Third Coast Audio Library

Our vast and ever-growing collection contains thousands of carefully curated audio stories, episodes from Third Coast podcasts, educational sessions on craft from the best makers on the planet, and more.

We’ve also featured some incredible audio work beyond this audio library, in other ways and using other formats: don’t miss the 2021 Web Showcase, featuring a more in-depth look at the winners, judges and even a list of 40 finalists from the 2021 Third Coast/RHDF Competition.

Audio in Space

Producing great audio experiences becomes challenging in entirely new ways when you go beyond the stereo field, and add the dimension of actual physical space (say, a person with an iPod in Central Park.)

  • 2010
  • 01:17:06

Music

Music and sound bring layers of meaning to your work. Incorporating them most effectively starts with looking for the movement and metaphor in your materials. Using examples from her own features, Sherre DeLys presents different approaches to integrated sound design.

  • 2002
  • 01:12:12

These Are a Few of Ira Glass's Favorite Things

Ira Glass plays and talks about radio and print journalism that has inspired him, including some surprising 1970s-era NPR documentaries which may be long forgotten by most.

  • 2002
  • 01:24:13

Rocks, Riptides, and Buoys: Radio in the Play of the Airwaves

Longtime proponent of radio as a fluid and flexible medium, Gregory Whitehead plays a variety of work from around the world and gives a philosophical and pragmatic talk on the role of imaginative radio in an increasingly congested media landscape.

  • 2002
  • 01:19:09

Featuring . . . the Feature

The radio "feature" is a long-standing tradition of European broadcasting, a format with a style all its own. Kaye Mortley, an independent producer based in France, describes the feature this way: "These pieces are mind movies -- road movies sculpted out of reality.

  • 2002
  • 01:26:59

Breaking the Mold: Youth Producers Share Their Work -- Day Two

Their work comes from the heart and gives us a glimpse into the most enigmatic of worlds: teenagehood. Listen in as young producers from around the country present their work and talk about how they're making radio relevant for a new generation.

  • 2003
  • 01:24:21

A Cold Freezin Night - 13

Austin, Texas based experimental performance art group Happiness is a Choice use improvisation and their unique style of meta-theater to learn about each other and about the moments that they share on stage.

Ways of Hearing

It's not always easy to put aside the culturally-formed listening patterns we take for granted and hear radio in fresh ways.

  • 2003
  • 01:29:31

The Music of Voices

Creative sound projects are increasingly blurring the lines between radio, audio documentary, sound art, and music.

  • 2003
  • 01:32:08

The Sound of Breaking News

You’re sent to cover breaking news – a natural disaster or a large-scale accident or crime. You don’t have much time, or much warning. How do you bring back sound-rich, interesting tape, that makes listeners perk up their ears?

  • 2016
  • 01:15:56

The Bigness of the Small Story

From the 2016 Third Coast Conference... celebrated author, filmmaker and radio journalist Alex Kotlowitz talks about the power of a finely crafted intimate narrative.

  • 2016
  • 01:16:42

First Off... This is in Really Good Shape

In this session for editors - or anyone who wants to help someone else shape a story – Gimlet Media’s Jorge Just explores the delicate art of making good things better.

  • 2016
  • 01:28:46

Ghetto Life 101

In 1993, LeAlan Jones (age 13) and Lloyd Newman (age 14) collaborated with public radio producer David Isay to create an audio diary of life on Chicago's South Side.

Hana's Suitcase

When the Children's Holocaust Education Center in Tokyo acquired Hana Brady's suitcase, all they knew was that Hana was born in Czechoslovakia in 1931 and died at Auschwitz at age 13.

Truth on Stage

When facts cannot plumb the depths, shall we lie? In this session, producers listen to and discuss radio documentaries that use fiction and dramatic elements to get to the truth.

  • 2004
  • 01:19:44

Deadline Radio

Most producers and reporters spend their days "feeding the machine" -- cranking out short-form work on a daily, sometimes hourly deadline, with no time for second guesses. However, a lot of news coverage is formulaic and, frankly, dull.

  • 2004
  • 01:18:25