Hello
We are Overcoat
We tell 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 work
A selection of our projects produced either in-house or for others
From Dadar to the Stars
BBC Radio 3
Prix Italia-winning producer Steven Rajam’s arresting, intimate, breath-close binaural portrait of the intoxicating city of Mumbai in India.
An Overcoat Media Production
A Racist Music
BBC Radio 3
Errollyn Wallen explores and challenges the legacy of John Powell (1882-1963), a once-celebrated composer whose racist politics scarred the lives of generations of Americans.
An Overcoat Media Production
Tim Key and Gogol's Overcoat
BBC Radio 4
Winner of the Prix Italia for Extraordinary Originality or Innovation, Documentaries, Tim Key spins his own surreal tale around one of Russian fiction’s greatest short stories.
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
Archive on 4: Diana - A Life Backwards
BBC Radio 4
A haunting, unmediated portrait of one of the most extraordinary lives of the 20th century – told uniquely in reverse chronology.
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
Do Pass Go
BBC Radio 4
Board games are back. Samira Ahmed sets out to uncover the modern allure of an analogue table top game in an increasingly digital world.
An Overcoat Media Production
Marketing: Hacking The Unconscious
BBC Radio 4
Rory Sutherland explores the story and psychology behind the most influential marketing campaigns in history.
Steven Rajam & Michael Surcombe for BBC Wales
Indian Rave
BBC Radio 4
At a vibrant gig in Mumbai, stories of young, contemporary India converge – a teeming aural world of stories, sensations and sheer headrush.
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
Robert Lowell: A Life In Study
BBC Radio 3
Acclaimed novelist Colm Toibin profiles the turbulent and brilliant life of 20th-century American poet Robert Lowell, once considered the greatest living poet in the English language.
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
From The Steppes To The Stage
BBC Radio 4
Nominated for the Prix Europa Radio Music Award 2018. Kate Molleson unravels the story of Mongolia’s remarkable rise to being an opera superpower.
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
The Welsh Under Canvas
BBC Radio Wales
Gareth Gwynn rekindles his childhood camping experiences in a bid to understand Wales’s obsession with getting wet and cold.
An Overcoat Media Production
Between The Ears - Re:Union
BBC Radio 3
The idea of a nation coming into being: in the track and weave of an oval ball. Owen Sheers’ new sound poem explores the complex and difficult relationship between rugby and modern Welsh identity.
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
LISTEN
Ghosts In The Machine
BBC Radio 4
Laurie Taylor takes us on an mind-bending journey through the world of aural hallucination and illusion…and the people who think they hear the voices of the dead in recorded sound.
Steven Rajam for BBC Wales
Thought Cages
BBC Radio 4
Rory Sutherland explores a selection of fresh, intriguing and iconoclastic ideas.
“Radio at its very best: informative, witty and entirely unpredictable.” – The Times
“Radio at its very best: informative, witty and entirely unpredictable.” – The Times
Steven Rajam & Michael Surcombe for BBC Wales
Covering a Catastrophe
BBC Radio Wales
50 years after the Aberfan disaster, Felicity Evans tries to make sense of the sequence of media events which saw a nation put on the global stage as never before.
An Overcoat Media Production
In Search of Originality
BBC Radio 4
Is it still possible to do anything truly original? And why should we care if it isn’t? Ian Peacock finds out, with a challenge to come up with just one original thought of his own: a new sound to end a radio programme.
Michael Surcombe for BBC Wales
The most important, least important thing
BBC World Service
The most important, least important thing: Why is watching sport so important to us as a species? What happens when it disappears?
An Overcoat Media Production.
The Greatest Ever Faker
BBC Radio 4
Can the traditions and heritage of a nation really be built on the work of a forger? Gareth Gwyn sets out on the trail of Iolo Morganwg, stonemason, historian and fantasist.
Michael Surcombe for BBC Wales
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.
Steven Rajam, creative director
Bold, imaginative ideas that tease the mind
As a BBC documentaries and music producer for over a decade, Steven built a reputation for arts and factual programmes that combine captivating stories with fresh, playful and original approaches to narrative and form.
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.
Steven’s also a vastly experienced creator of bespoke music content – having produced and managed more than 300 hours of live concerts, events and strand programmes for BBC Radio 3.
Michael Surcombe, managing director
We are at the heart of an audio revolution
Michael 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 Composer Of The Week, Radio 3 in Concert and Cardiff Singer Of The World – alongside documentaries for BBC Radio 4.
He’s also a respected technology professional and trainer, and led BBC Wales’s innovations programme in audio, video and digital from 2014 before setting up his own production company.
Alia Cassam, producer
Alia is a freelance radio producer who has made documentaries for BBC Radio 3, Radio 4, the World Service, Tate, and regularly features on BBC Radio 4's Short Cuts. She trained on the BBC's flagship Production Trainee Scheme where she focused on current affairs and arts broadcasting. She is interested in radio as a medium for "encounter culture", and for working with poetry in a prose-saturated world.
Melvin Rickarby, producer
Melvin 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 and 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.
Katherine Godfrey, executive development producer
Katherine is a freelance executive producer who, most recently, was Head of Audio at the Guardian. Over a decade as an audio producer, she has created new strands for BBC Radio 4 that celebrate smart thinking across disciplines from history to social science and the arts and exec produced major BBC Radio strands.
She’s created podcasts for Art Fund and Glyndebourne Opera and documentaries across the spread of BBC Radio and loves location recording. But she has, honestly, never enjoyed a production more than the comedy podcasts she made for BBC Sounds.
Her work emphasises the long tail of ideas and the importance of emotion, and reverberates with her love of experimental music. She is interested in audio that challenges our perceptions, particularly about mental health, and helps us make informed decisions about the way we live.
Dina Mufti, producer
Dina is an international freelance producer and recipient of a BBC Director General Award for Creativity. Starting out as a reporter, her work includes ‘Costing the Earth’ and the acclaimed ‘The Blood Telegram’ for Radio 4.
Crossing boundaries from Cardiff to Kathmandu, Dina moves between arts, science, history, performance, charity and adventure documentary and features - a journey that cultures a reputation for drawing out characters through dramatic, delicate and insightful storytelling.
Dina is a former scientist, athlete and theatre performer - a role she’s recently reprised as a TEDx coach, supporting the next generation of diverse creatives.