CBC Podcasts and the BBC World Service launch open call
This article is at least a year old
CBC Podcasts and the BBC World Service – two of the world’s leading podcast commissioners and creators – launched a new podcast commissioning opportunity. Together, the organizations are seeking proposals from audio producers for a factual narrative podcast, unique in story and treatment, told over 8-10 episodes, which will be presented as a major joint series in 2022.
Pitches are accepted from 24 May 2021 to 24 June 2021. Results will be announced at the end of September 2021.
You can find full details and submission portals on the BBC site and the CBC site. “We’ve been working informally with the BBC World Service over a number of years and are excited about this formal collaboration,” says Arif Noorani, Executive Producer of CBC Podcasts. “Together, we have a deep commitment to rich narrative storytelling and creating a series that is world class for global audiences. The audio making community has grown in leaps in bounds in recent years and we look forward to tapping into some of that energy and talent.”
“We’re looking for an outstanding, ‘unputdownable’ story for audiences around the world,” says Jon Manel, Podcast Commissioning Editor at the BBC World Service. “I am a huge fan of CBC Podcasts and what they have been achieving and we are delighted to be working with them on this exciting project. We hope whatever podcast comes out of this, it will have global appeal, attracting new listeners to podcasting, as well as appealing to existing audiences.”
About BBC World Service
BBC World Service is a key player in the podcast market. Death in Ice Valley, produced with Norway’s NRK and 13 Minutes to the Moon both became award-winning international hits. The Global News Podcast is the BBC’s most downloaded podcast, with more than 220 million downloads in 2020 and a worldwide following. Kalki Presents: My Indian Life, with Bollywood actor, Kalki Koechlin, has been reaching young listeners in India. The Comb and Africa Daily have been launched during the last 12 months, aimed at audiences in Africa. Other notable podcasts include The Lazarus Heist, The Climate Question, Goodbye to All This, Deeply Human, 30 Animals That Made Us Smarter, The Hurricane Tapes and The Bomb.
BBC World Service delivers news content around the world in English and 41 other language services, on radio, TV and digital. BBC World Service reaches a weekly audience of 351m. For more information, visit bbc.com/worldservice.
About CBC/Radio-Canada
CBC/Radio-Canada is Canada’s national public broadcaster. Through our mandate to inform, enlighten and entertain, we play a central role in strengthening Canadian culture. As Canada’s trusted news source, we offer a uniquely Canadian perspective on news, current affairs and world affairs. Our distinctively homegrown entertainment programming draws audiences from across the country. Deeply rooted in communities, CBC/Radio-Canada offers diverse content in English, French and eight Indigenous languages. We also deliver content in Spanish, Arabic and Chinese, as well as both official languages, through Radio Canada International (RCI). We are leading the transformation to meet the needs of Canadians in a digital world.
This is a press release which we link to from Podnews, our daily newsletter about podcasting and on-demand. We may make small edits for editorial reasons.