"Santa Ana Condition" Takes John Valadez Back to the Future

A legendary bookstore closed this year. Marcus Books had been in business in San Francisco since the 1960s -- and a gathering place for generations of black families. Black community leaders say the closing of the store is a symbol of the drastic decline in the city’s black population. (Photo Credit: Lydia Daniller, lydiadaniller.com)

San Francisco Losing Black Residents, Black Business (Marketplace)

Our producer Brian De Los Santos grew up in a religious family and identified as Christian. Until one day in middle school, his faith was put to the test. 

This story aired on KCRW's Morning Edition on June 30. 

Putting Faith to the Test

Liminar, ensamble de música experimental. at Ex-Teresa Arte Actual

Everyone’s path to journalism is different, and the internet and an increasingly diverse population have made those paths even more varied. J-school isn’t (and shouldn’t be) the only place where news organizations find talent. ONA on Air producer Andrea Gutierrez, who also works for KPCC public radio, chats with longtime journalism educator Michelle Johnson about supporting journalism newcomers. She has run the Student Newsroom and Innovation Lab at ONA’s annual conference for years and is passionate about training the next generation of journalists of color. We also hear from ONA19 speaker Priscilla Villlareal, better known as Lagordiloca, about non-traditional paths to journalism and how ONA can encourage people from different backgrounds and identities to enter the profession.

Episode S2E12 was produced by Andrea Gutierrez of the ONA19 Audio Team. Music used in this episode is by Bonus Beats Blast 2011 at FreeMusicArchive.org.

Training Future Journalists with a Focus on Diversifying the Industry (ONA on Air)

*FINALIST* National Arts & Entertainment Journalism Awards, 2020

Costa Rica-born singer Chavela Vargas moved to Mexico as a teen and began singing rancheras at a time when the genre was dominated by men, her songs telling emotional tales of love and longing, both as a migrant and a lesbian. For the centenary of Vargas’ birth in 2019, Los Angeles singer and performance artist Dorian Wood unveils “Xavela Lux Aeterna,” a tribute and reinterpretation of Vargas’ work. Wood talks with The Frame’s Andrea Gutierrez about Vargas’ legacy as a queer icon, and relating to her music as a non-binary person and migrant.

This feature first aired on KPCC's The Frame on November 21, 2019. It was reported, edited, and mixed by Andrea Gutierrez, with engineering help from Eduardo Perez.

Dorian Wood Remembers Chavela Vargas (*FINALIST* NAEJ Awards 2020)

Let me set the scene. Sunday, April 7, 2002. Photographer Mark Savage is about to hop into a cherry picker that’s going to raise him high enough to take “The Big Picture” of LA’s poets. Below, I’m walking around, just about 18 months after moving to LA to become a reporter at KPCC, really a startup news operation which had changed formats and management about two years earlier. I pitched a story about this gathering of poets and my news director said yes, because we were a startup and that means there’s room to take poetry seriously. I don’t know many of the writers but the ones I do, Wanda Coleman, Marisela Norte, Alicia Vogl Saenz are pillars, they’re the real LA poets, the ones who’ve picked up the pain, sweat, and blood the city’s pulled out of them and put it into their fountain pens. So I start walking up to folks, and there’s Lewis MacAdams, the poet of the LA River. And here’s the four minutes he and I shared, the beginning of on and off conversations. I’d run into him years later in DTLA when he was submitting pieces for NPR and he’d share horror stories about the Jann Wenner biography he was writing. A few years after this, my friend Sara Harris and I produced a documentary about the Cornfield art project before it was a state park, and of course we had to record Lewis reading some of his poetry. I texted Sara the day I found out Lewis died: “He centered me in my new hometown. Wanda Coleman, Lewis… how do you move through the city when the landmarks and monuments dissolve? Memory has to be enough, right?”

Lewis MacAdams at "The Big Picture" at Beyond Baroque, April, 2002

Hello Stranger Teaser

Listen to our Mother's Day episode and share it with your mothers.

MothersDay2013

EN
A striking mixtape recorded by Lydia Ourahmane and Alex Ayed during the trip they undertook for the exhibition 'Risquons-Tout'.

FR
Une mixtape saisissante enregistrée par Lydia Ourahmane et Alex Ayed lors du voyage qu'ils ont entrepris pour Risquons-Tout. 

NL
Een treffende mixtape opgenomen door Lydia Ourahmane en Alex Ayed tijdens de trip die ze ondernamen voor 'Risquons-Tout'.

Risquons-Tout - Bosnian Mixtape B by LOAA

Adolfo Guzman-Lopez is a journalist and poet. He lives in Long Beach, California.

Lewis MacAdams at "The Big Picture" at Beyond Baroque, April, 2002

AGLopez

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