The Black Mass
Encyclopedia
Radio drama
Radio drama is a dramatized, purely acoustic performance, broadcast on radio or published on audio media, such as tape or CD. With no visual component, radio drama depends on dialogue, music and sound effects to help the listener imagine the characters and story...
produced by Erik Bauersfeld, a leading American radio dramatist of the post-television era. The series aired on KPFA
KPFA
KPFA is a listener-funded progressive talk radio and music radio station located in Berkeley, California, broadcasting to the San Francisco Bay Area. KPFA airs public news, public affairs, talk, and music programming. The station signed on-the-air April 15 1949, as the first Pacifica Station...
(Berkeley) and KPFK
KPFK
KPFK is a listener-sponsored radio station based in North Hollywood, California, United States, which serves the Greater Los Angeles Area, and also streams 24 hours a day via the Internet...
(Los Angeles) from 1963 to 1967, on an irregular schedule. Bauersfeld was the Director of Drama and Literature at KPFA from 1966 to 1991.
Bauersfeld's sound designer for most of the episodes was John Whiting, KPFA's production director. Their collaborations were later credited in a Ph.D. dissertation with "keeping radio drama alive in America in the 1960s."
Music for the series was by several Bay Area composers, including KPFA's Music Director Charles Shere, a composer and music critic who later wrote books on American composers and also serves on the board of the Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse
Chez Panisse
Chez Panisse is a Berkeley, California restaurant known for using local, organic foods and credited as the inspiration for the style of cooking known as California cuisine. Well-known restauranteur, author, and food activist Alice Waters co-founded Chez Panisse in 1971 with film producer Paul...
.
Bauersfeld's Black Mass productions were an influence on writer-producer Thomas Lopez
Thomas Lopez
Thomas Lopez, aka Meatball Fulton, is one of the founders and president of the ZBS Foundation. He writes and produces the ZBS Foundation's audio drama productions. Some of these aired in 1984-85 as part of ZBS' stereo radio series The Cabinet of Dr. Fritz.His output includes the entire Jack...
(ZBS), who noted, "In the 1960s, I was inspired by someone at KPFA in Berkeley, Eric Bauersfeld. who did a series called The Black Mass, adaptations of H. P. Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
and such. He helped me a lot. I consider Eric my mentor. He also did some fine Eugene O'Neill
Eugene O'Neill
Eugene Gladstone O'Neill was an American playwright and Nobel laureate in Literature. His poetically titled plays were among the first to introduce into American drama techniques of realism earlier associated with Russian playwright Anton Chekhov, Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, and Swedish...
plays for radio."
Episodes
Except as noted, these are in the Pacifica RadioPacifica Radio
Pacifica Radio is the oldest public radio network in the United States. It is a group of five independently operated, non-commercial, listener-supported radio stations that is known for its progressive/liberal political orientation. It is also a program service supplying over 100 affiliated...
Archives and on the Official Black Mass site:
- "The Flies"
- "O Mirror, Mirror" and "Shidah and Kuziba"
- "Evening Primrose" (adaptation of John CollierJohn Collier (writer)John Henry Noyes Collier was a British-born author and screenplay writer best known for his short stories, many of which appeared in The New Yorker from the 1930s to the 1950s. They were collected in a 1951 volume, Fancies and Goodnights, which won the International Fantasy Award and remains in...
's short story) - "An Evening's Entertainment"
- Two by Edgar Allan PoeEdgar Allan PoeEdgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
: "A PredicamentA Predicament (short story)"A Predicament" is a humorous short story by Edgar Allan Poe, usually combined with its companion piece "How to Write a Blackwood Article." It was originally titled "The Scythe of Time".-Plot summary:...
" and "The Tell-Tale HeartThe Tell-Tale Heart"The Tell-Tale Heart" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe first published in 1843. It follows an unnamed narrator who insists on his sanity after murdering an old man with a "vulture eye". The murder is carefully calculated, and the murderer hides the body by dismembering it and hiding it under the...
" - "Nightmare"
- "A Haunted House" (by Virginia WoolfVirginia WoolfAdeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....
) - "Bartleby the ScrivenerBartleby the ScrivenerBartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street is a short story by the American novelist Herman Melville . It first appeared anonymously in two parts in the November and December 1853 editions of Putnam's Magazine, and was reprinted with minor textual alterations in his The Piazza Tales in...
" (by Herman MelvilleHerman MelvilleHerman Melville was an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet. He is best known for his novel Moby-Dick and the posthumous novella Billy Budd....
) - "A Country Doctor" (by Franz KafkaFranz KafkaFranz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...
) - "The Ash Tree" (by M. R. JamesM. R. JamesMontague Rhodes James, OM, MA, , who used the publication name M. R. James, was an English mediaeval scholar and provost of King's College, Cambridge and of Eton College . He is best remembered for his ghost stories, which are regarded as among the best in the genre...
) - "Atrophy" by J. Anthony West
- "The Judgement"
- "Oil of Dog" (by Ambrose BierceAmbrose BierceAmbrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...
) and "Esmé" (by SakiSakiHector Hugh Munro , better known by the pen name Saki, and also frequently as H. H. Munro, was a British writer whose witty, mischievous and sometimes macabre stories satirised Edwardian society and culture. He is considered a master of the short story and often compared to O. Henry and Dorothy...
) - "The Jolly CornerThe Jolly Corner"The Jolly Corner" is a short story by Henry James published first in the magazine The English Review of December, 1908. One of James' most noted ghost stories, "The Jolly Corner" describes the adventures of Spencer Brydon as he prowls the now-empty New York house where he grew up.He encounters a...
" (by Henry JamesHenry JamesHenry James, OM was an American-born writer, regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr., a clergyman, and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James....
) - "Diary of a MadmanDiary of a Madman (story)Diary of a Madman is a farcical short story by Nikolai Gogol. Along with The Overcoat and The Nose, Diary of a Madman is considered to be one of Gogol's greatest short stories. The tale centers on the life of a minor civil servant during the repressive era of Nicholas I...
" (by Nikolai GogolNikolai GogolNikolai Vasilievich Gogol was a Ukrainian-born Russian dramatist and novelist.Considered by his contemporaries one of the preeminent figures of the natural school of Russian literary realism, later critics have found in Gogol's work a fundamentally romantic sensibility, with strains of Surrealism...
) - "Legend of the Island of Falles"
- "All Hallows" (by Walter de la MareWalter de la MareWalter John de la Mare , OM CH was an English poet, short story writer and novelist, probably best remembered for his works for children and the poem "The Listeners"....
) - "The Dream of a Ridiculous ManThe Dream of a Ridiculous Man"The Dream of a Ridiculous Man" is a short story by Fyodor Dostoyevsky written in 1877. It chronicles the experiences of a man who decides that there is nothing to live for in the world, and is therefore determined to commit suicide...
" (by Fyodor Dostoyevsky) - "The Death of Halpin Frayser" by (Ambrose BierceAmbrose BierceAmbrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...
) - "Moonlit Road" (by Ambrose BierceAmbrose BierceAmbrose Gwinnett Bierce was an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist and satirist...
) - Two by Poe - "The Man of the Crowd" and "MS. Found in a BottleMS. Found in a Bottle"MS. Found in a Bottle" is an 1833 short story by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The plot follows an unnamed narrator at sea who finds himself in a series of harrowing circumstances. As he nears his own disastrous death while his ship drives ever southward, he writes an "MS.", or manuscript...
" - Tales by Lord DunsanyEdward Plunkett, 18th Baron DunsanyEdward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany was an Irish writer and dramatist, notable for his work, mostly in fantasy, published under the name Lord Dunsany...
- "The OutsiderThe Outsider (short story)"The Outsider" is a short story by American horror writer H. P. Lovecraft. Written between March and August 1921, it was first published in Weird Tales, April 1926. In this work, a mysterious man who has been living alone in a castle for as long as he can remember decides to break free in search...
" (by H. P. LovecraftH. P. LovecraftHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
) - "Proof PositiveProof Positive (Greene story)-Publication:It appeared in Harper's Magazine in October 1947 and in Greene's 1947 collection Nineteen Stories.-Inspiraion:It is inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Facts in the Case of M...
" (by Graham GreeneGraham GreeneHenry Graham Greene, OM, CH was an English author, playwright and literary critic. His works explore the ambivalent moral and political issues of the modern world...
) and Witch of the Willows (by Lord DunsanyEdward Plunkett, 18th Baron DunsanyEdward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany was an Irish writer and dramatist, notable for his work, mostly in fantasy, published under the name Lord Dunsany...
) - "The RenegadeThe Renegade (Camus short story)"The Renegade" is a short story written in 1957. It is the second short story published in the volume Exile and the Kingdom by Albert Camus.-Plot summary:...
" (by Albert CamusAlbert CamusAlbert Camus was a French author, journalist, and key philosopher of the 20th century. In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton.Camus was awarded the 1957...
) - "The Squaw" (by Bram StokerBram StokerAbraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...
) - "The Rats in the WallsThe Rats in the Walls"The Rats in the Walls" is a short story by American author H. P. Lovecraft. Written in August–September 1923, it was first published in Weird Tales, March 1924.-Plot summary:...
" (by H. P. LovecraftH. P. LovecraftHoward Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
)
The following are listed from KPFA, KPFK or KQED airchecks, not the Pacifica Archives:
Great American Scream - KPFK
KPFK
KPFK is a listener-sponsored radio station based in North Hollywood, California, United States, which serves the Greater Los Angeles Area, and also streams 24 hours a day via the Internet...
:
- "The Boarded Window" by Ambrose Bierce
- "A Haunted House" by Virginia WoolfVirginia WoolfAdeline Virginia Woolf was an English author, essayist, publisher, and writer of short stories, regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century....
- "The Feeder" by Earl Linder
- "Imp of the Perverse" (by PoeEdgar Allan PoeEdgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
from KQEDKQED-FMKQED-FM is an NPR-member radio station owned by Northern California Public Broadcasting in San Francisco, California.KQED-FM was founded by James Day in 1969 as the radio arm of KQED Television. The founding manager was Bernard Mayes who later went on to be Executive Vice-President of KQED TV and...
, San Francisco [15"])
Releases of Black Mass episodes
- Dream of a Ridiculous Man - Pacifica Radio Archive #BB5499 36:00 This tape has no opening, closing or credits; an older copy is listed as 37:40. A cast of six is listed on the label. With sound effects and original music by Ian Underwood, the show aired 1/29/67.
- Erik Bauersfeld's dramatic adaptations of Lovecraft's "The Rats in the Walls" and "The Outsider" were released in the 1970s on an unauthorized limited LP pressing of 1,000 copies.