Board of Directors
Steve Donofrio, President - Harrisburg, MO
Russell McGee, Vice President, Bloomington, IN Ellen Stewart, Treasurer - Sonora CA Angela Elam, Secretary - Kansas City, KS Alice Anne English, Rockville, MD Emily Labes, New York, NY Tony Brewer, Bloomington, IN Thomas Tiggleman, Bloomington, IN Bonnie Bogovich, Austin, TX Meredith Ludwig, Boonville, MO Renee Pringle, Washington, D.C. Charles Potter, Paris, France |
Programming Committee
Russell McGee (Chair)
Alice Anne English Renee Pringle Ellen Stewart Emily Labes Steve Donofrio |
NATF Advisory Board
Charlie Potter (Chair)
Butch D'Ambrosio Mac Chamblin Helen Engelhardt The Firesign Theatre Roger Gregg- Crazy Dog Audio Theatre Jeffrey Hedquist Simon Jones Tom Lopez- ZBS Brian Price- Great Northern Audio Theatre Don Priest - Community Radio - Fesno, CA Ben Taylor - Recording Engineer - Tempe, AZ Randy Thom- Skywalker Sound Vanessa Whitburn- BBC Robin Whitten- Audiofile Magazine |
HEAR Now Advisory Board
Rozanne Devine - Kansas City Performer / Community Radio Dwight Frizzell - Kansas City Producer / Musician / Educator Jeff Hays - Kansas City Performer Jackie Casteel - Missouri Arts Administration Tim Keltner - Kansas City Arts Administration David Shinn - HEAR Now Technical Director Jen Wilding - Kansas City Arts Administration Sue Zizza - SueMedia |
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
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SUE ZIZZA - President
Sue is an audio producer, director, writer, and sound designer, and the owner of SueMedia Productions, a full service audio production company, along with Radio Waves Studios, a premiere audio facility capturing and producing sound for all media: Audiobooks, TV, Film, VR, etc. For more than 25 years Sue has produced award winning audio drama for public radio and audiobooks. She is an Audie award winning producer of audiobooks, audio drama, radio plays and much more. Her work has also been honored by The Gabriel’s, The International Festival of New York, The National Federation of Community Broadcasters, and the Communicator Awards. Sue’s sound clients have also included: Cleo TV, PBS, Macmillan Publishers, USA Networks - SciFi Channel, The New Victory Theater – Broadway, USA Productions, Movies for the Ears, and The Museum of TV and Radio – NYC. Additionally from 1996 - 2007 she served as the Executive Director of the National Audio Theatre Festivals – an audio arts training organization. When she’s not producing and directing, Sue specializes in manual SFX (Foley) effects for audio productions, film, television and the stage. Sue also teaches audio arts and sound production at New York University’s Kanbar Institute for Film and Television at the Tisch School of the Arts. Sue has been a regular presenter at national audio conferences like the Audio Engineering Society (AES) where she demonstrates sound effects recording and performance techniques as well as creates unique performance events showcasing audio production at its best. |
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PETER GREGG - Vice President
Peter Gregg (Ph.D, University of Minnesota) is an Assistant Professor of Emerging Media at the University of St. Thomas. Dr. Gregg teaches media production, history, and criticism. Dr. Gregg's research and scholarship focuses on media and audiences, including the formation of attitudes and beliefs through observation. In 2017, he and his colleagues won the National Communication Association’s Charles H. Woolbert Research Award for “scholarship that has stood the test of time and has become a stimulus for new conceptualizations of communication phenomena” for the parasocial contact hypothesis. He has been published in Communication Monographs, the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, the Journal of Popular Culture, Death Studies, and the Journal of Homosexuality, and he was a contributor to the book Mass Media Effects: Advances Through Meta-analysis. His scholarship on teaching and learning includes publications in Teaching Media Quarterly and the Journal of Media Education. Dr. Gregg's web series Forsythia won a cinematography award at the LAweb Fest. An audio drama follow-up played at the HEAR Now festival in 2015 and won "Best New Original Ongoing Production" at the Audio Verse Awards. The second season played at the 2016 HEAR Now festival.He has served on the NATF board since 2017. |
ELLEN STEWART – Treasurer
Ellen Stewart is the Executive Director of KAAD-LP, a community radio station in Sonora, CA., which she developed with her husband when the FCC opened a window of opportunity in 2013. She has participated with NATF since 2001 and has served as Treasurer for the group for the last decade. For the HEAR Now Festival, she produced Oh! What a Poetical War and 1917as well as HEAR Now’s live show in 2013 and 2014. Her production, Licorice, was part of Podcast Palooza, 2019. She has spent a lifetime as a theatre director/producer/actor in Sonora where she was Artistic Director for Columbia Actor’s’ Repertory and Mountain Actor’s Conservatory. She is a professor emeritus of theatre and speech at Columbia College in California.
Ellen Stewart is the Executive Director of KAAD-LP, a community radio station in Sonora, CA., which she developed with her husband when the FCC opened a window of opportunity in 2013. She has participated with NATF since 2001 and has served as Treasurer for the group for the last decade. For the HEAR Now Festival, she produced Oh! What a Poetical War and 1917as well as HEAR Now’s live show in 2013 and 2014. Her production, Licorice, was part of Podcast Palooza, 2019. She has spent a lifetime as a theatre director/producer/actor in Sonora where she was Artistic Director for Columbia Actor’s’ Repertory and Mountain Actor’s Conservatory. She is a professor emeritus of theatre and speech at Columbia College in California.
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ALICE ANNE ENGLISH - Programming Director
Alice Anne English is and audiobook narrator and actor with a sister who lives in the Kansas City Area. She has been a Mark Twain reader and has been and will be the producer of the Mark Twain readings at Prospero’s books. She has performed in both New York City and in the Washington, DC area and toured with Encore Shakespeare out of Richmond, Virginia. She’s a bit of a technophobe, but is learning a bit more about sound technology every year with HEAR Now. |
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KENDRA MURRAY – Workshops Liaison / Programming Committee
Kendra is an audiobook narrator and producer, and the co-owner of Squeaky Cheese Productions with husband, Ralph Scott. Kendra has performed in, directed, and produced radio theatre programs for the Petaluma Radio Players, and has been honored for this work in the Platinum, Gold, and Silver Divisions of the NATF Playhouse. Originally from the Berkshires in Massachusetts, Kendra worked at Berkshire Theatre Festival as an apprentice during her teens and went on to become the Box Office Manager. Kendra received the Drama Cup award from Berkshire School. Kendra received a BA in Business Management from University of Puget Sound, where she also performed in a variety of stage plays. She is the proud mother of two children, Haley and Emmett, and a stepdaughter, Lucy. Kendra lives in northern California and works from her home studio. |
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ROZANNE DEVINE - Secretary
Rozanne Devine currently writes and performs with Shots in the Night Radio Theatre on KKFI Radio in Kansas City. She kicked up her comedy writing and acting career after retiring from the day job life. As a performer she has acted in regional theatres, independent films (even a Bollywood movie), voiceover, commercials and audiobook narration. Back in the day she was copywriter, PR specialist and production manager. She has planned events, escorted clowns, chaperoned chickens, interviewed bankers, boy scouts, authors and entrepreneurs. Hosted events, directed shows, created media plans, reviewed writers, pleaded with printers, disarmed designers, fawned over photographers, rounded up speakers and finally answered the call to retirement. Then she got restless and volunteered at the Hear Now Festival and they took her in and put her to work. |
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RALPH SCOTT – Director of Communications
An award-winning producer with a get-it-done (with a smile) attitude, Ralph Scott produces audiobooks, audio theatre, scripted audio entertainment, commercial spots, and pretty much anything within the live or recorded audio arena. The characters Ralph creates on the spot (we lost count just north of 83) are only bested by the number of children's verses he has written since he was handed a cocktail napkin on a dare back in 1993. (That would be just north of 1,700.) Give him three words and he'll compose a witty poem for you in under five minutes. Give him a studio and your manuscript and he'll vibrantly breathe life into any character you craft. Together with co-narrator and spouse, Kendra Murray, Ralph turns the studio into a theatre for the ear. Be sure to grab a chair the next time you download a Murray and Scott audiobook production. And dim the lights. And don't forget the popcorn. You'll swear you're in a movie. |
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CHARLES POTTER
Charles is a retired audio producer formerly based in New York City. He has taught sound and audio production at universities and in workshops in the US, Europe and Africa, including twenty-five years as Professor of Film and Television at NYU. He won numerous industry awards for his work including CPB, Armstrong and Ohio State Awards, and produced three Grammy Award winning recordings in the Spoken Word category. Charles taught interdisciplinary media and cultural studies courses at the Institute for American Universities in Aix en Provence, France for twelve years. He has been a craftsman all his life, working in many media: wood, metal, fiberglass, and stone. His special interests include, but are by no means limited to, old motorcycles, wine, Provencal language and culture, and all things medieval. He and his wife Helene are now full-fledged retirees who currently divide their time between Saugerties, New York and Apt, France. |
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JEFF HAYS
Jeff Hays is a voice actor, musician, and owner of Soundbooth Theater, an audiobook and audiodrama production company serving the indie publishing market. Having established a name for himself in the audiobook narration world with a unique style and a vocal range that often convinced listeners his productions featured a full cast, Jeff directed the momentum of his popularity into starting a brand that would quickly become known for quality. Soundbooth Theater has produced more than 50 multicast audiobooks in the past two years featuring music and sound effects, and has also brought many up and coming new narrators to the attention of their primary audience, the Gamelit and LitRPG fan community. Soundbooth Theater is also developing its own digital audiobook distribution platform through which authors can take more profits from their own organic following. |
