[Podcast] The host defines the brand with John Barth
SOUND JUDGMENT, THE PODCAST - EP 002 PUBLISHED ON 10/4/2022
What does it mean to have “hostiness?” That’s the question that John Barth has been asking — and answering — for decades. John is one of most well-known and respected producers and talent recruiters in audio storytelling. For 16 years, he served as chief content officer of PRX. He was the founding producer of Marketplace and a key developer of shows ranging from The Moth Radio Hour to Reveal. He shares his behind-the-scenes methods for spotting great hosts and coaching them to be their most natural, dynamic selves on the mic in this ‘don’t-miss’ episode. We dissect Reveal’s Mississippi Goddamn (host Al Letson), and discuss Wondery’s Bunga Bunga and The Daily.
Scroll down for details about the shows featured in this episode as well as credits and links.
Listen & Follow Sound Judgment: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Podcasts | Everywhere Else
How to be a great host: John Barth’s takeaways
1. What is “hostiness?”
This is where John shines as both a talent recruiter and a content developer. As he says, he’s always looking for ‘the blue M&M” — “that special voice.”
“It’s a combination of very different factors. There’s a likability in someone's voice or style. There's this innate sense that I’d really like to spend more time with them. There’s also this range of curiosity and joy and versatility that comes across when you encounter hostiness. But it’s that compelling nature, that if you saw them live on stage, you’d never want the show to end.”
2. Consistent sound matters, and improves with a good host-producer partnership.
“Anybody who uses their voice professionally, you want to get to a consistent sound. If a good host can hear what makes them sound good in front of an audience, you want to implant that sound in their head. [As a host], after a while, you know your own range — and even on an off day, you can pull that out.” John’s job as an executive producer? “Helping talent be the very best talent they could be behind a mic.”
3. For a more natural and dynamic sound, talk about your passions before taping.
John coached a reporter who’d never before had voice coaching.
“First, I let her talk about the story, about her passions. When people talk about their passions, they automatically get a bigger range. You hear more color in their voice. So then, when it came to reading a script, we would do it again and again. And I would listen for moments of passion…and hold up the mirror. After a while, you hear the joy come out.” And then, John says, they would rehearse that script again and again, going over the most difficult and most promising parts. Often, he would direct her, saying, “Take me back to that scene that you're describing and feel that in the sentence.” When they finished, she couldn’t believe how great she sounded. “Sometimes, we just don't know what our own voice can do. And you need a coach, another pair of ears to say, ‘Ooh, that really did work.’”
4. “We’re not enthralled by copies. We’re enthralled by originals.”
“The goal is certainly to read the script, but your voice and style is loose enough that you can really bring some expression of life to it. There's nothing worse than sounding like Walter Cronkite with the forced intonation and forced pattern. That doesn't mean credibility.”
5. A host defines the brand of the show.
“When you're hiring a host, the host really does imprint their own sound, voice, and style on the show. So it actually begins to define the brand that you're creating. [On Marketplace] it took me a while to get to a host who embodied the sound that I heard from the show… There was an editorial vision, but there was also a sound vision. And it needed to be distinctive. I always imagined how the audience was listening to the show and the kind of listener I wanted to attract. So that had to be a certain sound.”
6. How to prep before taping.
“Our goal (at Marketplace) was to laugh uproariously before we went into the studio to do the live show. So we would tell a funny joke or dirty joke; we would be really snarky in his (David Brancaccio’s) office. My job was to get [David Brancaccio], as a host, not only loosened up, but comfortable with a real range of emotion. So by the time that mic went on, he could really bring his full self to whatever he had to do in those 30 minutes. I mean, it was so much fun.”
7. What producers do
“It's sort of like directing theater and being a writer and being a cat herder. And, you know, everything all at once. People have no idea what producers really do.” (Elaine)
8. Choose to learn storytelling from the very best — The Moth
When John first saw The Moth on stage, he went back to his boss at PRX, Jake Shapiro, and said, “We have just found our first hit.” He then became a key member of the team that developed The Moth Radio Hour.
“The Moth knows probably more about hostiness than anyone. So if you think that storytelling is just getting somebody on a stage to tell their story into a mic, you don't appreciate what The Moth does to get to The Moth sound. Their process is so respectful of finding not only the true story of the storyteller, but the voice of the storyteller and the hostiness of the storyteller.”
9. Just because we are accustomed to a conventional broadcast voice does not mean it remains relevant today. Experiment.
[About the search for a host of Reveal and the choice to hire Al Letson]
“What we needed for that show was a voice and a host who would help us redefine what investigative reporting would sound like. And that's why Al was a natural choice for that job.”
10. Bring your identity to your story, and be transparent about it.
In Mississippi Goddamn, Al Letson and producer Jonathan Jones (J.J.), tell the listener where they were born, what their races are (Black and white) and where they have lived.
“Most journalists are trained to remove themselves from the story,” John says. ‘But that’s a false construct; you never really do.” Of course, he says, there are objective facts. “[And] it’s your eyes, your ears, your notes… And then it's also layered by all the experiences that help you see what you see or what you notice or what you miss…It's a false neutrality [to remove oneself from the story], because we're all individuals…It's rare to hear this acknowledged so plainly, but it really does need to happen that way, especially in a story like this.”
More about John Barth
Today, John Barth runs his own firm, Creative Media LLC. He does talent recruitment and content development for clients in public media, news and social impact. He also coaches people in their media careers. For 16 years, John was the Chief Content Officer of PRX, named by Fast Company magazine as one of the Top 10 Most Innovative media companies. He led the design and launch of Reveal with The Center for Investigative Reporting and The Moth Radio Hour, both Peabody Award winners. He was the founding producer of Marketplace and worked at Audible as director of original content.
A note about Sound Judgment: We believe that no host does good work alone. All hosts rely on their producers, the hidden hands that enable a host to shine. We strive to give credit to producers when it’s possible to do so.
The episodes and shows discussed on today’s Sound Judgment:
Host: Al Letson
Executive Producers: Kevin Sullivan
Series producer: Michael I Schiller
Producers: Al Letson and Jonathan Jones
Production manager: Amy Mostafa
Bunga Bunga
Network: Wondery
Host: Whitney Cummings
The episode: Trailer
The Daily
Network: New York Times
Host: Sabrina Tavernise
The episode: Utah’s ‘Environmental Nuclear Bomb’
Help us find and celebrate today’s best hosts!
Who’s your Sound Judgment dream guest? Share them with us! Write us: allies@podcastallies.com. Because of you, that host may appear on Sound Judgment.
Sound Judgment is a production of Podcast Allies, LLC.
Host: Elaine Appleton Grant
Project Manager: Tina Bassir
Sound Designer: Andrew Parella
Illustrator: Sarah Edgell
Subscribe to Sound Judgment, the Newsletter, our once- or twice-monthly newsletter about creative choices in audio storytelling.