Massett, Larry/Archives
HV023- This Is Insanity
HV/Series/Episode/ Work by: William S Burroughs · Scott Carrier · Joe Frank · Larry Massett · Sound Portraits
Hearing Voices from NPR®
023 This is Insanity: Disturbed Mental States
Host: Scott Carrier of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2010-03-03 (Originally: 2008-08-06)
“This is Insanity” (52:00 mp3):
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A survey of disturbed mental states:
With the music of Disposable Heroes of Hiphopcracy (rapper Michael Franti and percussionist Ron Tse), from the 1993 CD Spare Ass Annie and Other Tales.
A first-person account from an anonymous reporter of his experience undergoing ElectroConvulsive Therapy.
Music from the Australian mashup/cut-up artists 2000 CD Since I Left You.
Our host travels the Utah backroads testing folk for schizophrenia.
The narrator is pathologically challenged by time, and the stories societies tell themselves, excerpted from the 2006 radio hour “Time’s Arrow.”
Howard Dully traces the reasons and repercusssions of his transorbital or “ice pick” lobotomy, a radical new procedure in the treatment of mental illness in this country, pioneered and performed by psychiatrist Walter J. Freeman.
Produced by Dave Isay and Piya Kochhar, with help from Larry Blood, Eliza Bettinger, Brett Myers, Jessica Tickten, Anna Goldman, Maisie Tivnan, Colin Murphy and Jonah Engle Narratored by Howard Dully; edited by Gary Covino. Jack El-Hai was project advisor. Special thanks to: Barbara Dully, Andrew Goldberg, Christine Johnson, Lyle Slovick & David Anderson at the GWU Gelman Library archives. Funding provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting with additional support from the National Endowment for the Arts.
HV046- All Happy Families
HV/Series/Episode/ Work by: Mark Baldwin · Erica Heilman · Larry Massett · Eric Winick
Hearing Voices from NPR®
046 All Happy Families: Love and Loss
Host: Larry Massett of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2010-02-10 (Originally: 2009-01-14)
“All Happy Families” (52:00 mp3):
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Tolstoy wrote, “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” But sometimes it’s hard to tell who is and isn’t happy:
After decades together, the Nadeaus find their husband/father has a secret. This story, told by family friend, come to us from Transom, which has a longer version, with photos and family history. [Music: Bach Six Cello Suites performed on viola performed by Patricia McCarty (Ashmont Music), Stravinsky ""Apollo" Three Greek Ballets performed by London Symphony Orchestra (Naxos).]
Steve Fugate roams the roads of America, walking thousands of miles with a sign stuck over his middle-aged head that reads “Love Life” — because of what happened to his son; recorded by Mark Baldwin, produced by ).
Follow Steve’s writing and walking at Trail Therapy. [Music: Stravinsky "Agon" Three Greek Ballets performed by London Symphony Orchestra (Naxos), Bach Six Cello Suites performed on viola performed by Patricia McCarty (Ashmont Music), Dolly Parton "Silver Dagger" The Grass Is Blue.]
We follow an evolution of relationships revealed in conversations between Greg Sharrow, his mother Marjorie, and Greg’s husband Bob Hooker, as Marjorie’s dementia progresses. Produced with the Vermont Folklife Center. Transom has the original longer version, with photos. [Music: Karinne Keithley.]
HV031- The Stamberg Files
Hearing Voices from NPR®
031 The Stamberg Files: Essays, Audio-tours, and Interviews
Host: Susan Stamberg of NPR
Airs week of: 2009-12-30 (Originally: 2008-10-01)
“The Stamberg Files” (52:00 mp3):
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Susan pulls some pieces she’s most proud of from the NPR audio archives:
She knits her way though history, takes us on a personal tour of DC, and tries to interest her colleagues in resurrecting her infamous relish recipe.
She talks with economist Milton Friedman, actor Judi Dench, writer Nora Ephron, and pianist Leon Fleisher.
In pursuit of patriotism, Ms. Stamberg de-France-ifies popular culture, then ends in a Parisian park, chatting with a world-class conversationalist. Above photo © 2006 NPR by Antony Nagelmann.
HV036- Paintbrush
Hearing Voices from NPR®
036 Paintbrush: Lives of the Artists
Host: Larry Massett of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2009-12-02 (Originally: 2008-11-05)
“Paintbrush” (52:00 mp3):
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Sound-portraits of painters:
Singer Jonathan Richman puts forth the proposition that Pablo Picasso was never called an @#%hole; recorded in 1972, released on the 1976 album The Modern Lovers.
Susan enlists elementary school kids to evaluate the paintings of Pablo Picasso. Their art crit proves accurate and insightful. Co-produced by host Larry Massett.
The poet paints a depiction in prose of her pal Pablo.
A history of injuries and inspiration unfolds in this an audio biography of the legendary Mexican artist.
From Jonathan’s 2008 solo CD Because Her Beauty Is Raw And Wild.
HV076- Small Town
HV/Series/Episode/ Work by: Ben Adair · Ginna Allison · Scott Carrier · Sean Cole · Larry Massett
Hearing Voices from NPR®
076 Small Town: Rural Routes
Host: Larry Massett of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2009-11-11
“Small Town” (52:00 mp3):
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Spending time in some shrinking American townships:
The postmistress of describes her Mississippi River community’s dwindling population. Music: Larry Massett.
Four former Massachusetts municipalities were flooded to make room for a reservoir. But the villages live on in the former residents’ minds. A ShortDocs winner, from Third Coast Festival.
This town in California never did exist, though it’s full of folk who live there: an unofficial RV Park and home to the homeless thrives in culture and community.
Little Talcott, West Virginia has a big claim to fame: It’s home to a famous story and song.
Slab City photo © DesertDutch.org.
HV072- Predator
HV/Series/Episode/ Work by: Mark Allen · Alex Chadwick · Carolyn Jensen Chadwick · Hillary Frank · Barrett Golding · Erica Heilman · Long Haul Productions · Larry Massett
Hearing Voices from NPR®
072 Predator: Hunter and Hunted
Host: Larry Massett of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2009-10-14
“Predator” (52:00 mp3):
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For the opening of hunting season:
A teenage babysitter convinces his younger siblings he’s a werewolf… who’s going to kill them, produced by Hillary Frank (author of I Can’t Tell You) for This American Life.
Beatrice is a white toy poodle, a neighbor, and “the most evil entity, force, energy known to man. Death to humans is a mere plop of a pebble in the ocean that is the evil that you are Beatrice. Evil Beatrice the white poodle.”
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Grizzly Bear 0:00-0:17
Harbor Seal 0:17-0:33
Dall’s Sheep 0:33-0:44
Timber Wolf 0:44-0:51
Moose 0:51-1:22
Cougar/Mountain Lion 1:22-1:26
Sea Lion 1:26-1:51
Porcupine 1:51-1:58
Bison 1:58-3:26
Ringtail/Rodent 3:26-3:41
Musk Ox 3:41-4:11
Columbia Black Tail Deer 4:11-4:37
Caribou 4:37-5:06
Coyote 5:06-5:25
Mountain Goat 5:25-5:48
Peccary 5:48-6:26
Mule Deer 6:26-6:58
From Sonic Scenery, an exhibit I worked on at the natural history museum in Los Angeles a couple years ago. Composers were invited to record music specifically to be heard in wings of the museum. The visitor wears a headset, which plays the compositions when triggered by remote signals in the galleries. Experimental duo Matmos took it all the way by making audio environments for each of the seventeen dioramas in the North American Mammals hall. The timechart (above) was intended to cue the visitor to move from one window to the next, but you can read along for a similar effect.
Artist statement:
In general, our work starts by taking an object, making sounds with that object, and working outward from those sounds in a free-associative manner, without a preconceived result or specifically targeted genre in mind.
In this case, we have had to reverse this process and have tried to think about the precise specifics of the North American Mammals hall and work to gather sounds that will evoke both the natural locale and the specific behaviors of the animals in the room. We decided to anchor our piece around the sounds of animals eating, breathing, and sniffing their environment, and to locate these noises of animal life against a backdrop of plateaulike drones generated with musical instruments associated with “Americana”: pedal steel, acoustic guitar, banjo, harmonica, and autoharp. Feeding peanut butter to a friend’s dog, we built up a basic library of mammalian lip-smacking, huffing, barking, whining, sniffling, and breathing noises, and combined this with a percussive battery of antler noises made by smacking deer antlers against each other and some softer rustling textures harvested by stroking and rubbing the pelt of a wolf.
The work is divided into miniature ‘cells,’ which stand in for the seventeen distinct dioramas/environments and animal species represented in the room, and this is split down the middle by a central section that corresponds to the large bison display at the far end of the room. Our work is intended to be a sound map of a walk through this room and is paced to coincide with a five-to-seven-minute counterclockwise walk through its contents
–Matmos
via futurechimp
“17 Species of North American Mammals” (2:22 excerpt) Matmos
LA’s The Natural History Museum commissioned original music compositions to accompany their 2006 exhibit Sonic Scenery: Music for Collections. Matmos’ music used the vocal sounds of North American mammals.
One of America’s oldest roadside attractions is the Linesville Spillway in northwest Pennsylvania. Tourists toss bread; carp amass at the spillway’s edges: The fish are so thick that mallard ducks hop, skip and jump on the fish’s backs to compete for a slice of bread. Original music by Tim Fite, part of LHP’s song/story series.
More music from the LHP story.
Writer (Amazon), hunter, angler, outdoorsman, Norman Strung demonstrates the shrill sound and thrill found in calling for elk. (Miss ya, Norm: “Labradors [are] lousy watchdogs. They usually bark when there is a stranger about, but it is an expression of unmitigated joy at the chance to meet somebody new, not a warning.” –Norman Strung)
Father Rupe LaRock and son Joe provide a hunter’s perspective of the annual deer breeding cycle. “You can just smell the heat and smell the rut right in the air.” Another of the Deer Stories , produced with Gregory Sharrow at the Vermont Folk Life Center.
Guns, guitars, guts, and wild game. Hunting wildlife and the wild life in the mountains of Payette National Forest. From the Chadwick’s Conservation Sound series. Audio by Micheal Scweppe.
HV071- Vietnam Vets
Hearing Voices from NPR®
071 Vietnam Vets: Coming Home
Host: Larry Massett of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2009-09-23
“Vietnam Vets” (52:00 mp3):
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Recordings, remembrances, poetry, and PTSD from some of those who fought America’s longest war:
The sounds of Saigon, 1972: in combat, on the radio, in the streets, were recorded by Claude Johner for the Folkways recording Good Morning, Vietnam (liner notes 4M pdf).
Doug Peacock, former Green Beret medic, deals with the PTSD of vets, including himself (interviewed by Scott Carrier). Peacock wrote the book Walking It Off: A Veteran’s Chronicle of War And Wilderness.
Rich Kepler’s war experiences were bottled up and about to burst, until he released them in his poetry (producer: Larry Massett).
An oral history of African-American Vietnam vets, based on the book Bloods: Black Veterans of the Vietnam War: An Oral History by Wallace Terry; produced for radio by Katie Davis.
HV069- Pen to Paper
HV/Series/Episode/ Work by: Charles Bowden · Alex Caldiero · Scott Carrier · Barrett Golding · Larry Massett · Susan Stamberg
Hearing Voices from NPR®
069 Pen to Paper: Writers Charles Bowden & Isak Dinesen
Host: Scott Carrier of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2009-08-26
“Pen to Paper” (52:00 mp3):
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Sound-portraits of wordsmiths:
Writer Charles Bowden reports from the US-Mexico border about the drug wars, the poverty, and the environment. His writing is harsh but unflinchingly accurate. Host Scott Carrier portrays Bowden in the words of the people he has written about.
Susan Stamberg revisits the world of Karen Blixen, aka, Isak Dinesen, when she lived in Kenya and wrote “Out of Africa” (produced for NPR by Larry Massett; mixed by Barrett Golding.)
Poet and wordshaker Alex Caldiero (The Sonosopher) ponders the writing and sounding of “That One” word, with music by Theta Naught.
Scott Carrier (Communication) and Alex Caldiero (Humanities/Philosophy) are professors at Utah Valley University in Orem. Go Wolverines!
