From boom bap to EDM, we look at the line between hip-hop and not, and meet a defender of the genre that makes you question... who's in and who's out.

How Radiolab took 7 classic songs and transposed them, then translated them into 7 foreign languages. 

Ragtime pianist Bob Milne blows our minds with a should-be-impossible musical feat in our Inner Voices episode. After you listen, watch him go to town in this boogie-woogie piece.

What's the soundtrack for the end of the world? We go looking for an answer.

You don't get to see this too often: a man (in this case, a very talented man) totally possessed by his muse. Watch pianist Glenn Gould deep in what psychologists call "a flow state."

Hotel hallways are cramped and narrow, like cages. But Storyboard P won't be trapped. Watch this Brooklyn dancer float toward a fire extinguisher — beauty in tight places.

 

Names are useful. We use them to catch someone's attention, to talk about them. Do animals create names for each other like we do? Yes, turns out. Here's a crazy example, with a dastardly back story.

Take Beyonce. Take Sinatra. Take whomever you love and set them on fire — with a "Pyro Board." It plays music by pulsing the beats in flame, and when the singer hits a high note — stand back.

From boom bap to EDM, we look at the line between hip-hop and not, and meet a defender of the genre that makes you question... who's in and who's out.

He could fly like a speeding bullet, leap tall buildings in a single bound, but that's not what made Superman super. The real source of his power, we learn from five fine dancers, is the love he had for a certain newspaper reporter: A dancer's valentine.

You've heard it a thousand times, maybe 10,000. Is there any way to make "The Star-Spangled Banner" fresh? Even fascinating? There is (Jimi Hendrix aside). Here is a new one that did it for me — the Jon Batiste version.

This isn't science. Not today. It's art — in this case, the sly performance of a young comedian who is accosted backstage by not-so-nice "fans." But he gets free (wait for this, it comes a few minutes in) by using his pointer finger. I was enchanted.

A preview of Radiolab's live show Apocalyptical: dinosaurs, death, destruction... plus cinematic live scoring and comedic mayhem from Reggie Watts and Kurt Braunohler. Feast your eyes on more video -- including a cut of the full show! -- at radiolab.org/live.

Whatever your feelings on Disco, it's hard not to root for the resurgence of one particular track that started taking CPR classes by storm. Producer Ellen Horne explains how one aptly named 70s mega-hit could help you save someone's life.

Then, Jad and Robert pit physics against an ancient tale. ...

There are few musical moments more well-worn than the first four notes of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. But it turns out that Beethoven might have made a last-ditch effort to keep his music from ever feeling familiar, to keep pushing his listeners to a kind of psychological limit.

In this short, we go looking for the devil, and find ourselves tangled in a web of details surrounding one of the most haunting figures in music -- a legendary guitarist whose shadowy life spawned a legend so powerful, it's still being repeated... even by fans who don't believe a ...

A quick dispatch from the road. Glenn Kotche and Darin Gray are on tour with us and they're insane. They make up the band On Fillmore, and Glenn also plays with Wilco. Each night, during the show, they create excellent noises to go along with our stories. Just ...

In this short, Jad puts on his music hat and shares his love of Dawn of Midi, a band that he recently started using on the show.

Blood soaked music made especially for Radiolab....