All Things Considered is on the air, and the control room appears to be in chaos. As the current story plays over the monitors, Director Bob Boilen begins to preview the next piece on the computer to his left. The two different audio sources create an unsettling cacophony in the room. To add to the confusion, producer Jon “Smokey” Baer is on speakerphone updating Bob on a story. Boilen is directing cues to the hosts, engineers and newscasters; setting and resetting the clock that counts down the time left in each piece. A production assistant scurries through the door with the just-finished lead-in to the next piece. As Boilen is picking music to go between the segments, there are seven people in the studio and as many as three sources of audio playing simultaneously, but to millions of listeners all across the country, it sounds like All Things Considered.
Bob Boilen has been director of NPR’s All Things Considered for the past 14 years. He also produces and hosts the multimedia, on-line music program, All Songs Considered. Last month, the NPR Classics label released the third All Songs Considered CD under his supervision.
Boilen’s relationship with NPR began when Susan Stamberg interviewed him for a 1983 piece on All Things Considered. He had just finished a new piece composed for Washington DC’s Impossible Theater using a new technique called ‘audio sampling.’ Six years later, looking for something new, a persistent Boilen found himself back at NPR. “I quit my TV job and knocked on NPR’s door…I would just show up every day at All Things Considered and ask if they needed help. Every day I would just pop in and sure enough I just kept working and got hired eventually.”
There has always been the thread of music running though Bob Boilen’s life. At age 17, Bob began working in record stores where he spent most of his time (and money). In the late 70’s, he was a member of the rock group, Tiny Desk Unit. Soon after, he became resident composer with the Impossible Theater, and before joining NPR in 1989, he produced a music video show on Channel 50 in Washington, DC. Much of his exposure to commercial recordings, however came from his earliest job at the record store.
“Our trick was, you’d take a razorblade and slit the plastic on the record. You’d pull the record out, you’d put it on the turntable at night when nobody’s in the store and you’d listen. And then you’d put it back in, you pull the cellophane over and you’d switch it around the other way so it doesn’t look like anyone opened the record…I got that down pretty good. So I listened to a lot of records that way.”
These days, Boilen doesn’t have to be so wily. The music collection in his office stretches from floor to ceiling, with CD’s wedged tightly together on shelves. It’s quite possible he has too much music, as currently, there are over 700 CD’s just waiting to be listened to.
As director of All Things Considered, one of Boilen’s daily tasks is to choose the music that segues from one story to the next. These passages of music, known at NPR as buttons, are usually submitted by artists with little or no commercial recognition. Boilen communicates the tone of a story through his musical choices which can range from comical to meditative. Even though they account for less than one-twelfth of the two hour slot, their resonance with the audience is apparent. All Things Considered receives more mail about their music than anything else on the program.
“I read every email we get, and I write back to everybody. It’s a constant conversation that I have every night when I go home with the people who write in to tell me how much they like what we play or ‘how do I find this?’ I’ve been answering mail from All Things Considered since 1989,”says Boilen “I know people are looking for this kind of music.”
n contrast to his role as show director, Boilen’s musical selection process is pretty simple. He describes his method in the liner notes of the new CD as simply, “I listen. If I like it, I try to find a place for it”.
“Listening is such a small part of what I do for All Things Considered. Most people think its most of what I do. Listening to new submissions is a small tiny window of opportunity I get, and its in my car, its when I wake up in the morning, if I can get in a song or two.”
After receiving countless emails and letters about the music on ATC, Boilen came up with the idea for a new music show that would feature eclectic, yet accessible music. All Songs Considered was originally conceived as a radio show but found its birth as a web broadcast, thanks in part to the introduction of the Internet to American households (Boilen himself is a self-professed “tech-nut”).
The web show debuted on www.npr.org in January of 2000 as the show’s host, Boilen, introduced listeners to a new “music show for your computer.”
“There’s a tremendous amount of people that don’t have an outlet to hear music…the point of all of this is to let people know: ‘hey, your radio station may not play this, but tons of artists are doing this everyday and putting out great music.’”
The inaugural show featured music from Argentinean musician Gustavo Santaolalla, Joplin piano rags arranged for guitar by Giovanni De Chiaro, and jazz from NYC jazz trio Medeski, Martin and Wood. In addition to the audio, users were also treated to thoroughly researched back-stories, photos, artwork and quotes from the artists.
Three years, and almost forty shows later, All Songs Considered has become a favorite among web-music fans. So far the show has featured over 250 artists and began incorporating exclusive performances by artists like the Bad Plus and The Be Good Tanyas. Earlier this year, ASC featured a special 2-hour program airing portions of “The Lost Beatles Tapes.” These tapes – stolen and later recovered in the Netherlands in January 2003 – featured unreleased recordings as well as studio squabbles that shed light on the waning last days of the Beatles. The show, which resembled a musical treasure hunt, made national headlines.
“You can’t go wrong [with the Beatles]. If you follow their progression from what they were doing in 1963 and what they were doing just four years later, the music was so incredibly different. Growing up on that progression and realizing, like a flower opening, what music can do and what its possibilities are, is always what’s excited me.”
All Songs Considered has released three albums, most recently in July 2003. The latest CD features artists from around the globe playing in a multitude of styles. Listeners may remember some of these artists from features on All Things Considered but as Boilen points out, that is not the rule. “Both the CD and the show have evolved. At the outset, the show was a vehicle to play longer version of songs we’d play on ATC. It’s evolved basically [as a place] to play great music”
Music on the new All Songs Considered CD is by all accounts eclectic. Ranging from Big Band to solo accordion to jazz trios, the album features both original music and covers, as well as big names and independents. The common denominator is Boilen’s affection for the songs. “I think of these songs as friends I’ve come to know,” he writes in the liner notes of ASC 2.
Beginning this September, NPR will begin producing a new All Songs Considered webcast every week. There are also plans to add a new section for independent artists to post their music.
Although it may seem like a contradiction to have an eclectic radio show with widespread appeal, Boilen doesn’t see it that way. “I think there a generation of people that grew up hoping that would be the future of music. That’s what the promise of the 60’s and early 70’s music was. You hear it….you hear the bluegrass influence in that early period of rock & roll. You hear the world music influence on that period. You hear reggae music in that early period. And then it all vanished somewhere in the superstardom of music. I think there is a generation of people that want eclectic, interesting music. Few people seem to understand that. And the appeal, judging from our audience is that 20 year olds, 30 year olds, 40 year olds and 50 year olds like this thing. It works. Great music is great music, you know? And people want to hear it and that’s why the artists make it. At least I’d like to think that.”
