Bob Boilen
In 1988, a determined Bob Boilen started showing up on NPR's doorstep every day, looking for a way to contribute his skills in music and broadcasting to the network. His persistence paid off, and within a few weeks he was hired, on a temporary basis, to work for All Things Considered. Less than a year later, Boilen was directing the show and continued to do so for the next 18 years.
Significant listener interest in the music being played on All Things Considered, along with his and NPR's vast music collections, gave Boilen the idea to start All Songs Considered. "It was obvious to me that listeners of NPR were also lovers of music, but what also became obvious by 1999 was that the web was going to be the place to discover new music and that we wanted to be the premiere site for music discovery." The show launched in 2000, with Boilen as its host.
Before coming to NPR, Boilen found many ways to share his passion for music. From 1982 to 1986 he worked for Baltimore's Impossible Theater, where he held many posts, including composer, technician, and recording engineer. Boilen became part of music history in 1983 with the Impossible Theater production Whiz Bang, a History of Sound. In it, Boilen became one of the first composers to use audio sampling — in this case, sounds from nature and the industrial revolution. He was interviewed about Whiz Bang by Susan Stamberg on All Things Considered.
In 1985, the Washington City Paper voted Boilen 'Performance Artist of the Year.' An electronic musician, he received a grant from the Washington D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities to work on electronic music and performance.
After Impossible Theater, Boilen worked as a producer for a television station in Washington, D.C. He produced several projects, including a music video show. In 1997, he started producing an online show called Science Live for the Discovery Channel. He also put out two albums with his psychedelic band, Tiny Desk Unit, during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Boilen still composes and performs music and posts it for free on his website BobBoilen.info. He performs contradance music and has a podcast of contradance music that he produces with his son Julian.
Boilen's first book, Your Song Changed My Life, was published in April 2016 by HarperCollins.
-
The Tuareg musician may have just made the most insane psychedelic guitar album of the 21st century. -
Hear the shredded noise rock of Rev Rev Rev, the thundering soul of Yola Carter, Afro-Cuban grooves from Cimafunk, the warped and woozy pop of Rose Droll and much more in our 2019 SXSW wrap-up. -
Cut through the noise at this year's SXSW music festival with our daily highlight reel. -
Submit a video of you or your band playing one original song behind a desk — any desk will do — and you could win a chance to play your own Tiny Desk concert and tour the country with NPR Music.
-
The singer and violinist's latest project is a symphonic love story set in World War II, inspired by the internment of Japanese Americans in the U.S.
-
We've listened to more than a thousand songs by bands playing this year's festival. On this episode, we share some of our best discoveries before we hit the ground to see as many shows as possible. -
The Sudanese musician shares an "anthem of inclusion" as the lead-off to his upcoming record, Dépaysé. -
The song is quieter than might be expected from the band, and would fit right in with the solo album singer Adrianne Lenker released last fall. -
The singer shares songs she loves by other artists and talks about her debut full-length release, Miss Universe, an album filled with melodies that won't let go. -
The New Zealand singer says her strangely alluring video for the song "The Barrel" has been described as "Amish Sci-fi." But its ultimate meaning depends on what you think you see.
