Jennah Bell’s love of music started with Disney movies and musicals. By age six she had matured past the soundtrack to “Annie” and discovered the magic of Stevie Wonder and the Beatles and began to understand the wide range of stories that music can tell.

Five former employees of the Hampton Inn in Mebane filed a complaint in Guilford County Superior Court alleging wage theft totalling $24,681. They assert that money is from unpaid bonuses and vacation time, mileage reimbursement, a malfunctioning time clock and more.

The term “Underground Railroad” evokes the image of the legendary Harriet Tubman engineering daring escapes in a false-bottomed carriage or slaves following the North Star through dark woods. Researcher and longtime history professor Adrienne Israel says those popular images only tell a sliver of the story.

2020 is more than a presidential election year — it is also the beginning of a new decade. Does this mean a new era of politics?

At 17 years old, he was barred from entering the front door of the Cat’s Cradle, so John Howie Jr. instead got on the stage of the Chapel Hill club.

North Carolina musicians made waves on the national stage in 2019. Close to a dozen artists from the state, including Rhiannon Giddens, DaBaby and J.Cole, are up for Grammy Awards in 2020 , and new talent keeps popping up.

2019 was a big year for the state of North Carolina: lawmakers held the second-longest legislative session in the state’s history, the city of Durham celebrated the 150th anniversary of its founding, and a major hurricane hit the coast in September. State of Things producers were busy covering these stories and many more.

The segments produced by a State of Things producer are as diverse as the people who listen to the show. Dana Terry joins host Frank Stasio to share how diversity informs the stories they tell and highlights some of the standout moments of the year, including a conversation with Jacob Tobia , a gender non-conforming Raleigh native who ran off to Hollywood to make it big.

The newest team member for WUNC’s daily talk show also produced the program’s first episode of the Embodied series, which explores topics related to sex, relationships and health. The series is hosted by Anita Rao and launched in July with an hour-long conversation about changing landscape of sexual education in North Carolina. Since then, the team has crafted weekly episodes for the series, featuring conversations ranging from fecal bio-art to intimacy through the ages.

In 2019, The State of Things met musical visionaries, people fighting to save endangered cultures, and folks who supported their neighbors through another devastating hurricane. The individuals and stories at the heart of those conversations stuck with State of Things producer Laura Pellicer throughout the year.