Three Song Stories

Shirlette Ammons is a Durham, NC-based musician, writer, and producer who grew up in rural Eastern North Carolina in an area called Beautancus near the little town of Mount Olive (where they make the pickles). As a musician, Shirlette has released four albums including her latest, called Spectacles which came out in April of 2024. She’s published several books of her poetry, and is currently worki...

Mark Rodriguez is a stonemason who was born and raised and still lives in Sante Fe, NM. Mark is on a very short list of people who have received two double lung transplants. Mark’s experiences and trials have brought him to a place where bringing a message of resilience, perseverance, and great faith has become central to his perspective, which he brings to his work as an author, international spe...

Matthew Sabatella is a Hollywood, FL-based musician who performs regularly, both as a solo artist and as the leader of the Rambling String Band. He earned first-place ribbons in the 2019 Florida Folk Festival’s Old-Time Banjo Competition and the 2023 Florida Old-Time Music Championship’s Old-Time Banjo and Singing competitions. Matthew also teaches about America’s music at Lifelong Learning Instit...

Dr. Mark Schulman is an award-winning pollster and was co-founder & CEO of one of the nation’s largest survey research & polling firms, SRBI. He's has worked with news media, major corporations, foundations, and government. For news organizations he has tracked presidential job ratings, political campaigns, analyzed election results, and probed policy issues.   Dr. Schulman served as Time...

Dr. Joe Kiniry (Mike's big brother) - is a Principal Scientist at a Portland, Oregon-based technology company called Galois. He’s also the Principled CEO and Chief Scientist of a Galois spin-out company called Free & Fair that works on high-assurance election technologies and services. Prior to joining Galois in 2014, Joe was a Full Professor at the Technical University of Denmark where he hea...

Jeff Marks is a retired journalist and television executive who grew up and started his career as a radio reporter in Kentucky. He's held senior management positions in television newsrooms in Kentucky and Washington, D.C. including serving as general manager for television stations in Maine, New Jersey, Georgia and Virginia. Jeff became known worldwide in 2015 as the public face of WDBJ-TV in Roa...

Marc Collins serves on The City of Ft. Myers Planning Board, the Ft. Myers Charter Review Committee, and since late 2022 he’s been the Executive Director of the Uncommon Friends Foundation. The list of the nonprofits and other local organizations he’s either directly involved with or that he supports somehow is far too long to list here. Marc is very involved in the Southwest Florida arts and soci...

Griogair Labhruidh is a Scottish singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist whose distinct musical stylings merge Scottish Gaelic language, music, and cosmology with modern influences like analog boom-bap, hip-hop and soul-inflected jazz, creating a truly unique sound. Griogair has gained international recognition for his voice as a featured soundtrack artist and songwriter on the TV series Out...

Tracy Waugh is co-founder of a dark wave cover band called the Lovecats with her best friend Missy Balsam. These days, she sings in the cover band Rockadelic with Joe Palumbo and Dan Wolkoff.  Tracy has been in a series of original bands since high school, she says her favorite being Space Vacuum (From Outer Space). They released their album Starcade in 2005 on Dionysus Records. It featured songs...

Eric King s a senior interpretive naturalist with the Miami-Dade County Parks, Recreation, and Open Spaces Department. He manages and conducts nature-based education at Castellow Hammock Nature Center & Preserve in Redland Eric is also an avid butterfly and vegetable gardener as well as an eclectic musician who writes and produces everything from folk to cinematic music - and he’s currently in...

Paula Poundstone is well-known to NPR listeners - especially those who tend to tune in on the weekends to catch Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me , on which she’s a regular and beloved panelist. Beyond Wait Wait, Paula is a legendary stand-up comedian, author, actress & voice actor, interviewer, and commentator. She was introduced to the world at large in the late 1980s through a series of hour-long HBO...

Daniel Donlan was born in Narragansett, Rhode Island but his family moved to southwest Florida when he was just five so pretty much considers himself a Florida man. He graduated from FGCU in 2021 and then taught high school algebra (where he was in charge of his students’ DND club) for two years before deciding that was enough of that -- he now works at Gartner in Fort Myers.  See omnystudio.com/l...

It's time for another throwback to the songs our musician guests played for us.  Bulletproof Heart by Dan Navarro (Ep 309) Lucky to Find Love Again by Tim McGeary (Ep. 323) Hills by Coyote Island from the Sugarshack Sessions (Ep. 311) Preston Rumbaugh Maggie Campbell Blues (Ep. 314) Favorite Things by DAVE!Ja! Vu! (Ep. 326) Buzzcut by Charlie Pace (Ep. 327) The Ballad of Cilantro by Dan Navarro (E...

This week, we're featuring 3 clips from the podcast hosted by our audio producer, Jared Gonzalez - The RAZZLE DAZZLE Show. First up, a look back at Guitar Hero, then an with renowned music composer and writer, Adam Gubman, and finally, THE DELTA QUEST, their monthly D&D campaign! See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Laura Kiniry (no relation by the way) is a freelance journalist specializing in travel, food, and culture. Laura has gone on numerous adventures including a six-month solo journey across Australia, New Zealand, and Thailand - she spent a summer working in Montana's Glacier National Park, and has visited all seven continents.  Laura’s work can be found in publications including Smithsonian Magazine...

Lauren Robie co-founded Hope Eternal Gardens in Punta Gorda with her husband Chris Alonso. It’s a licensed natural burial cemetery with planting forests and meadows where people can celebrate loved ones in a park-like setting. The dream of creating Hope began with the last wish of Lauren’s mother-in-law, and she and her husband have kept that promise and brought her dream into reality. See omnystu...

Jessica Lindsey is System Director for Performance Excellence at Lee Health (the largest public health system in Southwest Florida). She has her master's in healthcare administration but has held all sorts of roles with Lee Health over the years. Jessica also serves as treasurer on the SWFL Inc. Board of Directors and is an Advisory Board Fellow.   Beyond her professional roles, Jessica volunteers...

JP Soars is a Boca Raton-based multi-instrumentalist who’s been releasing his music with his powerhouse trio The Red Hots since 2008, when he released his debut album Back Of My Mind. JP has won the Blues Foundation’s International Blues Challenge in 2009 and the prestigious Albert King guitar award. In 2012, he was named a Blues Music Award Nominee for Best Contemporary Male Blues Artist, and in...

Casey Kalmenson is a Los Angeles-based singer, writer, and producer who makes music under the moniker Little Monarch. She’s also an integral member of Gracie Abrams' band and played a pivotal role in the highly acclaimed Taylor Swift The Era's Tour in 2023, showcasing her exceptional talent on a global stage. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Vivian Howard is the chef at the center of A Chef’s Life , which ran on PBS from 2013 to 2018 - and 2020’s Somewhere South. Vivian won a Peabody, Emmy, and James Beard award for A Chef’s Life . She also runs three restaurants: Lenoir and Handy & Hot in Charleston, South Carolina, and The Kitchen Bar at Chef & the Farmer in Kinston, NC. Vivian is author of two books, Deep Run Roots: Stories...

Kelsie Watts is a singer-songwriter based in Nashville. Raised in a musical family, she went on to study opera, vocal performance, and commercial music. Following her collaboration with AJ McLean from the Backstreet Boys and her appearance on The Voice, she released original songs in 2021 and 2022.  When not writing and performing, Kelsie is a mental health advocate, working with organizations lik...

Jay Allison is host and producer of The Moth Radio Hour,  host, curator, and producer of This I Believe on NPR, and creator/producer of hundreds of documentaries, essays, and special series for national and international broadcast. Jay has won virtually every major industry award for his productions and collaborations, including six Peabodys.  He was also the 1996 recipient of the Corporation for...

Tara Lynn Rye is a musical artist and filmmaker from New Jersey who calls southwest Florida home these days. She spent time in New York City and Los Angeles honing her craft in film - she directed, produced, shot, and edited short films, documentaries and episodics. Tara’s played shows with her band at Rockwood Music Hall, the Peppermint Club, and the legendary Viper Room. She released her song “G...

Mitchell Austin is the Urban Design Manager at the City of Punta Gorda, where he is responsible for long range planning and capital projects planning and design. Since arriving on August 16, 2004 (three days after  Hurricane Charley devastated Punta Gorda), Mitchell has focused on the art and science of urban place-making in Punta Gorda. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Courtney McNeil is museum director and chief curator at the Baker Museum at Artis—Naples. She’s an award-winning curator, art historian, and museum leader with more than two decades of museum and gallery experience. Prior to joining Artis—Naples, Courtney served 15 years in the curatorial department of Telfair Museums in Savannah, ultimately holding the title of chief curator and deputy director f...