pages in books featured on Bookworm
voices featured on-air
vinyl records in the music library
members
average weekly broadcast listeners
pies entered in the Pie Contest
best of 2019 lists Lost Notes was featured on
awards won (including 1st, 2nd & 3rd place)
tortillerias in the Tortilla Tournament
Dear Listeners and Friends,
I am thrilled to share KCRW's Annual Report for 2019 with you, a year filled with exciting new developments for the station. In our inaugural year in the KCRW Media Center, we created new local journalism shows, produced higher quality music content, and hosted live events that showcased KCRW's best offerings.
In addition to our signature current affairs programs (Press Play, To The Point, and local news coverage on All Things Considered and Morning Edition), KCRW launched Greater LA. Hosted by veteran newscaster Steve Chiotakis, Greater LA takes listeners into communities throughout LA to provide nuanced reporting on this vast region.
In 2019, Morning Becomes Eclectic hosted the first performance in the state-of-the-art Annenberg Performance Studio featuring artist James Blake. We also said goodbye to long-time MBE host and Music Director Jason Bentley and celebrated his tenure as host with a limited-edition vinyl record. (Don't worry: you can still hear Jason on his show Metropolis on Saturday evenings!)
The most exciting part of our new studios is our ability to invite the community into our new home. We hosted Summer Nights Concerts at the new HQ, a community panel on wildfires and climate change, collaborations with NPR, and a live tie-in to our award-winning podcast Lost Notes. We also celebrated the 10th anniversary of the KCRW Good Food Pie Contest and the 20th Anniversary of the World Festival at the Hollywood Bowl.
Our listener and community partners are essential to making KCRW’s mission a reality. Santa Monica College remains an extraordinary partner in providing us with the operational and logistic support so that we can continue to grow and adapt to our community’s needs.
I hope you will explore this report and delve into some of the work over the past year. I feel proud of all that we accomplished, and I hope that you are, too, as none of this is possible without your steadfast support.
Sincerely,
Jennifer Ferro
President
To the KCRW Community,
I am pleased to introduce myself as KCRW Foundation's Board Chair as of December 2019. I first joined the Board in 2012 (and have been an avid KCRW listener for years before that). I'm a transactional partner at the Los Angeles office of Kirkland & Ellis LLP. While I'm deeply proud of my accomplishments in my corporate and securities law practice, serving my community as Board Chair of KCRW Foundation is among the most meaningful roles I've held.
I, along with the rest of the Board Members, am dedicated to ensuring that KCRW thrives for decades to come through strategic planning, responsible stewardship, working with phenomenal partners like Santa Monica College, and advocating on behalf of KCRW in our workplaces and our communities. Through building diverse sources of funding, finding the best talent available, and preserving what is special about KCRW, we help KCRW be an organization that responds quickly to our listeners' and community's needs.
The KCRW Foundation Board of Directors is only able to successfully champion KCRW in the community because of your continued support. Your donations, participation at events (virtual and otherwise), and all-around enthusiasm ensure that the world knows that KCRW is a force of nature in the public media world and an essential Southern California institution. As you review this Annual Report, please know that none of what KCRW does would be possible without your support.
I'm excited to lead KCRW's Board in this next chapter in our more than 40-year history as a nonprofit organization. On behalf of all of us on the Board of Directors, I thank each of you for your commitment to and passion for KCRW.
Sincerely,
Monica Shilling
Greater LA, which premiered April 2019, is a daily 30-minute local affairs program that creates an immersive experience for listeners through the use of field-recorded sound. Hosted by veteran reporter and host Steve Chiotakis, Greater LA’s closely-reported stories across the neighborhoods of Los Angeles explore topics through the lens of our local communities
Terminal Island: Where cars go to die
"They throw away your food. My god, we’re homeless people"
Meet the LA Football Club’s biggest fans
Press Play with Madeleine Brand featured ongoing coverage of California’s climate-related natural disasters such as the Woolsey Fire, the January 2019 LAUSD teachers’ strike, and the beginnings of the 2020 Presidential Elections.
In 2019, Left, Right & Center, one of KCRW’s most popular shows, began producing a weekly spin-off: LRC Presents: All the President’s Lawyers, which covers the intersection of law, libel, litigation, and the White House.
Host Warren Olney draws on his decades of experience to explore the people and issues shaping–and disrupting–our world, with a special emphasis on the climate crisis.
Hosted by Evan Kleiman, highlights of Good Food in 2019 included a tribute episode to Anthony Bourdain, a deep dive into SoCal’s Filipino food culture, and how consumers’ food choices can reduce their carbon footprint.
Bookworm’s Michael Silverblatt interviews both legendary and up-and-coming authors from diverse genres, backgrounds, and identities.
Highlights of Elvis Mitchell’s in-depth interview series The Treatment included conversations with Spike Lee (BlacKkKlansman), John Krasinski (A Quiet Place), and Regina Hall (Support the Girls).
Season 2 of Lost Notes, KCRW’s music documentary podcast, received universal acclaim, was ranked the #1 podcast of 2019 by Vulture, and made it on multiple publications’ “Best of 2019” lists.
The inaugural series Bodies is an intimate, highly-produced documentary podcast series that focuses on women’s health issues, one person’s journey at a time.
Nocturne, which explores slices of life from the dusty corners of the night, was selected by The Guardian as a Producer’s Pick for its blended form of storytelling that “strikes a beautiful balance between audio documentary and sound art.”
KCRW’s climate change coverage relies on a “solutions journalism” approach that shifts our focus from not just covering the climate change emergency but also citing potential solutions that our listeners, community leaders, and government officials can employ to make a difference.
Fighting climate change in our daily lives
What will it take you to give up the car?
Santa Barbara's dump is nearly full. What next?
KCRW’s music programming aims to highlight the best music ranging from the newest, cutting edge releases to classics in a wide variety of genres. Led by our flagship Morning Becomes Eclectic and also featuring DJ-hosted programs on weeknights and weekends, our music programming is an essential component of our mission to serve the whole person.
In the four decades of Morning Becomes Eclectic, listeners have heard countless sessions broadcast live from our humble basement studios. On Tuesday, May 21, we began a new chapter with our first MBE broadcast from our new home with a performance by James Blake in the state-of-the-art Annenberg Performance Studio.
To celebrate Jason Bentley’s tenure as host of Morning Becomes Eclectic, KCRW produced a limited-edition 2LP vinyl record featuring tracks from Jason’s favorite live sessions. The first run of 1000 records sold out in less than a month.
On August 31st, Jason Bentley aired his final program as host of Morning Becomes Eclectic, completing his tenure of over ten years. While Jason no longer hosts Morning Becomes Eclectic, you can still hear his show, Metropolis, on Saturday evenings.
KCRW events are an essential part of KCRW’s programming and enable us to bring our award-winning programming to communities throughout Southern California as well as invite listeners into our new home at the KCRW Media Center.
KCRW events are an essential part of KCRW’s programming and enable us to bring our award-winning programming to communities throughout Southern California as well as invite listeners into our new home at the KCRW Media Center.
KCRW’s partnership with the LA Philharmonic, The KCRW World Festival, returned for its 20th season and featured artists ranging from Natalia Lafourcade to Gary Clark, Jr. and Chromeo.
The KCRW Good Food Pie Contest celebrated its tenth anniversary and featured 500 pie entries and 6,000 attendees.
In September 2018, KCRW launched the Gustavo & KCRW’s Great Tortilla Tournament, a competition dedicated to celebrating an essential component of Latinx cuisine and finding the single-best tortilla in Los Angeles.
With our increased capacity supported by the KCRW Media Center and the Annenberg Performance Studio, KCRW was able to expand our event offerings to bring the community in for live event tie ins to some of our most popular programs including Press Play, Lost Notes, and two events co-produced with NPR West.
