The World from PRX

Ian Coss is an audio producer, composer and sound designer whose work spans the worlds of podcasting and performance.IC

Ian Coss

The World
Ian Coss is an audio producer, composer and sound designer whose work spans the worlds of podcasting and performance. He has produced several critically-acclaimed series with the Radiotopia network — "Ways of Hearing," "The Great God of Depression" and "Over the Road" — and developed new podcasts with television programs, including Antiques Roadshow, Nova and American Experience. This type of work has been recognized with multiple Edward R. Murrow Awards, including "Excellence in Sound," and a nomination for "Podcast of the Year" from the Podcast Academy.Additionally, Ian has premiered live sound works at the Boston Museum of Science and Harvard Museums of Science and Culture, and collaborated on immersive audio installations for the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Richmond ICA and Atlanta Science Festival.Ian holds a PhD in ethnomusicology from Boston University, where he conducted research on Haitian radio broadcasting and Indonesian shadow-puppetry. He continues this work as musical director for The Brothers Čampur, an international puppetry collaborative that has performed at major festivals in Indonesia and at universities throughout the eastern United States.
‘Catching the Codfather’ in New Bedford’s Portuguese community
10:26
Dengue fever singer Chhom Nimol on developing her voice
Oddisee returns from a pause with a new album
Whose life matters more? An Argentinian woman wrestles with her father’s complicated legacy.
Haitian American artist’s album offers chance for family reconciliation
Clarissa Bitar plays the oud, a classic string instrument.
Movement
How the oud brought this Palestinian American musician closer to their culture, family and history
Chhom Nimol is the lead singer of Dengue Fever.
Movement
How this Cambodian American singer found her voice
A portrait of Sasami from her self-titled LP, "Sasami."
Movement
‘It’s all mixed’: Sasami makes music inspired by her multicultural heritage 
Gino Yevdjevich – who goes by “Gino” — is the founder and lead singer of the Seattle-based punk band Kultur Shock.
Movement
‘Sing every single song like it’s your last’: How conflict in Sarajevo changed this musician’s life
Belgian artists Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul.
Movement
‘It’s not about you, it’s about the conversation’: This Belgian music duo gets you dancing — and talking
DMV rapper and record producer Oddisee realized early on that purpose and success are self-designated.
Movement
Sudanese American rapper Oddisee on overcoming cultural taboos and confronting self-doubt
Enrique Kiki Valera is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger, sound engineer and producer. He’s best known as one of the world’s greatest players of the Cuban cuatro, a mid-size guitar with eight strings grouped in sets of two.
Movement
Kiki Valera on Son cubano and how he developed a unique musical perspective
Dakota Camacho, dancer and musician, seen in a body of a water unclothed with long hair.
Movement
‘I can speak the language of rhyme:’ Dakota Camacho on Guam, family and hip-hop
Momma Nikki as a child with their father Jean Bonny Etienne in an undated photo.
Movement
Haitian American artist Momma Nikki sings about a complicated father-child relationship — and reconciliation
For Dr. Enongo Lumumba Kasongo, whose stage name is Sammus, Afrofuturism has been a well of inspiration and a living current underneath all her work.
Movement
Forging new space: The multidimensional Afrofuturism of Sammus
Black and white cover of composer Arooj Aftab
Movement
The ‘strange grace’ of singer Arooj Aftab
Sabha Aminikia immigrated to the US as a refugee and began studying at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. But even as he launched his career in America, his music was often focused on Iran.
Movement
Iranian American composer Sahba Aminikia: Music transforms like raindrops that ‘wash this part of humanity’
Ethiopian American Musician Meklit Hadero hosts an ongoing series at The World about stories of music and migration.
Movement
Ethiopian American musician Meklit Hadero: ‘We use music to talk about the things that are hard to talk about’
(Clockwise from top left) Meklit Hadero in red lighting, Sinkane stsnding in front of wooden wall, Diana Gameros standing in front of a brick wall and Hello Psychaleppo looking down at a keyboard.
Movement
Four musicians grapple with the same question: What is home?
Arts, Culture & Media
Jakarta Vinyl
Amal Hussein and Hamdi Mohamed work on poems together.
Arts
‘For My Ayeeyo’: Two young women learn Somali poetry from a distance
"We came out with a style where people were actually looking at our performance. And nobody was doing it at the time": Fito Hyacinthe on Carimi.
Music
Haiti’s ‘original boy band’ called it quits. Here’s how they got their start.
Abdirahman Yusuf works with the Somali Development Center in Boston, which helps resettle Somali refugees.
Music
For Somali immigrants, the generational divide plays out through music
Samson Pho (behind windows)
Culture
Jakarta is having a vinyl renaissance
A studio
Culture
For Haitian radio stations seeking a place on New York’s airwaves — the options are borrow or steal
Kasiva Mutua first learned percussion from her grandmother
Music
‘Every time I hold a drum…I feel like happiness is going to kill me’