“This American Life” Host Ira Glass To Speak At UB

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Ira Glass, idiosyncratic host and producer of the nationally syndicated radio show "This American Life," will present a program titled "Lies, Sissies and Fiascoes: Notes on Making a New Kind of Radio" at 8 p.m. Oct. 25 at the University at Buffalo.

The lecture, a presentation of the UB Center for the Arts (CFA), will be held in the Mainstage theater in the CFA on the UB North (Amherst) Campus.

It will be sponsored by Just Buffalo Literary Center and WBFO 88.7 FM, the National Public Radio affiliate operated by UB.

Tickets are $15 for general admission and $8 for students and can be purchased at the CFA box office (645-ARTS) and TicketMaster locations (852-5000).

Glass will discuss and illustrate some of his familiar approaches to sound and storytelling on "This American Life," heard from 7-8 p.m. Fridays on WBFO 88.7 FM. His insatiable curiosity and creativity have been said to demonstrate radio's potential as a technology more profound than television.

"This American Life," produced by WBEZ in Chicago and Public Radio International, is one of public radio's fastest-growing programs, drawing more than half a million listeners weekly on 324 stations.

Each week, Glass explores a theme -- Frank Sinatra, Canadians, conventions, Niagara Falls, the job that takes over your life -- through a playful mix of radio monologues, mini-documentaries, found tape and unusual music. He consistently delivers engaging, intimate, surprising, funny, disturbing, bittersweet accounts.

"I'm trying to make perfect moments," Glass told The New York Times Magazine. "And those generate meaning. If you go deep enough in how to make a moment, very

quickly you come to how narrative works -- to what we are as a species, how we've come up with telling stories in scenes and images."

A graduate of Brown University, Glass began his public-radio career as an intern at National Public Radio's Washington headquarters. He worked on nearly every NPR network news program and did nearly every production job for NPR news before launching "This American Life."