John Cage At 100: Remembering A Revolutionary Composer : NPR
September marked the centennial of the birth of composer John Cage and celebrations are being held around the world in his honor. His compositions include spoken texts, radios, toys and the sounds of vegetables being chopped. Cage died in 1992. Fresh Air listens back to an interview with Cage from 1982.
http://www.npr.org/2012/10/26/163713450/john-cage-at-100-remembering-a-revolutionary-composer
Philip Seymour Hoffman On Acting: An 'Exhausting' And 'Satisfying' Art : NPR
It's easy to lose yourself in Philip Seymour Hoffman masterful portrayals, but those performances were anything but effortless.
"Like any job," he told Fresh Air's Terry Gross in 2008, it could be exhausting. In our day to day lives, "we're not too introspective," he said. "We don't walk around our lives just constantly trying to delve into the understanding of ourselves unless you're in therapy or something. But that's what actors do, you know? We really explore ourselves and other people."
Actor Philip Seymour Hoffman was found dead in his Manhattan apartment on Sunday. He was 46.
Source: http://www.npr.org/2014/02/03/270954011/philip-seymour-hoffman-on-acting-an-exhausting-and-satisfying-art
NPR Fresh Air interview with Gabriel Sherman on his new book profiling the creator of Fox News, Roger Ailes
Gabriel Sherman traces the beginning of Fox News' success back to its wall-to-wall coverage of Monica Lewinsky. He says, "Ratings during the Lewinsky scandal exploded more than 400 percent, so you saw instantly that there was a market for this type of ... television." Sherman's book is called The Loudest Voice In The Room.
http://www.npr.org/2014/01/16/263063731/book-chronicles-the-building-of-roger-ailes-fox-news-empire
Who am I to judge?" With those five words, Pope Francis "stepped away from the disapproving tone, the explicit moralizing typical of popes and bishops," writes columnist James Carroll. Francis made that statement in July, in response to a reporter's question about the status of gay priests in the Church. In a new article about Francis in The New Yorker, Carroll describes the pope as having "unilaterally declared a kind of truce in the culture wars that have divided the Vatican and much of the world."
Interview: Jamie Moyer, Author of 'Just Tell Me I Can't' : NPR
In a new memoir called Just Tell Me I Can't Moyer explains how he became a better pitcher in his 40s than his 20s. Moyer's story isn't just the tale of a talented guy who hung on a little longer than others; with the help of a sports psychologist, he managed to gain control of the mental side of his game.
http://www.npr.org/2013/10/02/228196553/at-49-jamie-moyers-pitching-career-goes-into-extra-innings