Sound East is the Lowestoft and District Talking Newspaper Charity. We started in 1979 and have over 53 volunteers. There are five other talking newspapers in Suffolk, nine in Norfolk and over 500 across the UK.
We produce a weekly news recording, approximately 90 minutes long, as well as a fortnightly 'Informer' and an occasional magazine. More details about what we do can be found by clicking on the "What do we do?" button above.
Don't forget to look at the News and Events page to see what events we have coming up! You can also keep up-to-date by 'Liking' the Sound East Facebook page!
The photo above comes from an article that was published by The Lowestoft Journal earlier this year (2016).
Here's the article:-
VOLUNTEERS NEEDED:
They help bring the news to visually impaired people across Waveney - providing
a vital weekly service for residents. But the team at the Lowestoft and District
Talking Newspaper Charity urgently need more helpers to continue their work. Run
entirely by volunteers, Sound East produces a free 90-minute weekly audio
recording of the Lowestoft Journal, together with a bi-weekly Informer recording
and an occasional magazine, for partially sighted people in the Lowestoft area.
Recordings are dispatched individually on a USB stick, and listeners are
provided with their own machine to play them on. There are four news teams that
are part of the free service, each of whom has an editor. Every Friday evening,
they gather to read the pages of the Lowestoft Journal, ready to post out to
about 140 people who regularly use the service. All of the main news items are
included, along with the more interesting small articles, obituaries and details
of duty chemists. But the group urgently needs new volunteers to help in a range
of disciplines - with a minimum commitment of two hours per month required.
Roles include pouch sorting, registration duties, reading, recording, and
copying at the venue, based at 88 Alexandra Road in Lowestoft.
The first edition of the Talking Newspaper in Lowestoft went live at the end of
April 1979 and has continued to provide a crucial g service that people have
come to rely on. Chairman Rodney Scase got involved with the service a year
later - in 1980. "Some people haven't got anybody at home to read a newspaper to
them," he said. "We supply them with a player to listen to our recordings and
people can now listen online as well - they really do rely on us. We have about
50 or 60, volunteers at the moment, split over the four teams, but it would be
great if some more people could come and help us." There are five other talking
newspapers in Suffolk, nine in Norfolk and over 500 across the UK.
If you are interested in receiving copies of the recordings, or you wish to
volunteer as a reader or a recordist, or help with copying, registering and
packaging recordings, please contact 01502 581823 or visit the website at
www.soundeast.org.