Our LIVE TV experience.
Children In Need has raised a record breaking £50.6 million so far this year, making the all time total of money donated to Children in Need (CIN) over £1 billion since it started in 1980. The National TV show of course is pivotal in raising awareness and does an amazing job of getting celebrities on board to appeal to the public and get us to chip in for this great cause.
What the show also does is link up the rest of the country, in every region people are running their own CIN fundraising events and projects and in every region there are projects that benefit from the support of CIN.
There are a number of organisations in West Cumbria receiving support from CIN, for example, the funding given to us here at the music charity Soundwave helps us run the Friday Night Project - an open access youth club and music project at our HQ on Wilson Street, Workington.
Soundwave were delighted to be invited to the Pudsey Party on the 16/11/18 at Carlisle, and were even more delighted to be asked to provide some performers to entertain the studio audience. The Pudsey party is where our regional BBC broadcasts from (covering Cumbria and the North East) and to the National show, whilst not on air the assembled audience is treated to entertainment of various types.
Maddie Wylie and Willow Jarvis both use the Friday Night project to work on their music and are both AMAZINGLY talented performers so choosing who to take to play for the audience was a no brainer.
PLOT TWIST:
After accepting the invitation to perform on the night the goal posts shifted......quite a lot!
Suddenly the request was to perform when the broadcast went out LIVE (!!)...to the whole NATION (!!!)...and do an INTERVIEW (!!!!).
We arrived at the University of Cumbria on Brampton road around 6.30pm, this gave us plenty of time to get a drink and (what we think was) a pizza ;-)
Tom Salmon was floor manager for the night and came to take us through to the performance area.
It was quite a shock to step out of a regular looking canteen into a dazzling TV set. There was a large stage with fantastic lighting complete with glitter balls, giant pudsey bears projected on the ceiling and walls, and of course TV cameras - some on the shoulders of cameramen and others hoisted on cranes...very glamorous.
On the stage there was a VERY energetic Geordie man running around, telling jokes and generally warming up the crowd. It suddenly dawned on us this was actually happening and preparations were underway to go live. Tom was busy making sure everyone was in the right place at the right time and was being kept up to date through his earpiece, in turn Tom would let us know what to expect and where to be.
There was a group of musical theatre performers on stage called Showstoppers, they were really good. Then it was Willow's turn to entertain the audience, Willow sounded great and the crowd really got into her music.
All the time the clock was ticking closer to going "on air". Maddie was looking a tad nervous! Put it this way, she had a drink in a plastic cup...RIP that cup.
Before we knew it Maddie was asked to take to the stage and Emma and Willow were asked to go to the balcony where the interview would take place. Maddie started playing "breathin" by Ariana Grande and as ever it sounded fantastic.
When Maddie finished her song the VERY energetic Geordie man came back on the stage and announced that while Maddie had been playing we had been on air and gone out live to TWELVE MILLION people! Emma and Willow did their interview at the same time and just like that it was all done.
The magic of television.
It was great to see how a live TV show was put together and good to know that Maddie and Willow had helped Children in Need 2018 raise money for loads of great causes.
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