Jo Luke Rowntree

Director

My Loftus Recommendation: 'Walks Like a Duck' - a revelatory take on living with a disability.

My Favourite Sound: Rain. Preferably pelting, but I’ll take pitter-patter too. Glorious!

Kirsten Lass

​Director

My Loftus Recommendation: '​A Thorough Examination with Drs Chris and Xand​' - listening is a total delight: it’s beautifully crafted, the brothers are amazingly open and you learn without realising.

My Favourite Sound: ​People laughing​. ​

Richard Berry

Director

My Loftus Recommendation: 'Lockdown' - showcasing us at our creative best during an extraordinary year.

My Favourite Sound: My son chuckling to himself.

Reuben Huxtable

Sound Engineer / Assistant Producer (staff)

My Loftus Recommendation: ‘Cold Art'. I love how the show uses the reverberations of an abandoned Cold War listening station to create a sense of place and physicality.

My Favourite Sound: The startup sound for the Playstation 1. When we were younger it was always a worry the disk was scratched, the twinkly bit half way through never fails to give me chills.

Maia Miller-Lewis

Assistant Producer (staff)

My Loftus Recommendation: ‘The Exchange’ – a brilliant format that facilitates honest discussion between strangers on such varied topics.

My Favourite Sound: My dad’s whistle. It’s the only way I can find him in a supermarket…

Leon Gower

Producer / Project Manager (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: ‘Where Are You Going? - New York’ specifically Catherine's meeting with the cat lady married to Kiwi the cat - 'it's a love thing of the highest order'.

My Favourite Sound: The crunch, clicks and whirls of a cassette tape player.

Jon Calver

Studio Manager (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: Alan Bennett’s appearance on Private Passions.

My Favourite Sound: The fizz (and smell) of hot solder and the distant purr of a petrol lawn mower.

Sarah Jeynes

Lead Photographer (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: James Watkins' shot of The 1975. I love the way he's captured their personalities. He would have had very little time to take this shot yet it looks like a studio set up.

My Favourite Image (that I've taken): Soft Play aka Slaves at Reading Festival. I'm proud of how I worked the strobing to my advantage and think this encapsulates their energy perfectly.

Rami Tzabar

Executive Producer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: 'A Thorough Examination with Drs Chris & Xand’ for its humour, depth and expert blend of story-telling, information and entertainment. How often do you get to explore one idea around health, so, er, 'thoroughly'?

My Favourite Sound: As an avid cook, one of my favourite sounds is the sizzle of a steak as it goes into a hot pan.

Catherine Carr

Producer & Presenter (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: ‘Living in the Memory Room'

My Favourite Sound: Rain on a glass roof when I am warm inside.

Milo Hutchinson

Junior Designer (freelance)

Elizabeth Burke

Executive Producer (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: ’Private Passions’ - I’ve discovered so much great new music, and talking about music reveals well-known people in a new light.

My Favourite Sound: I’m torn between the Dusk Chorus on a May evening in a Suffolk churchyard and “Mind the Gap”.

Dan King

Sound Engineer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Our ’Equal Britain' series... innovative format, intimate revelations and the full range of human emotions; it's a brilliant listen.

My Favourite Sound: A deftly played, nylon strung acoustic guitar.

Alexandra Quinn

Producer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Jayde Adams and her love for 'O Mio Babbino Caro' in the Barbican’s ’Sound Unbound’ series.

My Favourite Sound: The tannoy announcement on LNER Trains “the next station will be York”.

Anne Harbin

​​​Associate Editor (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: ‘​A Mile In My Shoes’ ​- ​heartfelt stories of everyday people.

My Favourite Sound: The wind in the leaves in the trees makes me feel alive and of course the​ ​reggae air horn​​ as you know something magical is about to drop​. ​

Tom Woolfenden

Producer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: 'Why Can’t Our Children Talk?' or anything produced by Kim Normanton. Beautiful and moving stories about often difficult subjects.

My Favourite Sound: Scrolling through an old radio dial.

Sarah Louise Bennett

Photographer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Sarah Jeynes' shot of Stormzy's already legendary Glastonbury set, it perfectly sums up for me just how important, iconic and powerful that performance was.

My Favourite Image (that I've taken): Wolf Alice at Shepherd's Bush Empire in 2015. (That someone else has taken) Mick Jagger, photographed in Buffalo, New York in 1975 by Annie Leibovtiz.

Mark Allan

Photographer (freelance)

James Watkins

Photographer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Sarah Jeynes' images of Coldplay at Whitby Abbey. It's never easy working on location with a band, especially adding a pandemic to the mix. the resulting shots are iconic.

My Favourite Image (that I've taken): Bruce Springsteen at Claridges. To capture a portrait of one of the best musicians of all time is up there as one of my favourite jobs ever.

Gabriel Hutchinson

Photographer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Jamie Simonds' shot of Will.i.am and Tom Jones, because of its studio like quality. The lack of distractions around the legends help the image really pop and puts the focus solely on them.

My Favourite Image (that I've taken for Loftus): This image of KSI is a favourite of mine because I managed to capture what a big personality he is.

Shirlaine Forrest

Photographer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: I love the way James Watkins has captured this strong and intriguing portrait of Stormzy, the artist looks incredible and the lighting and framing is gorgeous...

My Favourite Image (that I've taken): This shot of Christine and the Queens was for 6 Music Festival. It was the first time the artist unveiled his wings and was a gift of a show to photograph.

Jonathan Birch

Photographer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Sarah Louise Bennett’s shot of Sam Smith & Kim Petras I loved their track Unholy and the space, lighting and their expressions really represented the mood of the song.

My Favourite Image (that I've taken): Steve Lacy on the balcony of Broadcasting House. I asked him to pose and he just fell back onto the railing which looked great. I love when you have that interaction, he really brought something to the shot.

Tracey Welch

Photographer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Sarah Jeynes' black and white portraits of Rankin. They look fantastic and it's not an easy job photographing another photographer.

My Favourite Image (that I've taken): Johnny Marr in his studio for Q magazine back in 2017. Great afternoon.

Jane Greenwood

Producer (freelance)

My Loftus Recommendation: Anything produced by Kim Normanton and Elizabeth Burke, a recent highlight being ‘Meeting the Man I Killed’ - utterly compelling, extremely moving radio.

My Favourite Sound: The nightingale that sang in my garden last summer.

Jane Long

Producer (freelance)

My Loftus recommendation: My favourite hard-boiled crime writer James Ellroy sharing his infectious passion for Beethoven - 'the big Beet' - on ‘Private Passions.’

Favourite sound: The roar of the MGM lion.

Chris Jones

Music Content Specialist (contractor)

Pete Marsh

Music Data Specialist (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: 'The Myth and Mystery of Anja Thauer'. This was a totally engrossing listen for me; the story of a German cello prodigy who died tragically young and whose story seemed to have been erased from history. A fascinating, moving tale that takes some unexpected turns.

My Favourite Sound: Foghorns (when you can still find them, that is).

Phil Hebblethwaite

Journalist / Presenter (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: The many programmes presented by Clarke Peters and produced by Tom Woolfenden. Always fascinating and that voice – just wonderful.

My Favourite Sound: The call of a herring gull. A hideous sound, but it will forever remind me of happy holidays in Cornwall as a kid.

Chris Maclean

Studio Manager (contractor)

My Loftus Recommendation: 'The Primacy of the Instant: CNN and Computers.’ I always find Michael an engaging and interesting host...but I like his contributions the most where we hear snippets of his life.

My Favourite Sound: I made some binaural recordings on Luskentyre Beach on the Isle of Harris… for people to stop and appreciate how rich a soundscape sitting on the shoreline is.