HowSound

What do you get when you mix folklore, radio journalism, and a pear? An award-winning story from Canadian producer Rebecca Nolan that brings it all together in an unexpected way.

From time to time, you might learn something unfavorable about a character when reporting a story. Inevitably you ask yourself: should I include this detail or not? To help answer that question, take the squirm test.

History podcasts face a serious problem: sound. So much documentation from the past lacks audio. The Last Archive solved the problem in a very unique way: Produce the podcast like it's a radio drama from the 1930s. But, how do you do that? Producers Ben Naddaff-Hafrey and Sophie McKibben have the answer on this episode of HowSound.

There needs to be a radio and podcasting merit badge: reporters and producers earn one when they stretch above and beyond for a story. If there was one, I would present it to Lauren Chooljian of New Hampshire Public Radio for a pandemic diary she produced.

Rob's secret hope with every HowSound is that you'll hear creative storytelling and production and think "Oh wait! I wanna do that!" He has no doubt that Fiona Benson's and Mair Bosworth's sound poem about 17-year cicadas will do just that.

Emily Green says she "walked in the margins" of journalism ethics to report a story on kidnapping at the US/Mexico border for This American Life. Emily and producer Lina Misitzis join me on this episode of HowSound to parse out how they navigated the reporting and how TAL addressed it in the story. This story was part of a Pulitzer Prize winning episode -- the first for audio journalism.

This American Life's Sean Cole is the guest on this episode of HowSound. Rob dug this one out of the HowSound archive from 2010. It features a fantastic story Sean produced in '05 as well as a discussion about the value of including a reporter's question in a story.

This episode is aptly named: A Feast for the Ears. Rob features a handful of ear-catching clips. From a psychedelic road trip in Australia in the 1970s to a crowd-sourced poem produced by NPR to.... well, you'll have to listen!

You may know Jay Allison for his work on the Moth Radio Hour and in his role as the founder and executive editor of Transom. But, back in the day, Jay produced a trove of strange and ear-catching pieces about dog's dreams, talking horses, and freaky neighbors. Headphones on, people.

Selly Thiam says producing an LGBTQ podcast in Kenya is incredibly challenging. There's homophobia, government censorship, and a potential audience that still doesn't quite know what a podcast is. And, yet, AfroQueer, the podcast Selly hosts and produces, is winning major awards for the reporting.