A Town Hall feature from April 8, 2000

With guest Chee-Yun and Vince Giordano & the Nighthawks

That Time of Year: A Minnesota Life by Garrison Keillor — click here to purchase

"The title may have been borrowed from Shakespeare, but the content is vintage Keillor — and then some. But it’s also vintage Minnesotan — and then some. The result is a memoir that must have been (mostly) delightful to write and is entirely delightful to read. In fact, it’s a companion of sorts to A Prairie Home Companion. Like the show itself, Mr. Keillor’s recollections occasion many a chuckle and more than an occasional belly laugh.” —The Imaginative Conservative

That Time of Year was recently released in paperback wherever books are sold. With the warmth and humor we’ve come to know, the creator and host of A Prairie Home Companion shares his own remarkable story.

In That Time of Year, Garrison Keillor looks back on his life and recounts how a Brethren boy with writerly ambitions grew up in a small town on the Mississippi in the 1950s and, seeing three good friends die young, turned to comedy and radio. Through a series of unreasonable lucky breaks, he founded A Prairie Home Companion and put himself in line for a good life, including mistakes, regrets, and a few medical adventures. PHC lasted forty years, more than 1,500 shows, and enjoyed the freedom to do as it pleased for three or four million listeners every Saturday at 5 p.m. Central. He got to sing with Emmylou Harris and Renée Fleming and once sang two songs to the U.S. Supreme Court. He played a private eye and a cowboy, gave the news from his hometown, Lake Wobegon, and met Somali cabdrivers who’d learned English from listening to the show. He wrote bestselling novels, won a Grammy and a National Humanities Medal, and made a movie with Robert Altman with an alarming amount of improvisation.

He says, “I was unemployable and managed to invent work for myself that I loved all my life, and on top of that I married well. That’s the secret, work and love. And I chose the right ancestors, impoverished Scots and Yorkshire farmers, good workers. I’m heading for eighty, and I still get up to write before dawn every day.” Here is a video of what Garrison learned from writing his memoir.

Click here to purchase the book from our store. Also available is the audio version of the book read by Garrison which you can purchase here.

This week’s classic show: April 8, 2000 - click to listen

As we look forward to spring, we revisit a show from 2000 from The Town Hall, with classical violinist Chee-Yun and classic swing band Vince Giordano and The Nighthawks. Chee-Yun plays Kreisler, Garrison puts Rich Dworsky through the paces with a script called The Pianist, and Garrison can’t help himself, peppering jokes throughout the show. Join us on Facebook at 5:00 p.m. CT this Saturday. Or if you can’t wait, click this LINK now.

Chee-Yun

Chee-Yun made her first performance at the age of eight, after winning the grand prize in the Korean Times Competition in Seoul. At 13, she moved to the United States to study under renowned teacher Dorothy DeLay at The Juilliard School of Music. Within the year, she had made her Lincoln Center debut in a New York Philharmonic Young People’s Concert, and in 1985, she appeared as a soloist at The Kennedy Center for the Arts and at Carnegie Hall with the New York String Orchestra under Alexander Schneider. In 1993, she returned to Korea to receive the Nan Pa award, that country’s highest musical honor. She continues to perform with some of the world’s foremost conductors and orchestras, as well as in recitals in many major cities around the world.

Vince Giordano

VINCE GIORDANO grew up on Long Island listening to old 78s on his grandmother’s Victrola. He joined the musicians’ union at 14, playing a number of instruments. After high school, he joined the Navy and played in a big band that toured South America playing jazz, rock ’n’ roll, and music indigenous to the countries they visited. He later formed his own band, The Nighthawks, which continues to perform at Birdland and other venues. Also a big-band historian and collector, Giordano has more than 30,000 scores in his collection, most of which were found on cross-country trips spent poking around in musicians’ basements.

Tom Keith

Tom Keith was a legend who could do anything, even last-minute script adjustments and changes. (Note: a Tom Keith sound effects script will be featured on this week’s classic PHC show, so be sure to tune in.) Here is the answer he gave as to what a work week looked like on PHC:

The Academy of Radio Actors, first see the scripts on Friday during our first rehearsal. That's when it is timed for length and I try out my sound effects to hear what works and what doesn't. Garrison knows what I have in my sound effects kit but sometimes I have to come up with something new. If I can't then the script will be adjusted. The next day we will get the scripts again with edits. Sometimes on Saturday we might even get a new script we haven't seen and run through it during rehearsal and then have that edited just before broadcast. You have to be flexible.

Read our full guest interview with Tom Keith. Click here

Sue Scott: Seriously Silly (1 CD) - click here to purchase

A special release from A Prairie Home Companion!

The Royal Academy of Radio Actors presents Sue Scott, Seriously Silly. This CD collection highlights the best of Sue Scott so far, from live broadcasts of A Prairie Home Companion. A vocal talent without compare, at any moment Sue can be garrulous, gracious, sassy, sinful, prim and proper, worldly and wise. Here's Sue as Mom calling her son Duane. As Ruth Harrison, Reference Librarian, with her black belt in biblio-kwon-do. As devastatingly beautiful supermodel Cynthia Maxwell. As private eye Guy Noir's faithful ex-girlfriend, Sugar. As a blond. A bird. Berniece. Radio starlet Lulu Lane, and more. Here's Sue Scott with the rest of the cast in 14 sketches, bits, and send-ups. All seriously silly. One CD containing more than one hour of highlights. Click here to purchase

Special Report from Seriously Silly

Here is a humorous sketch from A Prairie Home Companion around that time featuring a special report from Linda Wertheimer. It's a classic! Here is what she said in our guest interview about the sketch: "Garrison wrote an amazing script for Tim and me. It was technically one of the hardest scripts to do. There were all these sections where we were speaking at the same time and then pausing … and then using our breath to signal each other as to when to start again. It demanded our full attention but was tons of fun to do!"

“She speaks fluent prairie.”—New York Times

A Prairie Home Companion 1974 T-Shirt Click here to purchase

In 2022, we presented A Prairie Home Companion American Revival performances, this artwork was the basis for 5 different designs featured at each show. This collectible T-shirt features one of the earliest wordmarks of A Prairie Home Companion alongside the house that sat on stage for many of the performances of the radio show. It feels as wistful today as it did some 40 years ago. Available in sizes S – XXL. Click here to purchase

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A collection of merchandise curated by Garrison Keillor & staff relating to Garrison Keillor, A Prairie Home Companion and The Writer's Almanac.

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