AT last year's Stroud Fringe Festival a willing team of volunteers showed they were capable of producing great quality radio with just a few weeks training and a bundle of ideas.

With this year's festival just days away, SNJ reporter Will Saunders met the staff at Stroud FM to find out why they have returned bigger and better...

Radio has given us many things - the background to countless car karaoke sessions, the opportunity to laugh at hillbillies on the phone-ins, not to mention waking up to the silky Irish tones of Terry Wogan.

Radio has given us many things but it has been surprisingly reluctant to give ordinary people the chance to get near a microphone. Until now.

Fringe Festival organisers first asked community radio guru Stephen Rowley to set up Stroud FM last year. Since then he has been the driving force behind last year's successful broadcast and the hectic preparations for this year's festival coverage.

Amazingly, he is still enjoying himself. "Oh, I love it," he said. "Community radio engages people in things to do with their community and their surroundings. It is one of the most effective vehicles for strengthening a community.

"But mainly people do it because it is fun. I have seen lots of people go into it with no confidence who actually get over that in the first few minutes of the broadcast. They suddenly realise they are learning new skills.

"There is a sense of power but that comes with quite a lot of responsibility. People start to realise that when they are broadcasting."

The idea of running a community radio station is fraught with problems. Essentially you have to organise dozens of amateurs, all with very little training, to somehow create four days of polished and professional broadcasting.

Before going on the air presenters not only have to be taught how to use the equipment but how to edit programmes, interview guests and refrain from swearing when they drop things. It has taken months of preparation for just these four days of broadcasting, not to mention organising fundraisers to finance the station.

One of the people responsible for making sure things run smoothly is Claire Penketh, a top broadcast journalist of 18 years who works for the BBC. She set up fundraising gigs to find the cash for Stroud FM and helped train the amateur presenters in radio technique. It has not been easy but she is quick to point out the benefits of community radio.

"Having worked as a professional journalist for the last 18 years I find what is good about community radio is it gives everyone access to the airwaves, which you do not tend to find in mainstream radio," she said. "It gives access to the medium for anyone and everyone who wants to come along."

The range of programmes this year is incredibly diverse. From hip-hop to blues, from soap opera to current affairs, the schedule is meant to reflect and appeal to all walks of life.

One of the presenters is partially-sighted Sue Allard from Ebley. She runs Modern-eyes, a magazine that takes a positive look at living with sight problems and is keen to spread the magazine's message onto the radio.

"We were so fed up with the general impression that visually impaired people want to do without things," she said. "Someone at the radio station suggested I put out a programme to encourage people to join us. This is great because we can get things out to everyone and make it as up-to-the-minute as possible."

For many of the younger presenters, Stroud FM is a platform to a potential career in the notoriously competitive broadcasting industry. Since 18-year-old Nicky Hendy presented her festival round-up with co-star Louise Neville last year she has appeared on Radio Gloucestershire and done work for BBC Online.

"I was keen to do it last year but I didn't realise how much work it would be," she said. "I think we only got about three or four hours sleep a night.

"But I love the adrenalin rush of radio, when you finish and realise you have just been on the air. I don't like hearing my voice on air though, it doesn't sound like me."

Just days after finishing the festival round-up this year Nicky will be going to Plymouth University to study politics and she believes her passion for radio can create further opportunities there.

"I want to set up a Plymouth University station and hopefully then go on to some sort of employment in radio, " she said. "Ideally, I would like to end up working on Radio 1."

While not all young presenters are so ambitious, many see their shows on Stroud FM as ideal career experience. Keen young Ebley DJ James Hassan, 16, will be presenting a hip-hop and chill-out show.

"I like my music and I just wanted to find people who have similar tastes to mine," he said. "I'm not so much into the presenting but I do like the technical side of the mixing. It is something else to do and I am hoping I will get recognised by some of the local clubs, maybe even get some gigs."

Whatever their motivation, the mish-mash of ages and backgrounds that make up the Stroud FM team will have to come together in style to make this year's broadcast a success. But regardless of how the shows turn out, a group of dedicated people have still showed the diverse community of the Five Valleys that they too can rule the airwaves.

Listen out for Stroud FM on frequency 106.8 Friday, September 10 until Sunday, September 12. To get in touch with the station contact 07813 318374 or visit the website at www.stroudfm.co.uk