Hey, this is Michael Loneser, and you're listening to the On the Media Midweek Podcast.

I don't know about you, but I've been completely glued to the Olympics.

I've loved the swimming, basketball, gymnastics, tennis, soccer, and volleyball.

The TV production has been slick, all the camera angles, the slow-mo replays, and the sound, so crisp, so immersive, you don't even notice it, like the soft

bounce of the tennis ball on the clay court before a serve.

Or the creaks of the uneven bars.

And that satisfying thump when the gymnast lands on the mat at the end of her routine,

all delicately mixed with the commentary and the cheers from the crowd.

The only reason I even pay attention to this stuff is because years ago I heard this great radio

documentary called The Sound of Sport, produced by Paragrin Andrews for the BBC in 2011. The piece takes us behind the scenes of several major

sporting events with Dennis Baxter, a master audio engineer. I'm so excited to share this classic character study with you.

Baxter takes it from here. I like listening to sports. I can close my eyes I can hear every single one in my head.

I can hear every single one in my head. It's my belief that people have ingrained in them a memory of certain sounds and if that sound is not fulfilled

then the mind knows that there's something wrong.

There is an expectation of what football sounds like,

and it certainly wasn't.

The vouselle's, the plastic horns whose noise has been driving people mad.

Just that continuous hum, which actually drowned out all of the meaningful noises.

Ah, the sound of the World Cup in South Africa and those damn vu-Zilas.

For many people, this was the first time they'd really thought about how sports should sound.

But it's what I spend my life thinking and dreaming about.

I'm Dennis Baxter and I designed the sound of sports for television.

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