The Sound Documentary International Summer Programme

The Sound Documentary International Summer Programme is a new international programme aimed for young international professionals, offered by the Ecole nationale supérieure Louis-Lumière (ENS Louis-Lumière) and designed with the support of the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs and the complicity of Radio France internationale (RFI). The first session of this programme held in English took place in 2021

As part of the 20th anniversary of the Longueur d’Ondes Festival in 2024, and due to the Olympic Games being held in Paris, the 2024 edition of the Programme will exceptionally be held in Brest (in Brittany, northwestern France) in partnership with the Festival Longueur d’Ondes and the Université de Bretagne Occidentale.

It will take place from July 12th to September 1st 2024 and it will welcome 14 young foreign audiovisual professionals.

Since the programme has been launched it welcomed 36 young professionals from all the world (Asia, Middle East, the Gulf, South America, Europe).

The candidates are young foreign audiovisual professionals, with experience as an author (blog, podcast or creative project involving sound). The laureates are selected by a jury of French professionals in connection with the cultural services of the French embassies. During 7 weeks of intensive training, the attendees, all laureates of a scholarship from the French embassies, dive into the radio ecosystem in France, a pioneer in the radio documentary genre. They learn the fundamentals of writing and recording a radio documentary, supervised by a documentary maker / soundscape artist and a sound engineer. They try out different sound-writing processes, they learn about the techniques of interviewing, capturing atmospheres, soundscape, stereophonic sound recording and audio editing. They learn how to present a project to the concerned audiences (radios, etc.).

The programme is structured around 3 components:

Theoretical and practical training in sound writing (from design to editing)
Production of a sound documentary in pairs (each pair will conceive and carry out its project from A to Z during the workshop)
Discovery of the French radio / podcast creation ecosystem (listening sessions, meetings with French authors and professionals in the sector, visits to key structures such as Radio France, etc.).

The programme also includes meetings and professional visits with key players in the sector: RFI, Radio France, Arte Radio, Festival Longueur d’onde, SCAM, French Institute.

The educational part of the programme is created and led by Frédérique Pressmann. She is a documentary filmmaker and sound artist, born in Paris in 1966. She started her career in New York in the late 80s in print journalism, before working mainly for the French public radio (France Culture, Arte Radio). Some of her documentaries have earned national awards. Since 2009, she has taught documentary practice in schools and universities in France. She is the author of three feature-length documentary films.

The coordination of the programme is The coordination of the programme is ensured by Pascaline Perretti, independant radio producer and cultural projects manager

Fresh News 2024

Longueur d’Ondes festival 2024 invited ENS Louis-Lumière to present the work carried out as part of the International Documentary Summer Program 2023

Raïssa Lahcine, Director of International Relations, and Frédérique Pressmann, Sound Documentarist, in charge of the Program’s pedagogical side, introduced the projects, explained the context and presented the sound documentaries produced in 2023. A listening session of 3 of them followed the meeting.

The meeting was attended by Eric Urbain, Master Son lecturer, the Audiovisual Attaché from the cultural services of the French Embassy in Greece and the one from the French Embassy in Morocco, RFI, partners of the Program and participants in the 2023 edition.