James Crawford

"I'm now going into Neil's Yard Dairy, and around me are piles upon piles of cheese. For me this is a lot like walking into a burning building".

James has been involved in radio for about fifteen years. He started off producing reports for Radio Scotland, then moved onto reporting for the World Service and a little Foreign Office-sponsored outfit called the London Radio Service. A dalliance with world of comedy led to an appearance at the Edinburgh Fringe in a double act called Lazlo & Parkin, which was well received by the small number of critics and audience members who were able to find the tiny venue in the back of a Starbucks.

This American Life got him back into radio and his first Radio Four commission, Michael and George, was the result of a more-or-less self-conscious attempt to develop a TAL-type story. Since then he's made programmes on all sorts of subjects, from the 70s sitcom 'Taxi' to the story of haemophiliacs infected with HIV through blood transfusions in the 70s and 80s. In the process he's worked with presenters such as Humphrey Lyttleton, PD James, Stephen Merchant and Frederick Forsyth.

Over the past two years he's developed an interest in corporate podcasts, making programmes for Deloitte, Unilever, BT and RSA. At the moment he's meeting all his cricketing heroes as he works on a series of CDs for BBC Worldwide called Tales From The Dressing Room.