Listening For What’s Real

Hobbit-sized hobby goblin and public radio ‘professional.’

I’ve been working full time for WNYC’s talkshows since 2019, mainly with The Brian Lehrer Show and All Of It with Alison Stewart. I helped launch Brian’s ‘Impeachment: Daily’ podcast, and continue to produce it after pivoting to a daily politics podcast. (see broadcast/audio) I also help AOI producer Simon Close with the Public Song Project, and develop interactive web elements for Brian’s annual ‘Shop Listener’ holiday project. (see audience engagement) I am also frequently a key part of the station’s special programing, including election coverage, limited series, and on-air conversations responsive to breaking news, and have worked with world-class hosts including Anna Sale, Andrea Bernstein, Ilya Marritz, Brigid Bergin and others.

While I have many years of producing talkshow conversations under my belt, much of my work has been behind the scenes, on the technical side, including the development of dynamic databases for managing live show guests and schedules, and helping my teams transition away from legacy software into new systems.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, I was also responsible for WNYC/Gothamists daily maps tracing infections by zip-code, and did some original reporting on how continued subway use early in the pandemic was correlated with neighborhoods with high poverty, and neighborhoods with major healthcare facilities. (see data journalism) I also leaned on my tech skills to organize ‘Reading Their Names,’ an audio memorial for locals who died of COVID, consisting of over 400 readings crowdsourced from listeners, to memorialize over 1,700 of our neighbors.

Prior to working at WNYC, I was hyperlocal reporter for the Long Island Herald. I used FOIL requests to uncover corruption within a local volunteer EMS department, covered school districts reckoning with the aftermath of the Parkland school shooting and profiled local personalities and events, often responsible for the associated photojournalism to provide art that accompanied my stories. (see local reporting and photography) I wrote pieces that earned me several statewide awards and the Long Island Press Club’s Cub Reporter of the Year. I also earned a promotion to assistant editor, which also entailed some layout, graphic design, and editing skills.

I graduated The New School in 2017. My favorite class was called, Sound and Power for which I made a disorienting cut-up of the Barney theme song to demonstrate its use as a device of torture. Fortunately, that audio has been lost. My final in that class was an exploration of the “acoustemology” of audio journalism and storytelling from the Golden Age of radio through today. My other coursework included political science, journalism, writing and the occasional music class.

In addition to my work, I am a life-long music maker, and dabble in numerous hobbies that keep me learning, including radio astronomy, primitive pottery, survival & homesteading, coding, gaming, archery, gem cutting, sci-fi writing and costume special effects.