🌜Sad to Say Goodnight to Short Cuts✨
Good night and joy be with you all.
Earlier this year the BBC made the upsetting decision to cancel Short Cuts, the beloved program hosted by Josie Long that allowed us to escape into beautifully made bite-sized audio pieces. It’s a decision that makes finding this kind of storytelling even harder than it already was. Short Cuts is one of those shows that went straight to the top of my queue every time I saw it, it was always a special treat I never felt I deserved. It will be strange to not see it in my feed.
The last episode came out today, and to hold a little candle I asked a few people to share with me an episode that they remember fondly. Listen to them again or for the first time. Share your favorites in the comments. Thanks, Short Cuts. I hope to meet again.
xoxo
Lauren
Episode: “Elders” (Sept 21, 2021)
by Jasmin Bauomy, creator of Little Devils & THE ECCO
I get a first taste of this, one of my favorite pieces ever, in Josie’s intro to the episode “Elders”. The breathing I hear immediately takes me into the story and together with the person who’s breathing, it feels like my heart takes a leap.. that small leap children take before they jump on something.
And then, I hear Eileen Kramer, 103 years old at the time of the interview, and possibly one of the oldest dancers in the world. Her voice is captivating, as she says “I’ve been alive for a long time.” It carries her life's marks: from that first scream as a newborn, through every laughter, heartbreak, pain, every glass of wine, every sigh, every word uttered.
“I like gathering up space or pushing it away”, she says while the music comes in and it, too, starts taking up space and pushing it away. Add to this the sound of breathing and the three elements — music, voice, and breath — start forming a choreography of story, precariously holding and balancing each other.
This piece showcases what the folks behind Short Cuts do best. I would say there’s magic in the sound waves, but that would be unfair to the artful craft that went into this. This takes skills: the skill not just to interview but to know which words hold the most meaning. On a conceptual level, crafting a choreography of sound, where words, breath and music get to dance with each other… is so smart and intuitive.
Eileen Stellar Kramer died in November 2024. She was 110.
But just like Eileen, this piece never gets old. She’s forever memorialized with her soul dancing between the 0s and the 1s of the digitized soundwaves in my ears.
Episode: “Self-Portrait” (Aug 27, 2019)
by Jazmine (JT) Green, Molten Heart
This episode, which featured “How To Remember” by Axel Kacoutié, felt like a calling card to the type of audio I always want to make. Personal, engaging, immersive. Short Cuts has been near and dear to my practice and my growth as an art maker. Without this program, I would not have met many of the collaborators I now call friends, nor would I have been exposed to the global tapestry of audio alchemists and sculptors. This show has been a staple of my regular listening, and to lose it is like having a precious node suddenly switched off, phantom-searching for a home frequency.
Episode: “Postcards” (May 16, 2017)
by Vaida Pilibaitytė, audio documentary producer, Vilnius, Lithuania
I remember vividly where and when I listened to Short Cuts for the first time. It was 2017. I was on a bus from Munich to Vienna. Series 12, ‘Postcards’, ‘A Very Different Time’ by Phil Smith.
Something clicked in my head and in my heart: this moment when you realize an entirely different kind of sonic world is possible, a world where I felt most at home. It moved me, inspired me, and took me to places where I kept chasing that special feeling – I attended audio festivals, organized our own radio cinema sessions, went to sound design workshops, and met most amazing people who share similar affection to all things audio.
Little did I know, that fast forward five years and 20 series, I will be right there, in one of the Short Cuts, with my short story from the Lithuanian woods.
I am most in awe and full of gratitude to have been a small part of this series, and for a chance to work with Eleanor McDowall, the most supportive, enthusiastic editor I ever had.
Saying 'we will miss this' does not even begin to describe the emotion of having to say goodbye to Short Cuts.
Thank you for endless inspiration over the years: to imagine new sonic worlds, to try new things, to keep looking for your own voice, and for new audio friendships that were born through this journey.
I know I will be revisiting their back catalogue each time my creativity is in desperate need of a treatment, or when teaching a class on audio documentary. And I will be forever grateful it exists.
Episode: “Acts Of Love” (Feb 16, 2021)
by Phoebe McIndoe
I revisit Short Cuts episodes like sermons, depending on the mood or time, there is always something relevant. Today I'm revisiting Phil Smith's Acts Of Love.
Josie introduces the piece with a quote Phil has been turning over: "Grief is a way of loving what has slipped from view. Love is a way of grieving that which is not yet done so". And then we are pulled into a childhood memory with Anita Barrows: a moment where she witnesses a tree she loves being cut down. I came home to the “truck, the men, the buzz of the saw…my perfectly angled branches gone”. Anita rages against, “the men who went on sawing... Too loud the sound of the chainsaw. Not even a word to me. Skinny, inaudible girl in my green plaid skirt”.
Anita remembers thinking that "the single, last act of love I could perform for the tree - I had failed to save - was to stand and witness its dismemberment." She reflects that grieving and bearing witness is, in itself, a way of resisting the never-ending chop and surge. We are forced to stop producing and to feel.
We have all stood collectively and grieved the axing of Short Cuts. Through our grief we have discovered what was important to us, what we love and what needs treasuring. If we stop pouring our love into the BBC, where else could we pour it, and what else could we build towards?
Anita now preserves the memory of the tree through her poetry and through this collaboration with Phil Smith. By witnessing and staying with the pain together, they've created something powerful. The tree lives on, through this piece of short, staggering art, and through our Short Cuts archive. How will we turn our own pain into a powerful moment? What will our collective broadcast of grief sound like?
Short Cuts was the place where I first felt at home. Until then, I had occasionally found some work that spoke the language of my imagination, but Short Cuts gave me a constant appointment, and with each episode it was like opening a gift.
Everything that was broadcast was a cause for reflection, whether it made me shake my head in disbelief, or made me run to look for all the things ever done by a new producer that I just discovered. At the end of each episode, the exchanges with my listening friends began (did you hear the last one? Which one did you like best? It made me angry!).
I still remember when Eleanor asked me if I wanted to be included in the mailing list for producers, to send my pitch. Oh my happiness! Happiness that was renewed every time I threw down another proposal (almost a dozen) and it doesn't matter if I never had anything accepted (always with exquisite kindness and the offer of debriefing) because many of those pitches became pieces that I produced and Short Cuts represented a continuous source of inspiration.
I can't even begin to think of a favorite episode of mine, there are too many, and to weave all the stories, Josie's fantastic voice, with whom I feel I have travelled a piece of the way through the details of her private life that occasionally shone through.
The world continues without Short Cuts, certainly, but it's a world a little darker. Fortunately, many of us are finding each other elsewhere, because in the end we have learned to know each other. And if any Short-cutter feels like staying in touch, I'm here, I'm waiting for you.