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Overcoat tells stories in sound that
beguile, inform and intrigue.

From podcasts to live concerts, arts features to factual series, our content’s got a reputation for turning heads – blending the intimacy and rigour of documentary storytelling with narrative playfulness and sonic adventure.

Our Vision

A launchpad for new talent and new sounds

We are bespoke audio producers, dedicated to highly-crafted content for the radio, podcast and commercial worlds. And we’re determined to do things differently.

We hunt for new talent, new stories and new experiences on both sides of the microphone. And we’re passionate about giving expression to a fresh and diverse array of voices that matter.

Our home is Wales, and our language is international.

The Crossbow Killer

6 part True Crime podcast
BBC Sounds

One of Britain’s most callous and brutal killings. No motive. No explanation. Tim Hinman and Meic Parry investigate the case of a Welsh murder stranger than fiction.

“The producers are Overcoat Media, based in Wales, and their approach is imaginative, even more so than The Girlfriends’. Rhys Iorwerth has written poetry for the podcast, and reads it beautifully. Reporters Tim Hinman and Meic Parry are excellent, and the gorgeous Welsh accents of many of those speaking have an effect, as does the sonic atmosphere. The show is beautifully paced and realised. A feeling of dread – of something going really wrong – is conjured subtly and maintained: a result of careful, imaginative production.” – The Guardian

The Exploding Library – in it’s third series for BBC Radio 4

30m
BBC Radio 4

In each episode, a comedian explodes and unravels their most cherished cult books, paying homage to the tone and style of the original text, but blurring the lines between fact and fiction.

“The Exploding Library is…joyful… It celebrates adventurous fiction with equally adventurous, playful programme-making.” – The Telegraph

Producers: Benjamin Partridge, Steven Rajam, Leonie Thomas

A Positive Life: HIV from Terrence Higgins to Today

Podcast of the Year & Best Factual Podcast – British Podcast Awards 2023
BBC Sounds
8 part podcast

Sam Smith presents stories of HIV in the UK over the last 40 years; beginning with the life of Terrence Higgins, one of the first British people to die of an AIDS-related illness.

Producer: Arlie Adlington
Assistant Producer: Emma Goswell

The Bear Next Door

5 x 15m

BBC Radio 4

Leading cultural figures on the ‘front line’ of Russia’s border with Europe present a series of illustrated essays on the reality of their nation’s contemporary national identity.

Produced by John Beauchamp. An Overcoat Media/Free Range Productions co-production.

Multi Award-winning

6 Decades of Experience

54 Programmes
in production

Some of our team

Amy Wheel

Business Manager

Steven Rajam head shot

Steven Rajam

Creative Director

Steven is Overcoat's Creative Director and co-founder. He is known for audio documentaries that blend formal and narrative playfulness with factual storytelling that still winks at the BBC's mission to "inform, educate and entertain".
His feature “Tim Key and Gogol’s Overcoat” won the 2013 Prix Italia, and he’s made award-winning programmes on subjects from politics to sport, visual arts to history, comedy to poetry.

Michael Surcombe

Managing Director

Michael Surcombe is Overcoat’s Managing Director, and co-founder. He has a track record of being at the cutting edge of technological innovation, combining a content-maker’s creative flair with an eye for the latest digital ideas.
A music specialist, he’s produced numerous key strands for the BBC including a role as launch producer for BBC Radio 3’s The Choir and long-time producer for Composer Of The Week.
He’s also a respected technology professional and trainer, and led BBC Wales’s innovation programme in audio, video and digital from 2014 before establishing his presence in the independent sector.

Selma Chalabi

Freelance producer

Selma is a senior broadcast journalist with 20 years experience of making and presenting radio documentaries for BBC Radio Wales and Radio 4. Her trademark is to use audio in a creative and textured way, to tell stories with emotional depth and strong news lines. She won a Wales Media Award for her intimate portrayal of one family’s experience of postpartum psychosis, and more recently she worked on a BBC podcast about Aberfan, and she produced and presented the BBC Radio Wales programme A Welsh Mountain College for the World for Overcoat Media. She is now looking for opportunities to put her audio storytelling skills to work for a range of new platforms, creating podcasts for both broadcasters and companies.

India Rakusen

Freelance producer

India is a journalist, podcaster, presenter and film maker. She has worked across the BBC in TV (BBC Three, BBC Stories and BBC World) and audio (Radio 4, the World Service, BBC 6Music). She helped launch, and was senior producer and co-host on, The Guardian's daily news podcast Today in Focus. She is now freelance and has produced multi part documentaries for Audible, BBC Studios, and BBC Radio 4. She's also worked with Doc Society on "Mothers of Invention" and with artist Eloise Moody on a series of audio experiences for museums in the UK. India produced the BBC World Service programme Instahappiness for Overcoat Media.

John Beauchamp

Freelance producer

John is a British-born Pole with a French surname based in Warsaw. He has been in Poland since 2002 and has worked as a journalist and broadcaster since 2006, most of it at the English Section of Polish Radio, which he also managed for a while. John took a step back from international news broadcasting in 2015, deciding to move to the world of creative audio. At the beginning of 2020 John co-founded Free Range Productions with two good colleagues from my time at Polish Radio: Bartosz Panek and Jarosław Kociszewski. Overcoat Media have co-produced a number of programmes with Free Range Productions, including the BBC Radio 4 series The Bear Next Door.

Rosemary Baker

Freelance Producer

Rosemary Baker is an award-winning audio producer, filmmaker and visual artist. Her critically acclaimed documentary and film work has appeared across the BBC and Channel 4.

Melvin Rickarby

Freelance Producer

Melvin Rickarby is a freelance producer of podcasts, radio and music recordings. As an in-house documentary specialist at the BBC for 20 years, he authored features on everything from natural history to business takeovers, jazz to Nordic culture. Recognised for a creative, crafted approach to audio, he now brings that expertise to radio and podcast projects for broadcasters and brands.

Ben Gernon

Presenter

Ben is a hugely exciting, award winning young conductor who works with some of the world’s most prestigious orchestras. Ben has appeared on various TV programmes and Radio Shows, including Holst: The Planets with Professor Brian Cox, Channel 4’s Addicts’ Symphony and was one of the youngest conductors to be appointed to the BBC Philharmonic. Ben presented the BBC Radio 4 Archive on 4 Ministry of Fun.

Bartosz Panek

Freelance producer

Bartosz is a radio feature documentary maker and reporter with 20 years’ experience. Prize winner of Polish and international awards, including the Prix Italia for best radio documentary. He works with Free Range Productions, based in Poland, with whom Overcoat Media have co-produced numerous BBC programmes.

Julia Johnson

Freelance producer

With twenty years experience in factual audio, Julia / Julia Johnson has made live radio and documentaries all over the world, from Washington D.C. to Moscow, Beirut to Beijing. Her most recent BBC Radio 4 series was the Overcoat production 'Pride or Prejudice: How we Read Now' and her commercial podcast clients include The Economist, Hauser & Wirth and The River Cafe.

Gareth Gwynn

Freelance producer/presenter

Gareth Gwynn is a comedy writer, radio presenter and producer. He has written for The Now Show (BBC Radio 4), Have I Got News For You (BBC One) and his sitcom work includes Ankle Tag (BBC Radio 4) and Tourist Trap (BBC One Wales). He has presented several documentaries for BBC Radio 4 including “The Greatest Ever Faker” in which he met, interviewed and spent time with a real-life convicted fraudster, who was absolutely lovely. But then, that’s how they do it, isn’t it?

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