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.

Gone

About 12,000 students drop out of Chicago Public Schools each year despite efforts by administrators and teachers to keep them on track.

Three Records From Sundown

Nick Drake died in 1974, an unknown songwriter with three failed folk albums to his name. But fast forward to the present, and Drake is considered among the most important musicians of his time.

Sweeping Statements

Being a teenager can be really hard. Especially if you've flunked out of school. Or your dad has disappeared.

Rip, Rift, and Panic

Rip, Rift, and Panic weaves together stories, archival tape, and sound to create a portrait of the emotional and logistical aspects of living along an earthquake fault line.

Heroin

In Heroin, teenager Janesse Nieves confronts her father about his heroin addiction, and eloquently shares her own feelings of confusion, anger, embarrassment and disgust.

Tongues Twisting

Clapping games and tongue twisters in multiple languages turn into rich stories when Judith Sloan records young immigrants in a theatre workshop.

A Fragile Son

Surjit Sachdev grew up in a conservative family in India. Surjit's father was an engineer, and he's an engineer, but the family tradition ended when Surjit's son was born with a severe mental disability.

Honoring the Body: Taharah

The Jewish burial ritual places great importance on treating the deceased with the utmost honor and respect. This is especially important during the ceremony of taharah, which involves the physical cleansing of the dead body.

Rhapsody in Bohemia

"Bohemian Rhapsody" by Queen is one of the most ambitious and enduring pop songs of all time.

My Lobotomy

My Lobotomy explores one of medical history's most controversial chapters -- when transorbital lobotomies were widely condoned -- through one man's personal journey.

Before the War It Was the War

In the 2006 conflict between Hezbollah and the state of Israel, one man took it upon himself to "resist with his pen," to bear witness for his people and bring the world, in his words, "the real news from Beirut."

Grandpa

How do we deal with dying? Most of us look away, but in the case of the Zagar family, they look closer.

Except Me

Andrew Skillings is eleven now, but he was first diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, a high functioning form of autism, when he was just two.

Dreaming of Osama

Dreaming of Osama explores the ever-moving boundaries of the "war on terror" and its influence on the collective unconscious. Osama Bin Laden has a way of lying low -- then, just as the public begins to forget about him, he makes an unexpected reappearance.

Hearts, Lungs, and Minds

Hearts, Lungs, and Minds is a "composed documentary" by sound artist John Wynne, who spent a year as an artist in residence at Harefield Hospital, one of the world's leading centers for heart and lung transplants.

Dr. Phil

In the wake of a break-up, writer Starlee Kine finds so much comfort in break-up songs that she tries to write one herself, even though she has no musical ability whatsoever.

Lenin's Ears

Andrey Allakhverdov, from the Foundation for Independent Radio Broadcasting (based in Russia), talks about what the FNR is up to over in Moscow, and introduces the timezone-bending modern-day audio legend Lenin's Ears.

  • 2008
  • 06:48

Hong Kong Song

The sounds of the city resonate as Hong Kong comes to life through audio mosaic and three voices: a traveler remembers, newscasters rattle off facts and statistics, a young woman recalls a legend from her fading childhood.