The World According to Sound is the brainchild of two rogue audionauts who rebelled against the NPR mothership: Chris Hoff and Sam Harnett. It began as a micro podcast that held one unique sound under the microscope for 90 seconds each episode. Then it became something much more ambitious: a live sonic Odyssey in 8-channel surround sound. Starting January, Harnett and Hoff bring their realtime soundtrips direct to your home headphones via the internet in their winter listening series.

We are sure that Phantom Power listeners will love this experience. And right now, you can buy tickets for 25% off with the promo code phantompower25. (As a public university employee, I should probably note that I am not receiving financial compensation through this promo code. –Mack)

In this episode, host Mack Hagood talks to Harnett and Hoff about why they grew frustrated with working in public radio and how they now assemble sonic experiences that don’t impose a fixed narrative on their listeners. We also listen to some fantastic excerpts from their upcoming listening series.

We also briefly discuss a sound art classic, I am sitting in a room by Alvin Lucier. You can hear Lucier perform the piece in this video from an MIT symposium in 2014. Shortly after our interview, Lucier passed away at the age of 90. May he Rest In Peace.

Today’s show was written and edited by Mack Hagood. Music by Graeme Gibson.

 

Transcript

[00:00]

Ethereal Voice: This…is…Phantom Power.

[Snippet from The World According to Sound]

[00:59]

Mack Hagood: And welcome to another episode of Phantom Power, your monthly deep dive into all things sound in the arts and humanities. I’m Mack Hagood, and the audio you just heard comes from the long running project called The World According to Sound.

It started off as a podcast then it became a live listening series. Now it’s a virtual distributed experience, that’s available to folks online, streaming.

I mean, it’s a little bit hard to explain actually, but we’ll get into that.

But The World According to Sound is the brainchild of my two guests today.

Chris Hoff: I’m Chris Hoff. I’m actually based in San Francisco and yeah, I’m more of a sound engineer. I come from the public radio world. And I’m the co-creator of The World According to Sound.

Sam Harnett: I’m Sam Harnett, primarily a reporter, but now full-time World According to Sound co-creator.

Mack: Like Chris, Sam comes from the world of public radio, and as you’ll hear, they sort of have a complicated relationship with their old boss.

Sam: Well, we started basically as a reaction to public radio, I mean, Chris and I have both been doing public radio for over a decade–Chris as an engineer and me as a report.

And one day we were just like, “You know, as much as we love public radio, there’s like no sound on radio.”

If you listen to public radio, what you hear is people talking. You hear facts and information and stories and characters, but you hear very, very little sound.

[Snippet from The World According to Sound]

[02:41]

Mack: When I met Chris and Sam, they were in the middle of editing their latest project and you might say they were neck deep in what we could call “ancie...

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