Ari Shapiro was a co-host of NPR's afternoon news show All Things Considered for ten years, until he stepped down from the job a couple of months ago. During that time, there was always another side to him. Shapiro's been performing as a cabaret singer and also with the group Pink Martini for the last fifteen years. Now he's bringing his new solo cabaret show "Thank You for Listening" to the Kuumbwa Jazz Center in Santa Cruz on November 7th. I spoke with Shapiro
recently, and he began by explaining why he left the host chair at All Things Considered after ten years on the job:
"I always thought that ten years was probably the amount of time that I would spend hosting All Things Considered. I have never had any one job at NPR for more than five years, but hosting All Things Considered is such a dream that I could imagine doing it for twice as long as I've done anything else. Ten years. But I knew from the very beginning that I wasn't going to do it forever. It had nothing to do with the state of the news or politics. It just felt like the right time to explore new challenges and new adventures."
Click the audio player at the top of this story to listen to the interview or read the highlights below.
Shapiro on the throughline in his singing and journalism career:
"Whether I'm doing my solo show or whether I'm singing with Pink Martini or even whether I'm doing journalism on NPR, the through line is that they all
involve storytelling. They all involve connecting with an audience. They all involve trying to help people better understand each other and overcome this us them mentality that divides us in social media algorithms, in politics. There are so many powerful forces trying to pull us apart. I feel like the work that I do, whether it is singing or whether it is journalism, is about trying to bring people together."
Shapiro on his new cabaret show "Thank You For Listening":
"Thank You for Listening adapts some of the stories from my bestselling memoir, The Best Strangers in the World, into this fun, moving evening of songs and stories with tunes by everybody from Taylor Swift to Paul Simon to Stephen Sondheim. It kind of takes the audience on a journey. And it's really satisfying for me, having spent so many years having this kind of one-way relationship with listeners where they hear me, but I don't necessarily see or hear them, to be able to have this experience in a room with live people sharing something with a group that will never be together in quite this way ever again. And it really does feel like we go on a journey together. It does feel like a shared experience. And by the end, I feel connected to the people in the room in a way that you just can't get on the radio. I have found that very satisfying and gratifying. And the response from audiences has been really positive too."
Ari Shapiro will be performing in his solo cabaret show "Thank You for Listening," at the Kuumbwa Jazz Center in Santa Cruz on Friday, November
7th.