It’s not everyone who manages to design new modes of storytelling. Jad, with his pal Robert Krulwich, have invented ways of blending sound and voice into something musical–both familiar and strange, primal and sophisticated. In his Transom Manifesto, Jad reflects on the birth of Radiolab, the ways we discover things without realizing it, the difficulty of changing, and the burdens of geniushood. You can hear early mock-ups, seminal conversations, inspirational moments, and thoughts about what to do next. Jad recently won a MacArthur Fellowship and it’s brave of him to speak publicly, since all expectations from now on will be unreasonable, but this is very good stuff.
Interesting behind-the-scenes piece by Jad Abumrad, one of the voices behind the great Radiolab podcast.
Outline:
So how did Radiolab actually happen?
• What kind of host should I be?
• Who am I?
• Fast forward six months, another pointing arrow appears.So how do you recognize change?
A) Get comfortable with the idea that you won’t know what’s good until it’s already happened.
B) …you have to selectively tune out listeners. The “how dare you” instinct is strong in public radio listeners, and you just have to ignore it.What now?
A) We’ve decided to widen the subjects we cover.
B) We’ve decided that the best way to reimagine yourself is to collaborate promiscuously.
C) We decided that the ultimate experiment might be to take this show, which is so heavily edited that our sessions…and we decided to make it a stage show.