pjstock's Podcast

In 2007 I reported on the Tree Museum, an annual outdoor sculpture exhibit on a 200-acre wilderness space near Gravenhurst Ontario, about 2 hours north of Toronto.

On Labour Day this year, I returned with friends for the 2009 opening, to see what was new, and to speak with featured artists Dyan Marie and Ed Pien.

One Sunday afternoon in late september, I was driving along a rural road outside of Gravenhurst, north of Toronto. I turned a corner and saw two people waving cars into an improvised parking lot in a field. Alongside was a sign marked "Tree Museum". I was so intrigued that I had to stop and investigate.

This is the report.

Something strange happens every Wednesday evening down at the Dominion Pub on Queen Street East in Toronto.

Starting at about 730pm, a stream of customers -- young, old, male, female -- trickle into Toronto's second oldest pub, all clutching tiny instrument cases under their arms.

No, it's not a reenactment of the St. Valentines Day massacre. These are ukulele enthusiasts, coming together for their regular Corktown Ukulele Jam, a weekly workshop and open mic show.

I dropped in for a visit this Spring and prepared this documentary.

An insider's take on what to watch for when watching the Tour de France bike race.

Producers notes: I just had a laugh doing this piece. I'm a keen cyclist and so thought about banging out something just before the start of the 2007 Tour. For it, I interviewed Mike Barry, father of pro racer Michael, Barry and Toronto lawyer and top amateur racer Tim Buckley.

this piece was done for The Green Majority environmental show on CIUT. It combines some very practical E-lawn care tips with some quirky twists on the topic.

From January 22 through until March 8, 2009 a most unusual art "intervention" ran at Honest Eds, Toronto's historic discount retailer.

Artist Iris Haussler invited Torontoians to lend a treasured article of clothing, along with a personal story related to that item. Show visitors could then borrow the clothing -- a jacket, a sweater, a pair of shoes, a dress -- and wear it themselves for one week.

This is a documentary about the show.

What's it like to live in the same house your great-great-grandfather built? Musician and urban observer David Newland takes us for a walk through Toronto's working class Riverside neighbourhood to the very modest house that has been home for his family for five generations. Along the way he reminisces about a neighbourhood in transition.

Who'da thunk thought that an idea bred in a college dorm room would turn the music distribution world on its head. Ten years ago, that's exactly what Napster did.

And since 2006 an Amsterdam-based Internet company called Sellaband has been trying to do the same thing. By cutting out the record companies and matching unsigned musicians directly with fans willing to chip in a few bucks to finance a first album, Sellaband is democratizing Artist & Repertoire side of the music business.

The Rotman School of Management has been studying the phenomenon of community funding and recently brought Sellaband CEO Johan Vosmeijer and Canadian Sellaband recording artist Angie Arsenault to Toronto for a presentation and concert.

I attended, and then sold this report to CBC Radio National Syndication.

Roger Martin is the Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto. In this podcast I interview Roger about his latest book, "The Opposable Mind: How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking"

Publisher's Weekly describes the book as follows: "In this primer on the problem-solving power of "integrative thinking," Martin draws on more than 50 management success stories, including the masterminds behind The Four Seasons, Proctor & Gamble and eBay, to demonstrate how, like the opposable thumb, the "opposable mind"-Martin's term for the human brain's ability "to hold two conflicting ideas in constructive tension"-is an intellectually advantageous evolutionary leap through which decision-makers can synthesize "new and superior ideas." Using this strategy, Martin focuses on what leaders think, rather than what they do. Among anecdotes and examples steering readers to change their thinking about thinking, Martin gives readers specific strategies for understanding their own "personal knowledge system" (by parsing inherent qualities of "stance," "tools" and "experience"), as well as for taking advantage of the "richest source of new insight into a problem," the "opposing model." Each of the eight chapters is well organized, making for a clear and cumulative read. Part inspiration, part logic lesson, this title will provide fresh perspective for anyone prepared to dust off her thinking cap."

QUEST is a new private for-profit liberal arts undergraduate university located in Squamish B.C. I spoke with the President David Strangway about what makes them different, why Squamish is the ideal place to study the environment, and why their jaw-dropping annual tuition ($35,000 including room and board) is not elitist.

"DRIVE: A Road Trip Through Our Complicated Affair With the Automobile"

Viking Canada says:
"Drive is a cross-continent adventure that explores where our fuel-injected dreams have taken us. Award-winning journalist Tim Falconer invites us on his road trip as he meets vintage car enthusiasts on Route 66, rides along in a police cruiser, kicks the tires at a Las Vegas auto show and takes a hydrogen-powered car for a spin.

Steering us along North America's interstates and blue highways, meandering through small towns, sprawling suburbs and walkable neighbourhoods, Falconer shows us the growing collision of cars and people. In this complicated affair, who's really in the driver's seat?

Can smart growth, public transit and complete streets free us?

A spirited, front-seat view of quirky locals and locales, Drive looks at what auto-dominated life means to our health, environment and communities. Falconer also opens the door on British and Argentine car cultures, and considers the road ahead for China and India, nations with increasingly American attitudes. As billions grab their keys, can we avoid carmageddon?"

I speak with writer Chris Turner about his newest book "The Geography of Hope: A Tour of the World We Need" (20m37s)

After the fierce warnings and grim predictions of The Weather Makers and An Inconvenient Truth, acclaimed journalist and national bestselling author Chris Turner finds hope in the search for a sustainable future.

Point of no return: The chilling phrase has become the ubiquitous mantra of ecological doomsayers, a troubling headline above stories of melting permafrost and receding ice caps, visions of catastrophe and fears of a problem with no solution. Daring to step beyond the rhetoric of panic and despair, The Geography of Hope points to the bright light at the end of this very dark tunnel.

With a mix of front-line reporting, analysis and passionate argument, Chris Turner pieces together the glimmers of optimism amid the gloom and the solutions already at work around the world, from Canada’s largest wind farm to Asia’s greenest building and Europe’s most eco-friendly communities. But The Geography of Hope goes far beyond mere technology. Turner seeks out the next generation of political, economic, social and spiritual institutions that could provide the global foundations for a sustainable future–from the green hills of northern Thailand to the parliament houses of Scandinavia, from the villages of southern India, where microcredit finance has remade the social fabric, to America’s most forward-thinking think tanks.

In this compelling first-person exploration, punctuated by the wonder and angst of a writer discovering the world’s beacons of possibility, Chris Turner pieces together a dazzling map of the disparate landmarks in a geography of hope.

This little clip (1m13s) has 4 samples of interviews I recorded on my computer via a free program called Skype Call Recorder. they are basically embellished or tweaked, but I thought the sound quality of the interviewees side was far superior to anything I've achieved using a unit like JK Audio's InLine Patch for instance.

email me if you want details. More details are also on the Transom.org Tools forum.

Peter