Best Garrison Keillor Podcasts (2024)

1
A round table in St. Paul 7:18

2h ago7:18

7:18

It’s an amazing feat, turning the party of rectitude and personal liberty into a unified body of citizens totally devoted to one man, obedient to his self-absorption. He is down on the country, has never praised his wife or intentionally said anything funny, has never hugged a small child in public. But it was so good of these young people to give …

1
A Conversation With Garrison Keillor 43:18

9d ago43:18

43:18

Garrison Keillor spent 42 years as the host of “A Prairie Home Companion, a folksy show that was performed live on Saturday nights and broadcast on hundreds of public radio stations. Keillor, who likes to wear red sneakers, brought his audience news from Lake Wobegon, a fictional town in the state of Minnesota where he grew up. He also performed in…

1
Don't name a library after me, please, I'm still writing 7:45

6d ago7:45

7:45

George Latimer, the chatty New York lawyer who moved to St. Paul in the 1960s and went on to rejuvenate and transform the capital city in 13-1/2 years as its charismatic and visionary mayor. Latimer died on Aug. 18 at 89. This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit garrisonke…

1
Open the doors, let the young mingle among the treasures 8:09

6d ago8:09

8:09

Some of these kids at the Met will wind up in law school and get a serious education in civil procedure and come away with due respect for our system of justice: trial by a jury of one’s peers, the rules of evidence, witnesses testifying under oath aware of the penalty for perjury. The lawyers defending the Famous Man were so taught and they stand …

1
How I survived the solar flares 7:04

11d ago7:04

7:04

We live in an Age of Disgruntlement and when I dine with grumpy people, I listen to their gripes and when they stop to take a breath I talk about the great progress made in my lifetime, which of course irks them no end. For one thing, the cash card. We used to go into the bank and hand a check for cash to Mildred the teller with her pert hairstyle …

1
A Conversation With Don Lemon 40:06

15d ago40:06

40:06

He worked for CNN for 17 years. One day last year Don Lemon woke up to find out he he’d been fired. He’d won Emmys for his reporting and also hosted Don Lemon Tonight where he talked about controversial topics with politicians and newsmakers. It was after Lemon began co-hosting a morning show that he ran into trouble. He made a comment about a form…

1
The beautiful winding road 7:42

18d ago7:42

7:42

This is one of the happiest summers of my very long life. My wife installed WhatsApp on my phone and it dings and I pick up and she talks to me from the wine country of Portugal where she’s hiking with her brother and his wife, on their way to a baptism and pig roast. Sometimes my daughter comes on and says, “Make me laugh,” so I tell her about the…

1
Standing on the sidewalk shaking hands 7:23

28d ago7:23

7:23

What remains powerful is love. My parents loved each other dearly and I witnessed this and it remains large in my life. When I was six, I was a slow reader — when you’ve grown up trying to read Hezekiah and Jeremiah, it does crimp your style — and my teacher Estelle Shaver noticed and kept me after school to read aloud to her from Dick and Jane. Wh…

1
A Conversation With Stan Milford Jr. 35:27

29d ago35:27

35:27

Stan Milford is a Navajo Ranger who spent more than a decade investigating paranormal activities. Milford says he examined hauntings, witchcraft and skinwalkers. He also looked into reports involving dozens of witnesses who claim to have seen a creature known as Bigfoot on the Navajo reservation, an area of 27,000 miles that runs through 4 states. …

1
Looking ahead down the road 7:25

1M ago7:25

7:25

History is a complicated business. There are high plateaus and also a good deal of swamp. The Little Bighorn battlefield in Montana was preserved in honor of General Custer who there gave his life along with his men of the Seventh Cavalry, a sacrifice that no longer strikes anybody as noble. What is the good of preserving an enormous site of milita…

1
It's never too late to learn 7:30

1M ago7:30

7:30

like hamburgers. I went into a McDonald’s the other day and ordered a Double Quarter Pounder and thought it was good. At McDonald’s you do not have the carcass of the cow on a spit by the drive-up window, the eyes glazed, the tail hanging down, and the workers don’t gouge the meat from the cow’s rib cage. The hamburger is handed to you wrapped in p…

1
A Conversation With David Rohde 41:59

1M ago41:59

41:59

David Rohde is a National Security reporter for NBC News and a longtime foreign correspondent. He won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting on the war in Bosnia. When Rohde was a reporter for the New York Times, he was kidnapped by the Taliban and held for 7 months before he managed to escape. Rohde's latest book is called Where Tyranny Begins. He loo…

1
A perfect summer night in Manhattan 7:33

2M ago7:33

7:33

I was brought up by Midwestern stoics who drummed the lesson into us: Don’t think you’re somebody because you’re not. You’re not so smart as you think. You’re the same as everybody else. So buckle down and get your work done and don’t fall behind. So I turned into a hard worker. But sitting on this terrace at night with my daughter, and then my wif…

1
What an awesome August! 7:16

2M ago7:16

7:16

Thank goodness the Americans won men’s basketball over the French. It’s our game, Americans invented it. To lose would be like English Sauvignon Blanc beating out French. Some English wines have beaten out French in blind tests but who says vision-impaired persons are experts on wine?My event is the old man’s 90-minute stand-up storytelling with so…

1
A Conversation with Griffin Dunne. 49:21

2M ago49:21

49:21

Griffin Dunne grew up in Beverly Hills in a family of storytellers. His father Dominick was a celebrity journalist. His uncle, the screenwriter John Gregory Dunne was married to the Pulitzer prize-winning writer Joan Didion. Griffin starred in Martin Scorsese’s 1985 black comedy "After Hours" and he made a movie with Madonna called "Who’s That Girl…

1
Friendship is what it's all about 7:41

2M ago7:41

7:41

I spent a couple hours on the phone the other night with a man I haven’t seen since high school, he in Northern California, I in New York City, two old men recalling our youth in Minnesota. I love the telephone; it can be so intimate — like radio, which is the business I was in for years — the voice carries so much humanity, even the silences speak…

1
Mature man available for speaking, easy terms 6:44

2M ago6:44

6:44

I don’t require luxury accommodations. I’m fine with economy hotels. I prefer not to be put up in the home of a family with small children. A Holiday Inn Express is fine; they serve a nice scrambled-egg breakfast buffet. A coffeemaker in the room would be nice and I’d prefer a shower whose Hot and Cold knobs are not directly under the showerhead so…

1
A Conversation With Charles Busch: Re-Release 52:58

2M ago52:58

52:58

Charles Busch made a name for himself as a playwright and a leading lady in drag with productions like the off-Broadway cult classic Vampire Lesbians of Sodom. Busch was recently inducted into the Theater Hall of Fame for his Tony-award winning play The Allergist’s Wife. He appeared in the TV show Oz where he plays a cross-dressing homosexual. When…

1
Waiting at Gate 28 7:34

3M ago7:34

7:34

I don’t talk to many young people — so many of them wear headphones or earbuds and they look stressed out. I’m guessing the music they’re listening to is narcissist pop about Me, Myself and I, my need for more Me time, my exorbitant rent, boring job, bad boss, crowded bike paths, long wait times at climbing walls, the fear of arterial plaque caused…

1
Hard-earned wisdom passed on at no charge 7:52

3M ago7:52

7:52

Mostly I live in a comfortable bubble, enjoying my morning coffee, avoiding bad news that’s beyond my power to affect, bloody wars raging in Ukraine and Gaza, brutal civil wars in Myanmar and Africa, waves of migrants trying to escape violence and poverty — I am mostly oblivious. The Christian missionaries who set out to save souls in Africa and So…

1
A Conversation with Susan Seidelman 43:52

3M ago43:52

43:52

She’s a film director who made a movie called Desperately Seeking Susan. It’s a caper that revolves around mistaken identity starring Rosanna Arquette and a then unknown Madonna. Seidelman went on to direct She Devil with Meryl Streep in her first comedic role. But Hollywood is a tough place for women directors. Nora Ephron came on the scene and di…

1
Man walks out on stage as storm rolls in 7:04

3M ago7:04

7:04

I loved that audience dearly and gave them a good ninety minutes and afterward a distinguished man stopped by to shake hands. Back when, he’d heard me on the radio. I said, “I detect an air of authority about you. You’re the president of something.” He said he was a retired Army major; he’d commanded a tank battalion. “Where?” I said. “Vietnam,” he…

1
The meaning of the freestanding life 7:28

3M ago7:28

7:28

Aging is a beautiful natural process, the wisdom gained, the growing sense of gratitude, the amusement of seeing young people make your same dumb mistakes, but one thing that bothers me is the difficulty of putting on underpants while standing and not leaning against a doorpost. It’s a graceful moment, left leg held high and poked through the hole,…

1
A Conversation With Chelsea Devantez 53:13

3M ago53:13

53:13

Chelsea Devantez is a writer and comedian who has a good time being outrageous. She grew up in a family that moved around a lot when she was a kid. They never had much money. She was a victim of domestic violence. Chelsea had always wanted to be an artist. And her dream came true when she was hired to perform as part of the improv team at Second Ci…

1
A Letter from Greenville, S.C. 6:43

3M ago6:43

6:43

I spent last week gadding about the Carolinas doing shows and enjoying the South, eating eggs and grits and hearing the waitress say, “Can I get you more coffee, darling?” and encountering Republicans, a tribe rarer than Mohicans on the West Side of Manhattan where I live. I miss them. My uncles tended Republican, believing in personal responsibili…

1
A morning walk along Columbus Avenue 7:27

4M ago7:27

7:27

Now I’m an old man, in no rush, keeping an eye out for curbs and crevices and treacherous slabs of sidewalk, hoping not to make a spectacle of myself, knowing that in New York I am surrounded by writers, real or imagined, who would find the crash of a tall elderly author rather satisfying. Once I was swift afoot and long astride, and now I amble al…

1
A Conversation With Chuck D 44:24

4M ago44:24

44:24

I started to think a lot about music when I knew I’d be talking to Chuck D, the rapper and frontman of Public Enemy. Some critics point to the group as a revolutionary voice in hip hop. Chuck D and Flavor Flav formed Public Enemy in 1985. Their songs became known for political messages on albums like Fear of a Black Planet. But in the decades since…

1
A lucky man admits to happiness, and why not? 7:30

4M ago7:30

7:30

Ask a Midwesterner, “How are you?” and we tend to say, “Not bad” or “It could be worse,” feeling it’d sound glib or boastful to say, “Delighted,” and we men in particular tend to adopt an easygoing grumpiness as suitable for all occasions, but I think it’s bad luck not to acknowledge that I am very fortunate to have added my tongue to the other 999…

1
Spring is here, time to get to know each other 7:48

4M ago7:48

7:48

Myself, I have a bias in favor of public education because that was my experience. I came from very exclusive fundamentalist evangelicals who looked down on Methodists and Lutherans as Scripturally off-base, so when I left home and walked into public school, I found myself among — O my gosh! — Catholic kids, boys who took the Lord’s name in vain an…

1
A Conversation With Nick Kristof 41:41

4M ago41:41

41:41

Ever since he was a kid, Nick Kristof dreamed of being a foreign correspondent. And that’s what he spent decades doing, traveling to more than 150 countries to cover conflicts and crises. Kristof is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner for his reports on the deadly Tiananmen Square protests and for columns focusing attention on genocide in Darfur. Kris…

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