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All Songs Considered Blog
4:38 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Frank Ocean And Bon Iver Surprise Lucky NYC Fans

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Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Frank Ocean performs at Angel Orensanz Church. The special show was announced that day and a few hundred lucky fans were able to RSVP for free tickets.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Ocean also performed his beautiful reinterpretation of Coldplay's "Strawberry Swing," concluding it by recreating his hook from Watch The Throne's "Made In America."
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Frank Ocean performs at Angel Orensanz Foundation for the Arts. The special show was announced that day and a few hundred lucky fans were able to RSVP for free tickets.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Ocean closed his set with the nine-minute-long "Pyramids."
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Ocean's set was a mix of the strongest songs from 2011's nostalgia, ULTRA -- "Novacane" and "Swim Good" — and new tracks from channel ORANGE.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Audience members on the second-floor-balcony of the synagogue.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
The show was filmed by The Fader, so we hope to see and hear some of the performance again.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
The Angel Orensanz Foundation is located in a former synagogue in the heart of New York City's Lower East Side. Built in 1849, the building's design is meant to evoke the Sistine Chapel and the temple of Solomon.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
The audience filled three levels in the intimate, 300-person capacity venue.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Bon Iver's staging was a stripped-down version of his recent tour set up, but he still managed to fit about a dozen band members on stage, including two drummers.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Bon Iver closed the set with "The Wolves, Act I and II," leading the audience in a singalong of the refrain "What might have been lost" that continued well after he left the stage.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Colin Stetson played baritone saxophone, alto saxophone and clarinet for Bon Iver.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
This was the last live show in the U.S. from Bon Iver for a while. Vernon announced recently that the band will take some time off after their upcoming European tour.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Justin Vernon of Bon Iver.
Credit Ryan Muir for NPR
Bon Iver said it was an "honor to play on the same stage" as Frank Ocean.
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Originally published on Wed October 17, 2012 10:54 am

Last night, two of today's most recognizable voices lifted the rafters of a glorious synagogue on New York's Lower East Side. The surprise show was announced with just about 12 hours notice, and lucky fans who answered an RSVP quickly filled the venue's few hundred spots.

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Shots - Health Blog
4:37 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Branding Health Care Exchanges To Make The Sale

Credit Rich Pedroncelli / AP
Peter Lee, executive director of the California Health Benefit Exchange, discusses California's health care plans in Sacramento in July.
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Originally published on Tue September 25, 2012 7:39 pm

As states work to comply with the federal health care law, many are designing their insurance exchanges, where people will be able to shop for coverage.

But just the word "exchange" sounds to many like off-putting government-speak, and some states are eager to come up with a more appealing name for these new marketplaces.

Peter Lee directs California's Health Benefit Exchange. It's up for a new name, and Lee says they want it to sound fresh, dynamic and innovative.

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The Salt
4:24 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Greek Olive Oil Woes Echoes Country's Broader Economic Challenges

Credit Matthias Schrader / AP
A Greek farmer drives home with his fresh pressed olive oil in barrels near Alyki, Greece. The country's pure olive oil is hard to find, expensive and poorly marketed, businessmen say.
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Originally published on Tue September 25, 2012 7:39 pm

Greece is in the fifth year of a painful recession, and it doesn't look like it's going to end anytime soon. One big problem the country faces is a shortage of strong companies that know how to compete on the world market. And nowhere is this more painfully apparent than in the challenges faced by the country's olive oil business.

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Latin America
4:23 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Bolivia's Cerro Rico: The Mountain That Eats Men

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Credit Carlos Villalon for NPR
Cerro Rico, or Rich Mountain, rises like a monument in Potosi, Bolivia. It has produced silver, and hardship, for centuries. Now it may be in danger of collapse.
Credit Carlos villalon / Carlos Villalon for NPR
Saturnino Soncko is 58, but the fine deadly dust he inhaled while working in the silver mines of Cerro Rico has left him an invalid, gasping for breath in the pulmonary wing of a public hospital in Potosi, Bolivia.
Credit Carlos Villalon for NPR
A 17-year-old miner's hand, already battered from back-breaking work in Cerro Rico in Potosi, Bolivia, on Aug. 17.
Credit Carlos Villalon for NPR
A family celebrates a religious festival in the Calvary neighborhood of Potosi, at the foot of Cerro Rico, on Aug. 18.
Credit Carlos Villalon for NPR
Miners' families celebrating in Potosi, a break from the hardships of work in the silver mines.
Credit Carlos villalon / Carlos Villalon for NPR
Elogio Tola, 45, a miner since he was a boy, takes a break with coca leaves, chewing bagfuls to ward off hunger and exhaustion in the Cerro Rico silver mines in Potosi on Aug. 17.
Credit Carlos villalon / Carlos Villalon for NPR
Cerro Rico: Rising like a monument in Potosi, Bolivia, the 'Rich Mountain' provided silver that bankrolled the Spanish Empire.
Credit Carlos Villalon for NPR
Miners' families celebrate a religious festival in the Calvary neighborhood of Potosi, Bolivia, a break from the hardships in Cerro Rico.
Credit Carlos Villalon for NPR
Saturnino Soncko, 58, has been inhaling the fine dust at the silver mines of Cerro Rico for years. He is now extremely ill, gasping for breath in the pulmonary wing of a public hospital in Potosi, Bolivia.
Credit Carlos Villalon for NPR
Elogio Tola, 45, a miner since he was a boy, takes a break with coca leaves, chewing bagfuls to ward off hunger and exhaustion in the Cerro Rico silver mines in Potosi last month.
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Originally published on Tue September 25, 2012 7:39 pm

Near the mountain city of Potosi in the southern highlands of Bolivia, the cone-shaped peak of Cerro Rico stands as a 15,800-foot monument to the tragedies of Spanish conquest. For centuries, Indian slaves mined the mountain's silver in brutal conditions to bankroll the Spanish empire.

Today, the descendants of those slaves run the mines. But hundreds of years of mining have left the mountain porous and unstable, and experts say it is in danger of collapsing.

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All Tech Considered
4:21 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

National Security Experts Go Rogue For 'Drone Smackdown'

Credit John Procter
Alice Beauheim, her father and Bill Love fly their homemade machines at the Drone Smackdown in Manassas, Va., on Sunday. Objections by the Federal Aviation Administration forced organizers to hold the tongue-in-cheek contest outside of Washington, D.C.
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Originally published on Tue September 25, 2012 7:39 pm

It started as trash talk between two contributors to a national security blog. They decided to host a drone smackdown to see if one guy's machine could take down another.

Unarmed drones, of course. The kind you can put together with a toy-store model and $200 in modifications. But the game turned out to have some serious undertones.

First, a word about the location. For a moment last week, the whole drone smackdown was up in the air.

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Mountain Stage
3:58 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Ray Wylie Hubbard On Mountain Stage

Credit Brian Blauser / Mountain Stage
Ray Wylie Hubbard.
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Originally published on Sun March 10, 2013 8:47 am

Texas troubadour Ray Wylie Hubbard makes his 11th appearance on Mountain Stage, recorded live on the campus of West Virginia University in Morgantown. Hubbard first found success after writing "Up Against the Wall, Redneck Mothers," which became a beer-joint jukebox anthem some 40 years before anyone thought about singing the praises of a Solo cup. A high-school classmate of Mountain Stage host Larry Groce, Hubbard even played with him in a band for a while.

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Middle East
3:13 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

As Numbers Swell, Syrian Refugees Face New Woes

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Credit Mohammad Hannon / AP
A Syrian refugee walks with her children at Zaatari refugee camp in Mafraq, Jordan, near the Syrian border, Sept. 8. Around 30,000 Syrians live at the camp, with the numbers growing each day.
Credit Mohammad Hannon / AP
Newly arrived Syrian refugees gather at Zaatari camp, in Mafraq, Jordan, Aug. 29. Residents have rioted over the poor living conditions at the camp. The Jordanian government is not allowing Syrians to leave the camp and join friends or family elsewhere in the country.
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Originally published on Tue September 25, 2012 7:39 pm

Syria's refugees keep growing dramatically in number, and no country in the region has taken in more of them than Jordan — a poor, desert nation that is now hosting some 200,000 Syrians.

The conditions for the refugees are perhaps harsher in Jordan than in any other country, with many people sheltered in tents on a hot, dusty plain just inside Jordan's northern border with Syria.

At the Zaatari camp, everything is covered with a layer of sand and dirt; rows and rows of tents, once white, are now a golden color.

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The Salt
3:04 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Meadmakers Bottle Taste Of Maine With Roots In South Africa

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Credit Melissa Beuoy / NPR
A bee gathers pollen from goldenrod, a wildflower that's popular with meadmakers, in Scarborough, Me.
Credit Melissa Beuoy / for NPR
Maine Mead Works uses yeast to ferment its honey that originated on a ginger root brought over from South Africa by scientist and mead expert Garth Cambray.
Credit Melissa Beuoy / NPR
An ancient beehive sits on a shelf at Maine Mead Works meadery in Portland, Me.
Credit Eliza Barclay / NPR
Maine Mead Works sells seven different kinds of HoneyMaker mead from blueberry to dry-hopped to semi-sweet.
Credit Eliza Barclay / NPR
Maine Mead Works owner Ben Alexander pours a sample of his dry mead.
Credit Melissa Beuoy / for NPR
A bee gathers pollen from goldenrod, a wildflower that's popular with meadmakers, in Scarborough, Me.
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Originally published on Wed September 26, 2012 8:16 am

A few years ago, your best chance of tasting mead might have been at a Renaissance Fair. We're going to wager the enduring memory is of overpowering sweetness and little desire for a second glass.

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Shots - Health Blog
2:12 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Korean Eunuchs Lived Long And Prospered

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A mural in an ancient tomb in China shows a troupe of eunuchs. How long did they live?
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Originally published on Tue September 25, 2012 2:22 pm

Tell people you're doing a story about the life spans of Korean eunuchs, the typical reaction is a giggle or a cringe.

But if you can overcome your visceral response to the topic, a study scientists in Korea did is quite interesting, both for what they found, and the way they found it.

Several scientists have shown that there is a link between longevity and reproduction: the greater the fertility, the shorter the life span. This has been fairly well established in nonhuman animal species, but proving it's the case for humans has been tricky.

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The Two-Way
2:09 pm
Tue September 25, 2012

Sorry Ma'am: BBC Apologizes To Queen Over Terrorism Disclosure

Credit Odd Andersen / AFP/Getty Images
The British cleric Abu-Hamza al Masri, seen here in February 2003, is set to be extradited to the United States to face terrorism charges linked to the taking of 16 hostages in Yemen in 1998 and setting up a terrorist training camp in rural Oregon.
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By Maureen Pao

In Britain, frustration over why fiery radical Muslim preacher Abu Hamza al-Masri remained a free man for so many years went all the way to the top of society to the queen, the BBC revealed — a revelation the network has subsequently apologized for.

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