Fresh Air
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Fresh Air | |
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| Other names | Fresh Air Weekend |
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| Genre | Talk radio |
| Running time | ca. 50 min. |
| Country |  United States |
| Languages | English |
| Home station | WHYY-FM |
| Syndicates | NPR |
| Hosts | Terry Gross David Bianculli (Friday) Dave Davies (Guest Host) |
| Directors | Roberta Shorrock |
| Producers | Amy Salit Phyllis Myers |
| Executive producers | Terry Gross Danny Miller |
| Recording studio | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania |
| Air dates | 1975 to present |
| Audio format | Stereophonic |
| Opening theme | "Fresh Air" |
| Website freshair.npr.org |
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 PodcastPodcast Site |
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Fresh Air is a radio show broadcast on National Public Radio stations across the United States each weekday. In 2004, the show was syndicated to 445 stations and claimed 4.4 million listeners. In addition, some stations carry Fresh Air Weekend, a re-programming highlights of the past week's interviews.
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[edit] Beginnings
The show began in 1975 at NPR affiliate WHYY-FM in Philadelphia with Judy Blank as host; in September of that year Terry Gross took over as presenter and producer; over thirty years later she remains its chief presenter. The main segment of the show is an extended interview, often of persons in the arts and entertainment field, although other newsmakers, cultural figures, and journalists have been featured. Shorter segments follow the main segment and carry reviews of various cultural and entertainment diversions on a rotating basis. The subjects of the shorter segments include movies, books, stage plays, television programs, as well as recordings of popular music, jazz, and classical music. The program also features commentary from a range of regular contributors.
[edit] Background
Most of the program's interviews are recorded on tape and later edited down. As in the case of many such radio programs, guests are often not in the studio during recording often speaking by ISDN telephone lines from a sister station. While nearly all other radio programming now use digital recording, Fresh Air is still recorded, edited, and played on analog reel-to-reel tape. However, the program's website announced in 2006 that the aging tapes were now deteriorating and that they would soon begin transferring the thousands of interviews "to a digital format and indexing them." The show usually uses fiber-optic lines to conduct its interviews leading to a superior sound quality. When pressing news requires, it has gone live as during the Soviet coup attempt of 1991.
In 1993 NPR, Fresh Air, and Gross were presented with the George Foster Peabody Award with praise for her "probing questions, revelatory interviews, and unusual insights."[1]
In February of 2002 Gross interviewed Gene Simmons of KISS in an infamous clash of NPR propriety and rock star flamboyance. Simmons discussed his sexual experimentation with women of all age groups and propositioned Gross in demonstration. According to NPR's web site, Simmons withheld permission to supply transcripts or audio of the interview on their website.[2][3][4]
Fresh Air interviews are generally first aired on the Monday through Thursday shows. The Friday shows are rebroadcasts of past interviews.
The show's theme, "Fresh Air", was composed for the program by Joel Forrester of The Microscopic Septet.
In 2004 Gross published a book of her favorite interviews from the show under the title All I Did Was Ask.[5]
[edit] Staff
- Terry Gross - Host, Co-Executive Producer
- Danny Miller - Co-Executive Producer
- Roberta Shorrock - Director
- Dorothy Ferebee - Station Services Coordinator
- Monique Nazareth - Producer
- Naomi Person - Producer
- Amy Salit - Producer
- Phyllis Myers - Producer
- Ann Marie Baldonado - Producer
- Ian Chillag - Associate Producer
- Patty Leswing - Associate Producer
- Sam Briger - Researcher
[edit] References
- ^ The Peabody Award Winners Archive. The Peabody Award. Retrieved on 2007-03-13.
- ^ Leader and Bassist of the Band Kiss, Gene Simmons. Fresh Air. NPR; WHYY (4 February 2002). Retrieved on 2008-01-17.
- ^ Gene Simmons. Interview with Terry Gross. Fresh Air. WHYY; NPR. 4 February 2002. (Interview [Transcript]). Retrieved on 2008-01-17.
- ^ Gene Simmons. Interview with Terry Gross. Fresh Air. NPR; WHYY. 4 February 2002. (Interview [Audio]). Retrieved on 2008-01-17.
- ^ Gross, Terry (2004). All I Did Was Ask: Conversations with Writers, Actors, Musicians, and Artists. New York: Hyperion. ISBN 1401300103.
[edit] External links
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