PODCAST · education
Sound Judgment
by Elaine Appleton Grant
Become a better storyteller, in audio and beyond. Sound Judgment takes listeners into the studios — and the minds — of your favorite audio storytellers. In each episode, lifelong journalist Elaine Appleton Grant and a top host, producer or editor dive into their creative choices. It’s a revealing conversation about the storytelling craft, and it’s show and tell: Elaine plays back clips from her guest’s podcast. Tune up your storytelling by learning from today's best creators! www.soundjudgmentpodcast.compodcastallies.comsoundjudgment.substack.comThreads: @elaineagrant
Episodes
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Behind The 13th Step, Part 2: The best defense is the truth
On May 6, 2024, The 13th Step team was honored with a Pulitzer Prize nomination for audio reporting "for their gripping and extensively reported investigation of corruption and sexual abuse within the lucrative recovery industry that sought accountability despite legal pressure.” Today, we go...
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How to find the truth: Behind the blockbuster investigative series The 13th Step
In 2020, New Hampshire Public Radio Lauren Chooljian received an email about Eric Spofford, the founder of New Hampshire's largest addiction treatment network. In it was an allegation that Spofford was sexually abusing female clients and employees. Chooljian set out to learn whether this could be...
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How to Grow Your Show — Without Social Media
Sound Judgment is about the craft of audio storytelling. Not about the marketing of podcasts. But today, we're bringing you a gift from someone I trust completely when it comes to audience growth: Jeremy Enns of Podcast Marketing Academy, and his co-host, Justin Jackson, cofounder of…
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Courage vs comfort: Is it finally time to pursue your dreams?
At some point, every one of us will reach a point in our professional lives where it's time to change — but the status quo, even when it's not working, is comfortable. Are you ready to say goodbye to your old life in order to find your way to a new, better one? But you don't have a map? That's…
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[Bonus] Introducing Sound School Podcast: Tracking Partners
It's a brave thing to share the outtakes from a tracking session. All the blemishes are right there. But Martine Powers and Rennie Svirnovsky from the audio team at The Washington Post have graciously done just that. They invited Sound School's Rob Rosenthal into their studio to witness Martine…
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Six Proven Storytelling Strategies to Engage Your Audience
The six storytelling strategies you're about to learn are drawn from the patterns I've seen across more than 150 behind-the-scenes lessons — lessons learned from some of the best hosts, producers, writers and editors I've had on Sound Judgment. You can put these techniques to use right away in…
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Storytelling Secrets, Part 6: Specifics
This is the sixth and final part of our new Sound Judgment quick-hit series on storytelling strategies for hooking your audience and keeping them with you. Today: specifics. The more specific our language, the more sparkling and memorable it is. In the last 18 months of speaking with incredible...
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Storytelling Strategies, Part 5: The Missing Ingredient
This is part 5 of our new Sound Judgment quick-hit series on six storytelling strategies for hooking your audience and keeping them with you. This one can mean the difference between ho-hum content and stories that your audiences will talk about. And I’m betting that you give it hardly any…
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Storytelling Strategies, Part 4: Surprise!
Our fourth S in the 6S framework for hooking your audience and keeping them with you is surprise. It's the left turn when we're expecting a righthand one that makes us listen. It's the twists and turns of an involved, high-stakes plot that we love, or the ending of the movie or the novel that we...
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Storytelling Strategies, Part 3: Scenes
This is part 3 of our new Sound Judgment quick-hit series on six storytelling strategies for hooking your audience and keeping them with you. Today, we’re talking about scenes. They’re obviously a staple in longform narrative storytelling, like true crime and documentaries. Don’t ignore them,...
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Storytelling Strategies to Grow Your Audience: Part 2, Structure
In this series you'll learn how to use sound vision, structure, scenes, surprise, suspense, and specifics to make content that audiences love and share. Each of these bonus episodes is bite-sized and features examples from today's best audio storytellers. Growing your audience depends on more…
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New Series: Storytelling Strategies to Hook & Keep Your Audience, Part 1
This is Part 1: Sound Vision. Be sure to follow the show so you don't miss the next bite-sized episodes on: Part 2: Structure Part 3: Scenes Part 4: Surprise Part 5: Suspense Part 6: Specifics All of these segments — each around 10 minutes or less — will come together soon for a full episode on…
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How Storytelling Can Heal Your Life
Improve your storytelling, interviewing, writing, producing, hosting and guesting skills! Sign up for new Sound Judgment workshops today at www.podcastallies.com/workshops. On this episode, Emily Silverman and host Elaine Appleton Grant discuss: — Why she thought starting a live storytelling…
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Drama! Characters! Conflict! History podcasts have them all, with American History Tellers' Lindsay Graham
Don’t miss today’s takeaways! Scroll down for lessons from this episode. The episodes we discussed on today’s episode are History Daily: Silent Spring Sparks the Modern Environmental Movement and American History Tellers Season 61: Salem Witch Trials. Lindsay Graham Lindsay Graham (no, not that...
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Should you tell your own story? Navigating the tricky art of memoir
Sharing a personal experience, especially a traumatic one, is a particularly popular scripted podcast form. Memoir done well often shoots to the top of the podcast charts or the bestseller list. It moves us, leaves us breathless, inspires standing ovations and prompts us into conversations and...
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The Art of True Curiosity with Kelly Corrigan of Kelly Corrigan Wonders
This episode was sponsored by Signal Hill Insights. Want to know how your podcast is affecting listeners? Need to plan to share outcomes with a branded client? Visit measureyourpodcast.com for a free 4-part email series that will tell you how and why to measure the unique impact of branded...
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Introducing Podcast Perspectives: Audience Growth Lessons from Lemonada
If you liked this bonus episode introducing Podcast Perspectives with host Jeff Umbro and guest Jessica Cordova Kramer of Lemonada Media, you'll love: SJ S1/E1: Emotional Bravery on Last Day with Stephanie Wittels Wachs. Not only is she an amazing, evocative storyteller who knows how to get the...
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Secrets of Hosting In-Studio and Live from the Queen of Book Podcasts, Anne Bogel (Best-of Show)
This episode was sponsored by Signal Hill Insights. Want to know how your podcast is affecting listeners? Need to plan to share outcomes with a branded client? Visit measureyourpodcast.com for a free 4-part email series that will tell you how and why to measure the unique impact of branded...
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How to Track a Liar with Believable: The Coco Berthmann Story Showrunner Karen Given
The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Believable: The Coco Berthmann Story. Karen worked with reporter/host Sara Ganim to create Believable. This episode was sponsored by Signal Hill Insights. Want to know how your podcast is affecting listeners? Need to plan to share outcomes with a...
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How to Capture an Audience with Near Death’s Nikki Boyer
The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Near Death: Death Party. Near Death is a Dying For Media production with sales and distribution by Lemonada Media. Nikki Boyer's takeaways These are the takeaways from the end of the episode. For more takeaways from all of our guests, subscribe…
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Weight for It’s Ronald Young Jr.: Unlocking the Key to Storytelling Success
The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Weight for It: Episode 2, Shame Spiral. It’s produced by ohitsbigron Studios and distributed by Radiotopia. Ronald Young Jr. is a critically acclaimed audio producer, host, and storyteller, based in Alexandria, Va. He is an avid pop-culture...
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How Anna Sale invites listeners in
The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Death, Sex & Money_—Bells & Bills: The Price You Paid for Your Wedding. We also discuss Death, Sex & Money — A Headline Stays Static Even as a Life Transforms. Anna Sale is the creator and host of Death, Sex & Money, the podcast about “the things...
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Classy's Jonathan Menjivar: The Fine, Awkward Art of the Personal Audio Documentary
The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Classy with Jonathan Menjivar, Episode 1: Are Rich People Bad? Jonathan Menjivar is a senior producer at Pineapple Street Studios and the creator and host of Classy with Jonathan Menjivar. He also made the hit shows Project Unabom and The…
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Introducing Season 3: Inside the Minds of Today's Top Storytellers
Follow Sound Judgment on your favorite podcast app. For more information on the show and to browse the back catalog, visit our website: www.soundjudgmentpodcast.com. Leave a voicemail for us! Just click on the microphone icon on our website. Sign up for our twice-monthly Sound Judgment newsletter...
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How to Make Serious Topics Fun with the hosts of Famous & Gravy
The episode discussed on today's Sound Judgment is Famous & Gravy: Poetic Justice (Maya Angelou). Amit Kapoor is co-host and co-creator of the podcast Famous & Gravy. Amit has spent nearly two decades in management positions for media organizations, both commercial and non-profit, ranging from...
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Pushkin's Julia Barton on The Best Audio Storytelling of the Year
[Scroll down for takeaways you can use from today’s show.] Win prizes! Tell us your favorite Sound Judgment episode Deadline: 6.30.23 This Sound Judgment season is quickly coming to an end. Our season finale airs Thursday, June 29. We go behind the scenes with the hilarious hosts of Famous &…
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The Art of the Interview with Conversation Expert Celeste Headlee
Celeste Headlee has anchored many programs, including Tell Me More, Talk of the Nation, Here and Now, All Things Considered, and Weekend Edition. She also served as co-host of the national morning news show, The Takeaway, and served as executive producer of Georgia Public Radio’s On Second…
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How to Make Listeners Breathless for More with Wild Boys' Sam Mullins
About Sam Mullins Sam Mullins is a writer, comedian and journalist based in Toronto, and is the host of the critically acclaimed podcast series “Chameleon: Wild Boys” and “Chameleon: Dr Dante” from Campside Media and Sony Music. For the past decade, he's been writing comedy for TV + radio, and...
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How to Tell the Truth: The Art of Memoir with Dana Black
Mother's Day seems like it should be a Hallmark moment. But for many, reality is far different. Dana Black started her very personal podcast, I Swear on My Mother's Grave, for listeners suffering from complex mother loss — meaning not only people who have lost their mothers to death, but also, in...
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Best Of: Emotional Bravery with Last Day's Stephanie Wittels Wachs
One day in the summer of 2022, Lemonada Media’s Stephanie Wittels Wachs received a surprise: an invitation to the White House to witness the signing of a gun safety bill. The invitation was sparked by the tremendous emotional impact of their hit show, Last Day, and especially of this episode, "A...
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The Heist: How to Produce an Award-Winning Investigative Series with Sally Herships
The episode discussed on today’s Sound Judgment: The Heist: https://apps.publicintegrity.org/theheist/ Episode 2: Mnuchin's World was reported and hosted by Sally Herships. Our editor was Curtis Fox, with help from consulting editor Alison MacAdam and Center for Public Integrity’s Tax Project...
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How to Pitch an Audio Documentary and the Unusual Origin of a This American Life Story
The episode(s) discussed on today’s Sound Judgment: This American Life Episode 776, “I Work Better on Deadline.” Segment: “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Quorum.” Reporter: Sarah Gibson, NHPR Producer: Chris Benderev How to be a great host: Katie’s takeaways: What are your holy shit...
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Why Should Audiences Trust You? with Audio Branding Host Jodi Krangle, Part 2
Did you miss Part 1 of my conversation with Audio Branding's Jodi Krangle? Listen to it here. Takeaways from today's episode: 1. Imposter syndrome and the art of the interview When she started hosting, Jodi Krangle, who makes her living using her voice, had to overcome one big negative belief. “I...
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Grow Your Audience with Voiceover Talent Jodi Krangle
We’re doing something different on this episode. Jodi and I interview each other – and discover some real similarities and big differences between voice acting & hosting. One of the biggest similarities: As hosts and voice actors, we need to communicate emotion authentically. That’s where the joy...
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Bone Valley: How to Create a True Crime Podcast That Makes a Difference
If you like this episode, you’ll also like Episode 3: Cinematic Storytelling with Crime Show’s Emma Courtland and Episode 1: Emotional Bravery on Last Day with Stephanie Wittels Wachs. Scroll down for takeaways you can use from today’s show. About the creators Gilbert King and Kelsey Decker are…
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Juleyka Lantigua: What if all of your editorial choices were to serve one person?
Juleyka Lantigua is the Founder/CEO of LWC Studios, which received a Peabody Award nomination and won a Third Coast Award “Director’s Prize.” A Fulbright Scholar and Tory Burch Fellow, Juleyka holds a Master’s in Journalism and an MFA in Creative Writing. Connect with Juleyka at LWCStudios.com.…
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The Dinner Sisters: Navigating a Breakout Opportunity—and Devastating Grief
Dinner Sisters Producer and Co-Host Betsy Wallace is an editorial director for podcasting at WebMD. Her career pivot into podcasting started in 2018 with the first episode of the Dinner Sisters, a cooking podcast she produces and co-hosts with her sister, Kate. Through the Dinner Sisters, Betsy…
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Standing Ovation Host Jay Baer: How to Craft a Million-Dollar Story
Scroll down for takeaways you can use from today’s show. Enter the Sound Judgment Listener Name Contest! On Standing Ovation, Jay calls his listeners “clappers.” Glynn Washington of Snap Judgment calls his listeners “snappers.” What Should I Read Next? host Anne Bogel talks to her “readers.” What...
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Snap Judgment's Glynn Washington: Lessons from a Master Storyteller
Before creating the Snap Judgment radio show, Glynn worked as an educator, diplomat, community activist, actor, political strategist, fist-shaker, mountain-hollerer, and foot stomper. Snap Judgment is heard on about 500 public radio stations in the U.S. and on podcasts everywhere. Scroll down for...
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Six Unexpected (Life) Lessons from Great Hosts to Prepare You for 2023
The Six Biggest, Most Surprising or Useful Lessons our Hosts Identified in 2022 1. The host defines the brand of your show. 2. Hosting changes the host—not just as a storyteller and performer, but as a human being. 3. Great performances are valuable, whether that's a million-dollar signature…
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How Top Hosts Hook Listeners in 60 Seconds or Less
Listeners to Sound Judgment know I’m on a quest to unpack how today’s best hosts make their magic — and to define the universal skills and qualities of “hostiness.” What makes some hosts stars, while we don’t remember the rest? Today, we name and explore the first of these universal skills: #1:...
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Secrets of Hosting In-Studio and Live from the Queen of Book Podcasts, Anne Bogel
Anne Bogel has spent the last six years of her life doing something uncanny: Every week on her hit show, What Should I Read Next, she excavates a guest’s reading life in fine detail. Then she recommends books that always seem to be the perfect choices for that guest, no matter who they are. It’s...
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A host on a mission with ¿Quién Tú Eres? host Pabel Martinez
Subscribe to Sound Judgment, the Newsletter, our once- or twice-monthly newsletter about creative choices in audio storytelling. Scroll down for takeaways you can use from today’s show. Pabel Martinez is a native New Yorker, storyteller, and former tech executive. Throughout his career, Pabel...
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Finding your voice with Shelter in Place host Laura Joyce Davis
Laura Joyce Davis, Host/Executive Producer, Shelter in Place Laura Joyce Davis is the host and executive producer of Shelter in Place, which won the “Changing the World One Moment at a Time” award at the International Women’s Podcast Awards. She is a full-time lecturer and managing editor at...
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Cinematic Storytelling with Crime Show's Emma Courtland
Emma Courtland Emma Courtland is an award-winning podcast producer and oral historian. In 2020, she created Crime Show, an episodic documentary series "about people -- and sometimes crime." The show peaked at #2 on Spotify's podcast charts. Her work in audio has been recognized by the Podcast...
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Master the Secrets of Successful Cohosting with Pantsuit Politics
Scroll down for takeaways about co-hosting well from Sarah and Beth About the guests: Sarah Stewart Holland and Beth Silvers host the popular podcast Pantsuit Politics, which was named one of 2021’s best shows by Apple Podcasts and has been featured in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Good…
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The host defines the brand with John Barth
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...
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Emotional Bravery on Last Day with Stephanie Wittels Wachs
Stephanie Wittels Wachs is a longtime actor, voice-over artist, theater teacher, author and the co-founder, with Jessica Cordova Cramer, of Lemonada Media. Last Day is only one of Lemonada’s 30-plus podcasts and growing. Wittels Wachs and Cordova Cramer founded Lemonada three years ago. Its tag...
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Introducing Sound Judgment
The beautiful voices included in this trailer are: John Barth Former chief content officer, PRX Current principal, Creative Media LLC Stephanie Wittels Wachs Host, Last Day Co-Founder and Chief Creative Officer Lemonada Media The episode Stephanie mentions is A Love Story from Last Day, Season 2...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Become a better storyteller, in audio and beyond. Sound Judgment takes listeners into the studios — and the minds — of your favorite audio storytellers. In each episode, lifelong journalist Elaine Appleton Grant and a top host, producer or editor dive into their creative choices. It’s a revealing conversation about the storytelling craft, and it’s show and tell: Elaine plays back clips from her guest’s podcast. Tune up your storytelling by learning from today's best creators! www.soundjudgmentpodcast.compodcastallies.comsoundjudgment.substack.comThreads: @elaineagrant
HOSTED BY
Elaine Appleton Grant
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Sound Judgment have?
Sound Judgment currently has 49 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Sound Judgment about?
Become a better storyteller, in audio and beyond. Sound Judgment takes listeners into the studios — and the minds — of your favorite audio storytellers. In each episode, lifelong journalist Elaine Appleton Grant and a top host, producer or editor dive into their creative choices. It’s a revealing...
How often does Sound Judgment release new episodes?
Sound Judgment has 49 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Sound Judgment?
You can listen to Sound Judgment on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Sound Judgment?
Sound Judgment is created and hosted by Elaine Appleton Grant.
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