Featured Work
Our vast — and ever-growing — collection contains thousands of carefully curated audio stories from all over the world.
From Sagebrush to Steppe
Two years ago a group of Mongolian herdsmen and musicians traveled to Elko, Nevada, to participate in the National Cowboy Poetry Gathering.
- 2006
- 16:48
- Hal Cannon
- Taki Telonidis
Voices From the Past
Can you remember the sound of voices from the past, even of a close family member?
- 2005
- 09:12
- Pat Donnez
- Wim Vangrootloon
India Song
Originally a text by French writer Marguerite Duras, India Song was next made into an extensive radio program and eventually a film of the same title.
- 2005
- 05:00
- Georges Peyrou
- Marguerite Duras
Snow on Plum Blossom
Japanese springtime: the motif of countless haikus and soulful pop songs, spectacular kabuki and elegant Noh plays, short stories, and novels. In Japan, spring begins in winter -- with a lot of noise.
- 2005
- 07:10
- Barbara Entrup
- Malte Jaspersen
City X
The shopping mall is a cultural and commercial phenomenon in America that most can relate to in some way or another.
- 2005
- 22:33
- Jonathan Mitchell
Shocking Pink
Australian anthropologist, botanist, and eccentric Olive Pink waged a 40-year, one-woman civil rights campaign on behalf of the Aboriginal peoples until her death in 1975.
- 2005
- 36:29
- Hollis Taylor
- Jane Ulman
Electronic Samples Cut-Up
A few years ago, Mark Vernon bought a pile of old reel-to-reel audio tapes at a boot sale (think yard sale, but in the trunks of cars) near his hometown of Derby, England.
- 2002
- 02:14
- Mark Vernon
My Personal Board: Episode One
Five alarmingly self-aware people meet on the phone for an hour each week to talk about their lives and their goals.
- 2005
- 15:00
- Eurydice Aroney
Chicago Hustles
Meet Floyd (not his real name), a self-described "cigarette hustler" and part of Chicago's thriving underground economy, where goods and services -- legal and illegal -- are sold under the radar.
- 2005
- 26:37
- Ann Heppermann
- Kara Oehler
File Under Soviet Bizarre: Vyacheslav Mescherin's Orchestra of Electro-Musical Instruments
It was the closest thing to Muzak in Russia. This is the story of the rise, fall, and sudden resurgence of the music that dominated television and radio airwaves and whose spacey sounds made it the favorite of the USSR's cosmonauts.
- 2004
- 09:58
- Charles Maynes
Refugia
The Whole Wide World tackles issues of globalization by featuring leading economists, historians, political scientists, and some of the most influential artists, novelists, and musicians of our time. This episode focuses the restaging of an Athenian play as well as modern tales from refugees on the run from Bosnia, Haiti, China, and Somalia.
- 2003
- 0
- Christopher Lydon
- Mary McGrath
When the Dog Was Just the Dog
When her husband brings two puppies home, producer Lea Redfern becomes completely immersed in the world of canines. Now dog culture pervades her every waking moment, from commanding her social life to steering her personal politics.
- 2004
- 44:38
- Lea Redfern
The Paint Mixers
Wired with a low-fi tape recorder, performance artist Damali Ayo visited hardware stores and asked employees to mix paint to match different parts of her body.
- 2004
- 05:10
- Damali Ayo
- Dmae Roberts
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Thirty years ago no one believed that the psychological problems suffered by Vietnam soldiers were caused by their service in the war.
- 2004
- 12:47
- Alix Spiegel
Holy Soul
Matthew Power first met poet Allen Ginsberg at his cousin's Bar Mitzvah, when he was a 15-year-old aspiring writer.
- 2004
- 18:40
- Dean Olsher
- Emily Botein
- Matthew Power
Seratonin Syndrome
Ken Nordine wonders if the warning pamphlets included with many powerful prescriptions may cause some of us to suffer mild paranoia.
- 2004
- 03:36
- Ken Nordine
When Do You Feel Feminine?
After a teenager was killed near San Francisco for having a different biological gender from the one she expressed, some local middle-schoolers wanted to know why. What is gender, anyway?
- 2004
- 02:09
- outLoud Radio
Dia's Diary: My Mother
Dia Fallana is a young transgender woman living in a depressed area of Oakland, California. In this radio essay, she explains how her mother's anti-gay attitude kept her in the closet -- until she was forced to tell the truth.
- 2004
- 06:10
- outLoud Radio
Return to Oakland
When Youth Radio reporters in Oakland, CA, spoke with their friends returning home from Iraq, they realized that the public wasn't hearing the perspectives of these young soldiers.
- 2004
- 02:09
- Youth Radio
Soldiers React to Prison Abuse
When Youth Radio reporters in Oakland, CA, spoke with their friends returning home from Iraq, they realized that the public wasn't hearing the perspectives of these young soldiers.
- 2004
- 04:19
- Belia Mayeno Choy
Waiting . . . for Love
This is a playful exploration of Nicholas Longstaff's first forays into the world of relationships, documenting the semantics of falling in and out of love.
- 2004
- 02:57
- Nicholas Longstaff
Railway Lines
Sound artist Sylvi MacCormac tells this story about coming home by train along the Canadian Railway Lines.
- 2004
- 07:49
- Sylvi MacCormack
Radio -- What Do I Do?
Chandra Bulucon, sole proprietor of Puppy Machine Productions, recorded a 45-minute phone conversation she had with a friend about her relationship to radio.
- 2004
- 05:09
- Chandra Bulucon
A Drinking Song
Could The Star Spangled Banner be recast as a drinking song? Holger Mohaupt suggests that in this family, it could.
- 2004
- 01:40
- Holger Mohaupt
A Sense of Place
Filmmaker Tony Hill takes his blind friend to a mystery location, where she discovers her whereabouts solely through her sense of touch.
- 2004
- 04:59
- Tony Hill