Veteran CBC broadcaster Don Newman has announced his retirement. Newman was well known for his work on Parliament Hill over many years - as much for his distinctive trademark drawl as his lack of patience with political rhetoric and his uncompromising interviews.

His interview with Jean Chrétien in the wake of the former Prime Minister’s retirement stands out as one of his many memorable interviews.

Newman told CBC News that he’d continue hosting the Newsworld show Politics until June. According to the CBC he has decided to take the retirement package.

Newman’s career spanned 40 years and included reporting on events from the Watergate scandal to the Meech Lake and Charlottetown accords. A member of the Order of Canada, he has been working from the CBC’s parliamentary bureau since 1981.

During his show yesterday Newman addressed his retirement with characteristic professionalism, saying that he had become something no “that no reporter should - a story himself.”

“I very much appreciate all the kind comments and good wishes that I have been receiving. But I am going to be here for another seven weeks and there is lot of political news still to report.”

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	News & Journalism, Parliament, Personalities	Posted at 11:35 am (05 May 2009)

It seems some prankster has created a parody Twitter account for Peter Mansbridge.

The account is using the handle “petermansbridg.” It’s obviously a joke. For instance one of the fake updates after the Billy Bob Thornton interview says “Ghomeshi needs all the help he can get. I beat him in an arm wrestle last week at our local on Front - didn’t even loosen my tie.”

Another tweet written after the layoff announcements reads “Helping 800 CBCers pack their desks. Many have never witnessed a grown ‘Bridge cry…until today. Farewell noble colleagues!”

There’s been a whole bunch of fake or parody Twitter accounts pop up in the last few months, a practice known as Twitter Jacking or Phweeting (phony tweetering). The list of people with parody accounts includes among others: Vladimir Putin, Osama bin Laden, Dick Cheney, David Letterman, and Lindsay Lohan.

All parody aside, there is some risk to these kinds of phony accounts, especially when they are being used to write to real people. The fake Mansbridge account includes one reply to Ian Capstick, a communications consultant and blogger in Ottawa. The post reads “your bio pics are dreamy. who did them? i need some done.”

To which Ian Capstick replied in the comments below “You know, I’ve never laughed harder at an @reply on Twitter before…and I’m not sure there is any risk of folks mistaking @petermansbridg for the real one for long; speaking of which I hope the real Peter Mansbridge sees that @PeterMansbridge seems to be available. We would love to see him on Twitter.”

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	Asides, Personalities	Posted at 10:46 am (28 Apr 2009)

Post City Magazines has an interesting article on Peter Mansbridge; how he got his start in broadcasting, and went to become the CBC lead anchor:

“One day I was announcing a flight in the terminal. A guy heard me. He was from the CBC and he offered me a job there,” Mansbridge says.

Mansbridge began by working the late shift as a DJ. He admits he wasn’t very good at it, but it built his confidence to the point where he could be a radio broadcaster.

“I had never thought of it as a career. At the time, they didn’t have a newscast, so I started one,” he says.

The full article is here.

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	Personalities	Posted at 8:03 am (24 Apr 2009)

Joe Schlesinger has earned a lifetime achievement award from the Canadian Journalism Foundation.

I must say I can’t think of anyone at the corporation more deserving on this award. Schlesinger has worked for the CBC since 1966. I can still vividly remember his reports from Czechoslovakia and Hungary as the Soviet Union crumbled.

He covered wars and conflicts, from Vietnam to the Persian Gulf, and examined Canadian foreign policy under prime ministers stretching from Pierre Trudeau to Jean Chrétien.

For more on the award and Joe’s remarkable career click here.

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	People, Personalities, Working for the CBC	Posted at 1:06 pm (26 Feb 2009)

Carol Morin, a familiar face to many northern television viewers as the former host of CBC Northbeat, has won a National Aboriginal Achievement award.

Morin was the first First Nations person to anchor a national newscast in 1989 on CBC Newsworld. Since then she’s been recognized as a role model in the First Nations community, and has worked as a host on several networks, “Morin has helped make First Nations peoples of Canada more prominent and visible to the general public,” the awards committee said.

Last year she left Northbeat to run unsuccessfully as an MLA in the N.W.T. assembly. She has since returned to Northbeat as a producer.

Morin won the award in the media & communication category. She will receive the award at the ceremony on March 6 in Winnipeg.

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	North, Personalities	Posted at 11:48 am (29 Nov 2008)

CBC journalist Mellissa Fung was released into the custody of Canadian officials in Kabul on Saturday, four weeks after she was abducted.

Fung was taken by armed men who approached her in a refugee camp on the outskirts of Kabul on Oct. 12. The journalist, who was stationed at the NATO military base in Kandahar but was visiting the Kabul-area camp to report on a story, was then taken to the mountains west of the Afghan capital.

As news of her release emerged on Saturday, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reported that she was in good health and undergoing a medical examination.

News of the abduction had been kept secret over concerns about her safety.

“In the interest of Mellissa’s safety and that of other working journalists in the region, on the advice of security experts, we made the decision to ask media colleagues not to publish news of her abduction,” CBC News publisher John Cruickshank said. “All of the efforts made by the security experts were focused on Mellissa’s safe and timely release.”

“Fung’s family was in daily contact with the team at CBC that was trying to negotiate this and help this go forward to the successful conclusion,” said CBC journalist Susan Ormiston, who has also filed stories from Afghanistan.

Ormiston said several other reporters have gone into the same camp where Fung was taken. Fung was visiting the camp for internally displaced people to report on refugees who have streamed back into Afghanistan from Pakistan and Iran.

“It’s a difficult situation. It’s a management of risk all the time, and it’s something that we journalists do on a regular basis,” she said.

Fung herself first alerted authorities about her kidnapping on her portable phone. Her captors were not Taliban militants, she said, but unaffiliated bandits.

Adam Khan Serat, spokesman for the provincial governor in Afghanistan’s Wardak province, said the journalist was freed after tribal elders and provincial council members negotiated her release.

“I cannot offer any detail about how the negotiations were managed in any respect,” Cruickshank said. “We can’t discuss any demands or promises made to secure her release, except to say it is the policy of the CBC not to pay ransom, and we followed that policy to the letter.”

“She sounded terrific, and she said she hadn’t been harmed in any way,” CBC president Hubert Lacroix said. “She said she was sorry for all the trouble she caused.”

Harper thanks Afghan government

Prime Minister Stephen Harper told reporters that no ransom was paid. He also thanked all those who “worked so tirelessly” to help win Fung’s release, singling out Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

“I spoke with President Karzai immediately following her kidnapping, and he assured me of the full co-operation and engagement of his government, and he has delivered,” Harper said.

“This is wonderful news for her family, for her colleagues and for all Canadians,” the prime minister said.

Lacroix thanked Canadian and Afghan government officials, as well as dozens of media organizations in Canada and around the world that agreed not to publicize the abduction during the reporter’s month-long ordeal.

“Mellissa is now safe and in reasonable health, given the more than four weeks [she spent] in these difficult circumstances,” he said at a news conference Saturday afternoon.

“She is being examined by Canadian medical staff in Kabul and soon she will be flying to another location in the Middle East in preparation for her return to Canada.

“Plans are being made to reunite Mellissa with her family as soon as possible,” he added.

Lacroix said employees at the public broadcaster prepare “rigorously” for the possibility that a journalist may be abducted in a conflict zone, but no amount of planning or training could prepare them for the feeling of “hopelessness, anger and dread” they felt after hearing about Fung’s abduction.

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	Personalities	Posted at 4:58 pm (08 Nov 2008)

Richard Terfry will have a regular day job soon.

The musician (who plays under the name Buck 65) will be the host of Radio 2 Drive when the show launches next week. The Halifax Chronicle-Herald profiled Terfry Tuesday and got his thoughts on what you’ll be hearing starting September 2:

We kept it real simple, something punchy, think­ing about the fact that we’re going to be reaching a lot of people during their afternoon commute and we’re going to be providing a soundtrack for that….

As for the description of Drive as a “songwriters’ show,” Terfry hopes that the term is inclusive enough to reach as many listeners as possible, while opening up the spectrum of musical guests that will join him in the studio every week to talk about the creative process and even play a song or two.

“It’s really broad,” he admits. “We use that designation fairly loosely. There’s a lot of talk of songs, and a lot of singer-songwriters pop up on our play­list, as far as I can see it doesn’t really exclude much from what we can play

We’re playing a lot of Canadian stuff, 75 to 80 per cent, but a lot of stuff from around the world in practically every genre you can think of. [We'll play] some hip-hop, which may not be the first type of music you’d think of froma singer-songwriter perspective, but there’s also been those artists you’d ex­pect like Ron Sexsmith and Kathleen Edwards and Neil Young. Neil’s like a holy figurehead around here.

The full article is here.

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	Personalities	Posted at 12:12 pm (28 Aug 2008)

Fans of the CBC Radio show Disc Drive won’t be waiting long to hear long-time host Jurgen Gothe. Gothe will host a a new weekly show, tentatively titled Farrago on CBC Radio 2.

Last night, Gothe hosted a DiscDrive concert at the Vancouver Playhouse. (Have photos? Email them to insidecbcblog@gmail.com )

Jurgen is currently Food & Wine Editor of Vancouver Lifestyles Magazine, and contributes regular columns to the journal: “Carte Blanche” and the popular “Travels with my Appetite.” He has been approached by a major Canadian publisher to create a new book based on his “Travels” column.

CBC announced a few months ago that Gothe’s 23-year old Vancouver-based show on CBC Radio 2 would “leave the schedule.”

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	Personalities	Posted at 9:42 am (15 Aug 2008)

Simon Lee had been slated to work as musical supervisor for the Toronto production, the same role he served for Webber's British revival. (CBC)

Simon Lee, the longtime Andrew Lloyd Webber collaborator charged with assault in Toronto on Sunday, has a problem of his own.

Webber’s London production company says it dropped the 46-year-old as musical supervisor for the Toronto run of The Sound of Music, still slated to begin in October.

Lee was one of three judges for Tuesday night’s CBC-TV’s reality competition How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?  Viewers were told that Lee’s absences for the last two episodes was for “personal reasons.”

Lee was arrested and charged with assault and forcible confinement after an incident at a Toronto hotel on Sunday morning. He was released on bail and is scheduled to return to court on Aug. 27.

The veteran British conductor, who has performed with top orchestras around the globe, has served as the musical director or supervisor on projects ranging from the opening ceremony of the 1998 Nagano Olympics to both theatre and film versions of Webber’s Jesus Christ Superstar.

More at CBCnews.ca

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	Personalities	Posted at 1:36 pm (31 Jul 2008)

CBC Radio in Vancouver is on the hunt for a Host for its afternoon program, On The Coast. Guest hosts like CBC Television reporter Belle Puri and civic reporter Stephen Quinn have been filling the role until now. Priya Ramu, formerly a senior CBC Radio producer, has held the position after moving to Vancouver several years ago. She will stay with CBC as a local reporter in radio news.

This position hosts a daily current affairs program, including doing interviews, introducing segments, and shaping the program on air. The host is also responsible for writing scripts and continuity, booking interviews, selecting music and sound effects, and researching. This… wait for it… a contract position. (Does anyone actually get a full-time job at the CBC any more?)

Look for the position on the CBC’s job web site.

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	Personalities, Vancouver	Posted at 4:33 pm (02 Jul 2008)

The CBC’s Peter Mansbridge will become an officer of the Order of Canada, according to a list of 75 appointees released yesterday by Gov. Gen. Michaëlle Jean.

Mansbridge, the chief correspondent of CBC News, anchors the flagship nightly news program The National and also hosts Newsworld’s Mansbridge One on One.

Born in London in 1948, the newsman — who turns 60 on Sunday — was educated in Ottawa and served in the Royal Canadian Navy in 1966 and 1967.

His career with the CBC began by chance when someone from the public broadcaster overheard him on the public address system at an airport in the town of Churchill, Man., where he was working for the airline Transair, and asked him to come work at the local radio station. He was 19.

More at cbcnews.ca

I wonder if Canada is recognizing journalists and story-tellers as becoming people who actively shape the nation, as opposed to “just” reporting on it? Should our role be simply to reflect the changing nation, or do we have some responsibility to participate in that reshaping? I mean, I’m totally happy for Peter and the CBC, but — and I can’t quite put my finger on why — but this one’s not quite as cut-and-dry for me.

What do you think?

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	Awards, Personalities, The National	Posted at 4:21 pm (02 Jul 2008)

Beginning in September, CBC Radio’s arts show Q will follow The Current, and air from 10 to 11:30 a.m.  with a two-hour expanded broadcast on Friday mornings. Q will continue to air at 10 p.m. (10:30 p.m. NT) each weeknight., and Jian Ghomeshi will continue to host.

Taking Q’s former mid-day time slot will be Aamer Haleem, who is new to the CBC and radio. Haleem is currently a VH1 personality and host of the show Bands Reunited. He was host of VH1’s Top Video Countdown, interviewing celebrities like Madonna. Haleem was born in London but raised in Canada, attending the University of Toronto and the the Humber College School of Journalism.

CBC Radio icon Shelagh Rogers will be back this fall with a new program exploring the best in Canadian literature. Rogers will speak with renowned writers and future literary stars, and examine the issues having an impact on books in Canada. It will air Saturdays at 3:00 p.m.

Both new shows will originate from Vancouver.

(Both times +30 min in NT)

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	CBC Radio 1, Personalities, Q, Sounds Like Canada	Posted at 5:14 pm (25 Jun 2008)

This is what happens when you try to add George Stroumboulopoulos to your list of Facebook friends.

Wow. Way to rub it in.

In the world of Facebook, you’re only allowed to have 5,000 “friends.” People, like Strombo, who are are a public figure and have lots of Internet-connected fans usually accept every friend request as a means of promotion. (Actually, there are four “I’m the real Stombo” people on Facebook. It’s hard to tell who’s really behind them.)

Better to try fan pages instead.

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	Fun Stuff, Personalities, The Hour with George S.	Posted at 6:51 pm (17 Jun 2008)

Love him or hate him, you’ve got to admire Don Cherry’s fashion choices.

Now, even the Americans have taken note.

ESPN has a gallery peacocking — er, “showcasing” his colourful collaborations.

Hat-tip to MM.

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	Personalities	Posted at 12:04 am (16 Jun 2008)

CBC Radio announced today the hosts for a number of programs slated to air this fall as part of the revitalized CBC Radio 2 schedule.

Tom Allen, Peter Togni and Jurgen Gothe will be returning to the network, to be joined by Julie Nesrallah, Molly Johnson and Rich Terfry.

• Monday to Friday from 6 to 10 a.m., Tom Allen will host CBC Radio 2’s new morning show, which will serve as the gateway to the new Radio 2 schedule and will feature a wide range of music.
• At 10 a.m., mezzo-soprano Julie Nesrallah will take the helm of the network’s new daytime classical show, airing until 3 p.m.
• Then at 3 p.m., Rich Terfry, better known as Buck 65, will host Radio 2’s new drive-time songwriter show until 6 p.m.
• On the weekends, Molly Johnson will host the new morning show airing Saturdays from 6 to 10 a.m. and Sundays from 6 to 8 a.m.
• Completing the weekend schedule, Peter Togni will be Choral Concert’s new host beginning in September, and Jurgen Gothe will host a new weekly show on Sundays from 5 to 6 p.m.

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	CBC Radio 2, Changes to CBC Radio Two, Personalities	Posted at 3:58 pm (10 Jun 2008)