Audio by Adam

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 15:34 — 14.3MB)

A survey look at what being Irish is all about deep down –from the “fairy faith” to its music, to Celtic myth, to sean nos and storytelling. Collected entirely in the West of Ireland down some very very back roads.

See also “Visions and Beliefs in the West Ireland,” which focuses on the spirituality and folkways of the Irish Gaeltacht.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 19:48 — 18.1MB)

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:16 — 2.4MB)

The Bible says that a woman’s hair is a glory to her, and they take that quite literally at several African American beauty salons that are springing up in the Washington DC and other urban areas.  Come with me on my visit to a salon where being “born again,” amazing hair-dos and “prayerful” and joyous sisterhood intertwine in a sacred (often musical) weave.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 28:55 — 23.2MB)

A sound-rich odyssey in which Adam explores various healing systems that use the plants of the rainforest for physical and spiritual healing. Includes interviews with Mayan shamans, and peasant Catholic and Creole healers.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 19:43 — 15.8MB)

A sound-rich look at the ways the Jews in America have influenced what Americans find funny, while expressing themselves and their take on life at the same time.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 9:50 — 9.0MB)

The Masons have long been the subject of curiosity, derision, persecution and admiration for their tight brotherhood, which claims millions of members worldwide, and which has been a mainstay for most American presidents and untold numbers of movers and shakers. The purported “secrecy” of their rites and symbols,  which are sometimes riffs on the belief systems of non-Christian cultures, notably that of Egypt and ancient Greece, has added to their allure and cache.  I met with a group of elite Amercian Masons, who described for me the spiritual path that Masonry can represent for men, and was granted some insight into how this fraternity works.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 8:28 — 7.8MB)

Native Americans are far more likely than their mainstream counterparts to die young and be poor along the way. This story examines, through interviews and sound, how the Blackfeet Tribe of western Montana are trying to hold on to traditional ways while bettering themselves economically.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 5:17 — 4.8MB)

New York City was full of ritual, ceremony, art and other forms of creative and numinous expression in the months following September 11th. This tells the story of one old ceremony that Native Americans brought to the Museum of the American Indian, near Ground Zero after several months had elapsed. It was a ceremonial moment to mark the necessity for drying the tears and moving on.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 15:42 — 14.4MB)

This is a look at the Iron John aka the Wild Man, an archetypal figure representing the deep masculine found in the Grimm Brothers tales, and other traditions. This was popularized by the poet Robert Bly as a story with much to tell modern Western man, who may have lost touch with their own wildness, and therefore their capacity to protect others, and to live fully.

See also my profiles of Robert Bly himself elsewhere in this blog.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 20:08 — 18.4MB)

In 1995, it was my good fortune to be flown down to Atlanta to interview the Dalai Lama. It was in the middle of a very ambitious and (to me) fascinating multi-million dollar project I was producing at the time on conflict resolution, and the psychology of war, violence, reconciliation and peace.  This long form doc uses some clips from His Holiness, and is leavened with dramatized excerpts from his speeches on these subjects, voiced by my colleagues at the VOA’s Tibetan Service.

May these words benefit all sentient beings!