When Vulfpeck played a sold-out show at Madison Square Garden, the performance looked effortless. But behind the scenes, their Front of House Engineer and Tour Manager Jake Hartsfield was juggling missing tickets, technical curveballs, and mix…
Dallas Taylor
The Music of Jeopardy! From a Lullaby to $100,000,000
It’s the most recognizable TV theme in America. But Jeopardy’s “Think Music” wasn’t originally written for a game show… It was written for a toddler. In this episode, we trace the unlikely journey of the Jeopardy theme, from Merv Griffin’s liv…
Sound Off: Siren calls, medical melodies & missing frequencies
Twenty Thousand Hertz is proud to present the first short story collection from our Sound Off competition, featuring six bite-sized pieces written and produced entirely by our listeners. From the dawn of recording to the sonic secrets of thund…
I interviewed 5 other Dallas Taylors and things got weird
Your name isn’t just a label. It’s a signal to everyone who meets you, filled with meaning that you may not fully understand. In this story, Dallas revisits one of the most surreal experiences of his life: tracking down five other people who s…
Mix Notes: Dumb Farts, Alien Crickets & Junkyard Instruments
Behind every incredible sound in a movie or TV show is a creative person with a unique story. In this episode, Dallas heads to the legendary Sony Pictures lot during Mix Magazine’s “Sound for Film & TV” event, and invites Hollywood’s sound…
The Deaf Composer: How Beethoven wrote music he couldn’t hear
What happens when one of history’s greatest composers begins to lose the very sense he relies on most? In this episode, we explore how Ludwig van Beethoven continued to create groundbreaking music even as his world fell into silence. Along the…
The Sonic Brand Makeover We Didn’t Know We Needed
After 10 years and 400 episodes, our friends at Switched on Pop decided it was finally time to revamp their outdated theme song. In this episode, they take us inside the chaotic, hilarious, and surprisingly emotional process of making a new on…
Inside Apple: Sonic Accessibility
If you want to know where the future of sound is headed, accessibility is a great place to look. And for decades, Apple has been leading the charge in accessible technology. In this episode, the Apple team breaks down the philosophy and craft …
“In a World…” The epic evolution of movie trailers
Movie trailers have changed dramatically over the decades, from the classic “Voice of God” narrators of the ‘80s and ‘90s, to today’s thunderous “bwaahs” and “boojes.” In this episode, Dallas and producer Andrew Anderson take a deep dive into …
Lofi Girl: The story behind 📚 beats to relax/study to
The Lofi Girl YouTube channel has over 14 millions subscribers, and at any given time, tens of thousands of people are listening together. Created by a mysterious French producer named Dimitri, the channel features a 24/7 livestream of an anim…
Golden: Finding silence in a world of noise
In a noisy, tumultuous world, how can we find inner peace? This episode features two stories about the transformative power of silence. In the first, the Lieutenant Governor of Washington State abandons politics to become a Jesuit novice, and …
Sound Cinema: Experiencing film through audio description
When Matthew Shifrin was growing up, his blindness meant that trying to enjoy a movie or TV show was often a confusing and frustrating experience. But then, Matthew discovered something called video description—an extra audio track where a nar…
The mysterious “Windsor Hum” is finally solved!
In 2011, residents of Windsor, Ontario started experiencing a strange rumbling hum that rattled dishes and kept people awake at night. Then, after years of getting nowhere, the mystery of the Windsor Hum was finally solved… Or was it? This i…
Tyrannosaurus FX: What dinosaurs really sounded like
When you imagine the sound of a dinosaur, you probably think of a scene from the Jurassic Park movies. How do sound designers make these extinct creatures sound so believably alive? And what does modern paleontology tell us about what dinosaur…
Noise “R” Us: The evolution of noisy toys
From See ‘n Say to Speak & Spell, and beyond, toys provide the soundtrack of our childhoods. Huge advancements in computer technology in recent decades mean that today’s toys can make a wider variety of sounds than ever before. In this epi…
Boots ’n Cats: The scientific secrets of beatboxing
Beatboxing began as an imitation of a drum machine, but over the decades it has evolved as a means to emulate any number of percussive sounds. Now beatboxing is being studied by scientists who are fascinated by the vocal dexterity of artists. …