Join us for this family friendly performance! The creators of the award-winning Circle Round storytelling podcast for kids are here to share stories from their latest picture book, The Great Ball Game. Copies of the book will be available for purchase and signing.
On Sunday, November 20, 2022 at 4:00 p.m., Rebecca Sheir and Eric Shimelonis, host and composer for the award-winning children’s podcast Circle Round, will explain how they came up with the idea for the podcast and how they make the programs. Children are definitely welcome!
Created and produced by parents of young children, WBUR’s Circle Round podcast adapts folktales from around the world into sound- and music-rich radio plays for kids ages 3 to 103. Each episode explores universal themes like friendship, persistence, creativity, and generosity, and ends with an activity that inspires a deeper conversation between children and grown-ups.
Beloved voices from the stage, screen, and podcast/public-radio worlds bring these stories to life with the help of narrator, writer, and veteran public radio host/reporter Rebecca Sheir. Eric Shimelonis, composer for the stage and screen, creates original music for each story.
Circle Round has earned numerous honors, including a Parents’ Choice Gold Award, a Webby nomination, and featured spots at the The UK International Radio Drama Festival and HEAR Now Festival. Circle Round was also the recipient of a major grant from the Henry Luce Foundation.
Rebecca Sheir has brought thousands of stories to life as a public radio reporter and host, appearing on such shows as Morning Edition, All Things Considered, Here & Now, The Splendid Table and Marketplace. She has hosted several weekly news programs, including AK (Alaska Public Radio Network) and Metro Connection (WAMU 88.5), along with podcasts for the Folger Shakespeare Library and Slate Magazine. Rebecca holds an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of Iowa. Her first book, Onions and Garlic, was adapted from a Circle Round episode and published by PJ Library. She is also the author of the Circle Round picture books series, published by Storey Publishing.
Eric Shimelonis is a composer, musician, and audio producer whose work has been heard on stage, screen, and over the airwaves. Audiences have enjoyed his classical compositions at the Juilliard School, the Rattlestick New Music Series, the Kennedy Center, and at a sold-out concert at Carnegie Hall. With more than 300 sound designs in the theater, Eric has won a Helen Hayes Award, and has been nominated for Drama Desk, Lucille Lortel, Big Easy, and Henry Hewes Design Awards. Film highlights include the features International Falls and Winter Passing, for which he performed a duet with Will Ferrell.
Now in its 16th season, the Distinguished Lecture Series is organized and hosted by Dr. Jeremy Yudkin. Dr. Yudkin is a resident of the Berkshires and Professor of Music and Co-Director of the Center for Beethoven Research at Boston University. Every summer at the Lenox Library he presents the pre-concert lectures for the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Tanglewood season.
All programs in the Distinguished Lecture Series are free and open to the public.