Stevie Wonder turned 75 this year. Also this year, our friend the jazz pianist Noah Baerman put out an album of covers of Wonder’s “message music.”

This hour, a look at Stevie Wonder as musical icon, as important civil rights figure, as utterly timeless songsmith.

Plus: some in-studio performances of Stevie Wonder classics.

GUESTS:

• Noah Baerman: A pianist, composer, and educator; his newest album is Right Now Volume 4: Visions of Steveland
• Kevin Gaines: The Julian Bond Professor of Civil Rights and Social Justice at the University of Virginia
• Erica Tracy: A vocalist, songwriter, and arts curator

MUSIC FEATURED (in order):

• You Haven’t Done Nothing – Stevie Wonder
• Signed, Sealed, Delivered (I’m Yours) – Stevie Wonder
• Superwoman (Where Were You When I Needed You) – Stevie Wonder
• Higher Ground – Noah Baerman
• Happy Birthday – Stevie Wonder
• Big Brother – Stevie Wonder
• Black Man – Stevie Wonder
• Can We Fix Our Nation’s Broken Heart – Stevie Wonder
• As – Noah Baerman

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

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Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show.

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What counts as a robot? This hour, a look at what robots are and the latest in robot technology.

Plus, how robots were used and thought about in medieval times and Ancient Greece and the role of robots in science fiction.

GUESTS:

• Chris Atkeson: Professor at the Robotics Institute and the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University
• Adrienne Mayor: Author of Gods and Robots: Myths, Machines and Ancient Dreams of Technology, among other books
• Elly Truitt: Author of Medieval Robots: Mechanism, Magic, Nature, and Art
• Daniel H. Wilson: Author of Robopocalypse and How To Survive a Robot Uprising: Tips on Defending Yourself Against the Coming Rebellion, among other books

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Colin McEnroe, Jonathan McNicol, and Cat Pastor contributed to this show, which originally aired July 12, 2022.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This hour, we look at the political erasure of history, and its impacts. Plus, we talk about why artists destroy their own work or the works of others. And, the history and evolution of erasers.

GUESTS: 

• Jason Stanley: Bissell-Heyd-Associates Chair in American Studies at the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy at the University of Toronto. His latest book is Erasing History: How Fascists Rewrite the Past to Control the Future

• Preminda Jacob: Associate Dean of the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, where she is also an Associate Professor of Art History and Museum Studies 

• Caroline Weaver: Former shopkeeper at CW Pencil Enterprise, a pencil shop in New York City. She is founder of The Locavore Guide and author of The Pencil Perfect: The Untold Story of a Cultural Icon

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show, which originally aired on April 23, 2025.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

President Donald Trump has found inspiration for tariffs and more in the 25th President of the United States: William McKinley. This hour, we look at the life and legacy of McKinley, and why Trump is drawn to him. Plus, we'll learn about the Gilded Age and its parallels to today.

GUESTS: 

• Kevin Kern: Associate Professor of History at The University of Akron. He is co-author of Ohio: A History of the Buckeye State

• Beverly Gage: Professor of 20th-century U.S. history at Yale University. Her newest book, G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century, received the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Biography.

• Joan Antonson: Executive Director of the Alaska Historical Society

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode.

Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show, which originally aired on March 18, 2025.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing — calls about grammar, gardening, long-distance dialing, autotune. Anything. Everything.

These shows are fun for us, and they seem to be fun for you, too. So we’re doing another one.

In other words: Give us a call during the 1 p.m. EST hour about whatever you want to talk about. 888-720-9677.‌

And! Now you can watch our calls shows on Connecticut Public’s YouTube. Subscribe to get notified when we go live, and come say (nice) things to us in the comments!

MUSIC FEATURED (in order):

• Super Mario Praise Break – 8 Bit Big Band (orig. Mario)
• Automatic – Nate Smith, Lalah Hathaway (orig. Poynter)
• What Was I Made for – Dara Starr Tucker (orig. Billie Eilish)
• The Things We Do For Love – The Bird and the Bee (orig. 10cc)
• Celebrate Me Home – Lizzy McAlpine (orig. Kenny Loggins)
• Right Down the Line – Joshua Lee Turner (orig. Gerry Rafferty)
• Jet – Sammy Rae & The Friends (orig. Paul McCartney, Wings)

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This week’s Nose — guest hosted by writer and journalist Lindsay Lee Wallace — looks at:

PLUR1BUS is a new post-apocalyptic sci-fi thriller series created by Vince Gilligan. Apple TV describes its premise like this: “The most miserable person on Earth must save the world from happiness.” Rhea Seehorn stars as Carol, one of the few people on the planet who weren’t part of the “Joining,” an event that turned most of humanity into a — very polite — hive mind.

And: Orwell: 2 + 2 = 5 is the new documentary from Raoul Peck. Peck’s 2017 film about James Baldwin, I Am Not Your Negro, was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.

GUESTS:

• Shawn Murray: A stand-up comedian, writer, and the host of the Fantasy Filmballpodcast
• Mercy Quaye: Founder and president of The Narrative Project
• Bill Yousman: Professor of media studies at Sacred Heart University

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

From fueling some of mankind's most violent events to inspiring your daughter's latest pop star obsession, mania has become an indispensable force in shaping our collective story. This hour we explore a centuries-long flower frenzy and modern-day fanaticism to uncover why we are so drawn to being "totally obsessed."

GUESTS: 

• Daniel Durbin: Professor of Communication and Director of the Institute of Sports, Media and Society at the University of Southern California Annenberg School

• Sarah Bilston: Professor of English at Trinity College and author of the book, The Lost Orchid: A Story of Victorian Plunder & Obsession

• Paul Barnes: Pianist and Professor of Music at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Glenn Korff School of Music

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode.

This episode is produced by Angelica Gajewski. Colin McEnroe, Robyn Doyon-Aitken, and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show, which originally aired on April 1, 2025.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This hour, Daniel G. Lugo, the new president of Trinity College in Hartford, joins us to talk about the value of higher education, his background, the challenges of leading a college at this time, and more.

GUEST:

• Daniel G. Lugo: Trinity College’s 23rd President

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls, calls about anything, everything. These shows are fun for us, and they seem to be fun for you, too. So we did another one.

This hour, the conversation winds around to whether less is more or better, birds, the Governor's residence, Sweden, tariffs, minimalism … Anything. (Seemingly) everything.

MUSIC FEATURED (in order):

• How Can It Be? – Skinshape
• Juligen – Just D
• Billie Jean – Vanessa Fernandez
• Brand New Me – St. Etienne, Confidence Man
• Smells Like Teen Spirit – Paul Anka
• Cocaine Jobs – Cayden Wemple
• Waters of March – Nicole Henry

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

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In 2014, Colin McEnroe and the playwright and screenwriter Tom Stoppard recorded a live conversation at The Study in New Haven. Stoppard, whom Colin considers “quite possibly the most dizzyingly proficient writer of the English tongue (who) did not grow up speaking English,” has died at the age of 88.

In appreciation of Stoppard and his work, we’re republishing their conversation with a note from Colin.

GUEST:

• Tom Stoppard is a Czech-born playwright.  His most famous works include "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" and "Every Good Boy Deserves Favor." He co-wrote the screenplay for the 1998 Academy Award winning film, "Shakespeare in Love." Over the course of his career he has written for radio, television, film and stage. He' received one Academy Award and four Tony Awards for his work. 

Betsy Kaplan and Chion Wolf produced the hour.

The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode!

Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show.

Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donate

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.