I was always a fan of the CBS Radio Mystery Theater so when I recently discovered the radio program Nightfall I was pleasantly surprised.

“Nightfall is a radio drama series produced and aired by CBC Radio (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) from July 1980 to June 1983. While primarily a supernatural/horror series, Nightfall featured some episodes in other genres, such as science fiction, mystery, fantasy, and human drama. One episode was even adapted from a folk song by Stan Rogers. Some of Nightfall's episodes were so terrifying that the CBC registered numerous complaints and some affiliate stations dropped it. Despite this, the series went on to become one of the most popular shows in CBC Radio history, running 100 episodes that featured a mix of original tales and adaptations of both classic and obscure short stories.”

For the first year each 30 minute episode opened as follows:

"In the dream, you are falling... lost in the listening distance as dark -- locks in...

(Sound effect of a long chilling scream of man falling far below).

Nightfall!"

(Intense music sting!)

I’ve really enjoyed the half dozen or so of shows I’ve listened to so far. They have an interesting story line, seem well produced, and so far the sound quality is very good. I still listen to the old shows too, but this is a pleasant change of pace. If you enjoyed the CBSRMT I think you’ll like this series as well. Do a search and download a few and see what you think, they aren’t very hard to find as free downloads.

Edit: below is a link where there are several episodes available for free downloading:

http://www.archive.org/details/Nightfal ... dTimeRadio

I agree,Nightfall is an excellent series.I fist heard the program when I was still in high school(1983 or 84).NPR ran a selection of,I believe, 30 episodes from the series on Sunday nights at 11:00 P.M.

I used to record them on my Panasonic boom-box for later listening.The procedure was to start the recorder at 11:00,listen for 15 minutes,then go downstairs and watch the weekly re-run of STAR-TREK.Then after S.T.,I would listen to the rest of Nightfall on tape.

Interesting that you bring up CBSRMT as a comparable show.I used to listen to that show nightly at 9 PM in grade school.It used to really irritate my mother when she caught me listening to the show on my Sony TR-84 when I was supposed to be sleeping.