Prison and Outside In is available wherever you get your podcasts. Follow and subscribe.
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Learn more about how we’re taking part in this years Big Give Christmas Challenge.
The Prison Radio Association is a registered charity. If you would like to support our work, and enhance the futures of people in prison across the UK you can make a donation at prison.radio/donate.