JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
You mostly hear our voices on this show, but behind us, next to us, always having our backs is a huge team here at ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.
AILSA CHANG, HOST:
That's right. And this time of year, we turn the mic over to them to reflect on their favorite pieces of radio from the year that was.
AVERY KEATLEY, BYLINE: Hi. I'm Avery Keatley, and I'm a producer on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAMB BLEATING)
KEATLEY: Aww (ph). Yeah.
I've been wanting to produce a piece about lambing season for a while. And so I found a farm out in Poolesville, Maryland.
AMANDA CATHER: Welcome.
KEATLEY: And we went out to talk to shepherd Amanda Cather about what it means to raise lambs.
CATHER: This is our tenth year on this farm. So...
KEATLEY: When we first got to the farm, Amanda took us out to the pasture, and we saw a ewe who looked like she was maybe about to give birth. So we decided to hang around and go do our interview. And right when we were wrapping up our interview with Amanda, she got a text, and we found out that the ewe that we had seen did have a lamb.
So we are heading out to the field.
And we found that the sheep had had twins.
Twins. Hooray.
And I think what I love most about this piece is that, even though we dove into some really heavy topics about life and death and what it means to raise animals for meat, you can hear so much joy coming through Amanda's voice at the end of the piece.
CATHER: He's so pretty.
(SOUNDBITE OF PIG SNORTING)
CATHER: He's right here.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAMB BLEATING)
CATHER: Yeah. He's right here.
JONAKI MEHTA, BYLINE: My name's Jonaki Mehta. I'm a producer for ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. And for this story, we traveled to Taiwan. We did a series of stories about what it means to be Taiwanese. And one of the stories we got to report on was about two comedians. One of them's from Taiwan and started her comedy career in China, and the other is from China and started her comedy career in Taiwan.
JAMIE WANG: My name is Jamie. I'm from China. Thank you for the awkward silence.
MEHTA: We met them in this comedy club called Two Three Comedy, where they first met and did their first set together. As another comedy set was going on, we got to sit down with them in this dimly lit room right across from the bar where they first met.
J WANG: I think comedy is a very powerful thing 'cause it's not like a debate. You're like, one, two, three. This is the logic. Therefore, I'm right. You're wrong. I think it's a very non-hostile, very friendly way to make people listen to you.
VICKIE WANG: When someone laughs with you, it's the closest thing you get to changing someone's mind. It's a very proactive kind of empathy.
CHANG: Yeah.
V WANG: And it's a very joyful kind of empathy. Like, the world's on fire. I think that's the best thing we can do - is to make jokes about it. I just...
MEHTA: I love that they were able to get at these really profound, sort of serious consequential tensions that we often hear about in the news when we hear about Taiwan. But they were able to make people laugh about it and to get at some really, like, deep-seated stereotypes as well. And I didn't expect to learn so much about Taiwanese and Chinese culture sitting in a comedy club with a couple of comedians. So it was a lot of fun.
(APPLAUSE)
MARC RIVERS, BYLINE: Hey. My name is Marc Rivers. I'm a producer with ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I do a lot of the film coverage for the show. And earlier this year, I heard about a film festival having at Sing Sing State Penitentiary. The idea behind it was that these films that were all in some way or another kind of, like, touched the criminal justice system. These films would be judged by incarcerated men at Sing Sing.
MICHAEL HOFFLER: I've never been a part of, like, a film festival. I've never really seen it, didn't really think, you know, it was possible for people to grow up how we grow up.
RIVERS: I did the piece because it's not just about the bare necessities that an incarcerated person still deserves to have, you know, to kind of live. It's also about, you know, their thoughts, their feelings. It's about putting their thoughts and feelings to practice and feeling like they have some kind of meaning.
LAWRENCE BARTLEY: Their words, their thoughts have value, and it has weight. And I'm glad to be able to help bring that to the world. They are human beings. They're human beings with hopes and dreams and wants just like everyone else.
RIVERS: I think it's also about how art can be a way to transport you beyond the physical confines of where a person is. Maybe you physically cannot travel beyond where you are, but art can allow you to travel beyond your space.
(SOUNDBITE OF BOMB EXPLODING)
SEEMA JILANI: That feels very close.
ERIKA RYAN, BYLINE: My name is E Caan. I'm a producer on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. Back in January, we talked to Dr. Seema Jilani, who is a pediatrician that went with the IRC to Gaza.
JILANI: There are no beds available, so people are literally just on the ground, seeking treatment. There's not really room or space for us to breathe or think.
RYAN: She recorded voice memos of her experience while she was there...
JILANI: Six children in my line of sight right now in the corner that need medical attention urgently.
RYAN: ...And captured some of the, like, raw emotions of everything she saw and her reactions to some of the conditions in the emergency room, including not having pain medication or a lot of supplies.
JILANI: I've always told myself, there's not much we can do in medicine, but we can treat pain. And it's no longer true anymore. So we cannot even offer any comfort here. There is no death with dignity when you're lying on the ground of an emergency room in Gaza.
RYAN: I really admire her work and her bravery and the fact that she thought to document these moments that a lot of us will never get to see or hear about.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED SPORTSCASTER #1: We're courtside now, start of the third quarter. Iowa started off with the ball.
GABRIEL SANCHEZ, BYLINE: Hi. This is Gabriel Sanchez. I am a producer for ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. And earlier this year, we thought, you know, it'd be great to talk about Caitlin Clark possibly breaking the all-time college women's basketball scoring record. And in February, Caitlin Clark and the University of Iowa came to the University of Maryland to play.
SALLY MCGOVERN: They were $9 seats, and I think we paid 250 a piece.
KAREN SOTAYS: We didn't care.
MCGOVERN: And we got a steal.
(SOUNDBITE OF SCANNER CHIMING)
SANCHEZ: I had my hand over my mouth 'cause I just couldn't believe how much money everybody was dropping for student tickets that are less than $10.
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Chanting, inaudible).
SANCHEZ: There was music pumping. The crowd was yelling. Whistles were blowing.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED SPORTSCASTER #2: Oh, my God.
SANCHEZ: It was like you went to a buffet, and it was all you can eat, and you ate for, like, the whole table. And there was just so much to digest, to bring back and try and make for air. And it's now December 2024, and we're still talking about Caitlin Clark - Caitlin Clark in the WNBA, Caitlin Clark, the athlete of the year, according to Time. We're going into 2025, and we're still talking about it.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
SUMMERS: That was just a small selection of the team here at ALL THINGS CONSIDERED reflecting on their favorite radio of 2024. Thank you to the whole team that brings you this program today and every day with our cohosts Ari Shapiro, Mary Louise Kelly and Scott Detrow.
CHANG: Our editors are Christopher Intagliata, Jeanette Woods, John Ketchum, Justine Kenin, Patrick Jarenwattananon, Sarah Handel and Tinbete Ermyas.
SUMMERS: Our producers are Alejandra Marquez Janse, Avery Keatley, Brianna Scott, Connor Donevan, Elena Burnett, Erika Ryan, Gabriel Sanchez, Gurjit Kaur, Halisia Hubbard.
CHANG: Jason Fuller, Jeff Pierre, Jonaki Mehta, Jonas Adams, Jordan-Marie Smith, Kai McNamee, Karen Zamora, Kat Lonsdorf, Kathryn Fink.
SUMMERS: Kira Wakeam, Lauren Hodges, Linah Mohammad, Mallory Yu, Manuela Lopez Restrepo, Marc Rivers, Matt Ozug, Megan Lim.
CHANG: Mia Venkat, Michael Levitt, Noah Caldwell, Tyler Bartlam and Vinnie Acovino. Our technical directors are Ted Mebane and Neil Tevault. Our administrative assistant is Wendy Johnson. Our managers are Adam Raney, Ashley Brown, Courtney Dorning, Ollie Dearden and William Troop. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun.
(SOUNDBITE OF THE FLASHBULB'S "COMFORT INSIDE PLASTIC") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.