SUNWISE 2022-2025
SUNWISE was a weekly two-hour radio show encouraging deep listening through entrancing and spacious sets of multi-genre musics with natural sounds in highly developed themes. The braiding river channels of each episode brought wide ranges of music that invoked or praised landscape, nature, place, healing, and introspection. Every episode used the themes to bring the listener (and the host) back into the heart. The constant refrain on SUNWISE was that “music is medicine”, and each episode was an offering to find a way back to a grounded, less distracted, soulful place.
Sunwise (n.): a term derived from Celtic folklore that means to proceed in a prosperous way, in the direction of the sun’s movement (i.e. clockwise in the northern hemisphere).
Versions/Eras
Hopefully this brief guide will help you find some interesting ways to dig in to the archives of SUNWISE. First, there are eras of this show as I had been trying to calibrate to the best way to present my concept. All are interesting and may be indistinguishable to most listeners, but the approach is different, so perhaps it’s worth spelling it out.
- 1.0 – Opening Concept – generally open and spiritual, focusing on North Carolina artists and an occasional interview
- 2.0 – Deep Listening – focused on mostly instrumental pieces with deep listening at its core, music as medicine. Featured a field recording artist.
- 3.0 – “Anthems of the Anthropocene” – a brief detour into trying to feature primarily nature and environmental songs.
- 4.0 – Current – Music as Medicine – this is a deepening of version 2.0. And oh yeh, I like it. How about you?
Rating system
You’ll see in the track lists a rating system of stars as well. This is subjective. Fans who want to be thorough, check ’em all out.
- ⭐: Probably good, but we all have limited time.
- ⭐⭐: Very good. Worth listening to.
- ⭐⭐⭐: Excellent. Highly developed theme. On concept. Lots of heart.
Inner Explorations with Angela & Victor 2020-2022
Launched April 2021, and available on Spotify, Itunes, Pocket Casts, Google Podcasts, etc.
This is a new podcast featuring conversations with legendary yoga teachers Angela Farmer and Victor Van Kooten who teach us to do yoga from the inside out and point us to radically creative and alive ways to inhabit and move in our bodies. These conversations and occasional other special treats are for anyone exploring yoga, embodiment, healing, creativity, or deepening a connection to the natural world. Learn more about host and yoga teacher Blake Tedder at blaketedder.com. Learn more about Angela and Victor at angela-victor.com. Email questions to angelavictorpodcast@gmail.com.
I am excited to get back into “radio” and also talking about yoga and movement. I am happy to announce that I have a new podcast with two yoga “influencers”. No, not Instagram stars or gymnasts. They don’t have Instagram accounts; they’re over 80 years old; they are deeply alive and wild; and teach about tails. My kind of folks!
I consider Angela Farmer and Victor Van Kooten my primary teachers in embodiment and creativity work. And through the magic of technology, all the way from Greece, they have agreed to chat with me on a new podcast called Inner Explorations with Angela Farmer and Victor Van Kooten: A Yoga Podcast.
I am honored to have the opportunity to talk with them anytime but even more so to link their teaching to broader audiences—especially people disaffected by the yoga circus out there right now. What an ego mess. Great photos though and wow, those… endorsements!
Read more about my Yoga and Embodiment background.
Being with The Garden of Earthly Delights
I’d like to share a conversation I had with Victor about 16th century painting “The Garden of Earthly Delights” by Hieronymus Bosch. Where other commentaries on this incredible painting refer to the stunning detail and premonitory themes, Victor approaches the painting largely through the lens of inner transformation. Victor and Blake explore this painting in-depth and touch on the Bosch’s method and style and the more straightforward social commentary on display, but they also chat about what the artist may have been communicating about our internal world and process.
Short Run Shows 2011-2013
Trying out new formats, I had series of short run shows at WCOM.
Diamond Lightship 2013
Diamond Lightship was a beautiful show. Really, the precursor to SUNWISE. This was all about light against the darkness of the times. Positive music, positive messages. Named after the Diamond Lightship posted up over the treacherous Diamond Shoals south of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. Click to see the poster.
Rise and Shine Carrboro 2011
Sean and I had the best intentions. We were clever enough for sure. But a 7am morning talk show — even weekly — is a lot of work. Still, our conversations were about kindness and goodness and whatever was going on in the world in 2012 (the good ol’ days?). Click to see the show banner.
WOW! 2011
WOW! was a sprawling (and quite ridiculous) show that was extravagant in it’s positivity. A whirlwind. I wish I had had support to help me hone the idea and keep it moving. It was a lot of fun, especially the on street interviews and random guests. Click to see the text from the old website.
WOW! >>> Carrboro, NC’s Happy Radio Variety Show!!!
*^*Airs 1-3p EST on WCOM FM 103.5 broadcasting out of Carrboro, NC*^*
WOW! is radio show that is a celebration of the fulness of life. Host Blake “The Piscean/Hanuman Dass/Donkey Hotey” Tedder presents music, poetry, inspirational speeches and readings, and other types of sound media that heal, remind us of our innocence, reveal THE beauty, promote harmony/unity, connect us with natural world, and stimulate wonder. WOW! is a show of celebration, not seeking. WOW! is a show of sharing joy for all things that sound awe-some and open the heart.
WOW! features themed shows that include a seriously wide range of amazing music…whatever else may fit my intention and theme for the present show. Shows are categorized as celebration, inspiration, curiosity, healing, wisdom, with the intention that you could listen to the type of show you need when you need it.
Recurring theme shows:
Healing Our Spirit – shows solely devoted to healing. Teachings and music fromvarious wisdom traditions. World chant,meditations, and music that soothes the soul. These shows are to be absorbed.
The Sounds of Life – shows of field recordings and interviews to help us open up and hear this beautiful life going on around us
Dance Party – you could guess
Recurring segments in each show:
The Bob Marley Song of the Week – visionary/pioneer/avatar? Bob Marley wrote some of the most healing and happy music for the soul – expect to hear an amazing Marley track every week. Thank you Bob, you gave so much!
The Good News Report – one or two stories that inspire and give hope rather than promote fear like our given media
Aesop’s Fables Times – Animals getting in predicaments to give us teachings about life. Storytime? Why not?!
Mad Lib of the Week – a mad lib done by somone I run into on the street. It will be clean.. YES!
Spread – an interactive segment,where I will invite listeners to send in poetry, sound bytes, opinions, shoutouts, etc.
Life is hard. Damn, it’s hard. So painful. Frankly, it is guaranteed that we will lose everything and everybody we’ve ever loved. But, you know, life is also beautiful beyond measure. We must CHERISH the time we have and the beauty at hand. It is time we started loving, enjoying, and taking care ourselves. And that’s the healing.
Tune in each week from 1-3p EST on WCOM FM 103.5 Carrboro/Chapel Hill to celebrate!
Full Lotus Kirtan Show 2009-2012
For four years, I hosted an internationally acclaimed radio show from the studios of WCOM FM in Carrboro, NC. This show featured kirtan – a call and response chanting tradition from India. I amassed a huge collection of kirtan CD’s thanks to the generosity of artists and labels and interviewed dozens of kirtan artists including Krishna Das, Jai Uttal, Wah!, Snatam Kaur, Sean Johnson, David Newman, Deva Premal and Miten, and many others. Often FLKS featured local or touring kirtan groups live in the studio with a host of singers from the community. Thank you everyone for participating, listening, and underwriting this show!
“The Full Lotus Kirtan show is an offering of peace to our hectic world. Kirtan is call and response devotional chanting to the divinity and perfection within us all. It opens our hearts and brings us closer to each other and to the source of all that is. Let this show be a simple reminder to reflect upon the beauty of our world and to express love with a bold and boundless heart.“
FLKS Archive
Note: The links transport you to the Internet Archive. Click Play on the page you are taken to. I need to relisten to these to fill in all the interviewees
Also Note: The intro theme for most of the shows feature an audio sample of an aghori sadhu. This clip was originally included years ago as a humorous caricature of religious extremism. I do not endorse, practice, or promote their rituals, philosophies, or lifestyles. In fact, I think the aghoris are categorically uncool. And, despite his lip service, they do not posses great spiritual powers and think he/they should reexamine their understanding of how it all works. Choose compassion and light — the dark is no way. The clip is preserved here strictly in its original, historical broadcast format.