A Prairie Home Companion

A Prairie Home Companion was a live radio variety show created and hosted by Garrison Keillor. The show ran on Saturdays from 5 to 7 pm Central Time. It was usually broadcast from the Fitzgerald Theater in Saint Paul, Minnesota. The program was also taken on the road. A Prairie Home Companion was known for its musical guests, especially folk and traditional musicians. It was also known for its tongue-in-cheek humor and Keillor's storytelling segment, "News from Lake Wobegon".

The radio program inspired a 2006 film of the same name, written by Keillor, directed by Robert Altman, and featuring Keillor, Lily Tomlin, Meryl Streep, Lindsay Lohan, Tommy Lee Jones, Kevin Kline, John C. Reilly, and Woody Harrelson.

 History 
A Prairie Home Companion started as a morning show, running from 6 to 9 am on Minnesota Public Radio.Biographical Dictionary of Radio, ed. Christopher H. Sterling (New York; Oxford: Routledge, 2011), p. 209 The first program aired on 6 July 1974 before an audience of 12 people.U.S. Congress, Congressional Record, Vol. 146, Pt. 3 (March 21, 2000 to April 4, 2000), p. 3347 The idea for the name came from a cemetery in Moorhead, Minnesota called the Prairie Home. It was located across the street from the radio station.Noah Adams, et al., This Is NPR: The First Forty Years (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2010), p. 74

In April 1974, Keillor travelled to Nashville. This was the last broadcast of the Grand Ole Opry from the old Ryman Auditorium and Keillor was doing a story for The New Yorker Magazine. He decided to host a variety show based on that format on the radio. On July 6, 1974, the first live broadcast of A Prairie Home Companion took place.

In 1978, the show moved into the World Theater in Saint Paul, Minnesota. In 1987, he decided to move to Denmark with his new wife.Loyal Jones, Country Music Humorists and Comedians (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2008), pp. 229–30 He then moved to New York City. In 1989 he began a new show "The American Radio Company of the Air." The format was the same, but the program was geared to the New York audience. But after four seasons he moved back to Minnesota and brought back the Prairie Home Companion.

In 1985, the program was taped for audiences in Australia and Sweden. In 1990 digital tapes were rebroadcast in Tiwan. By 1995 the program was rebroadcast in numerous countries via satellite.

 Program 

Music was a main feature of the program. It included many different kinds of music, including country, bluegrass, blues, and gospel. The program also has guest performers from a wide variety of other styles of music, including classical, opera and music from a number of different countries.

News from Lake Wobegon

One of the show's best-known features was Keillor's "News from Lake Wobegon". This was a weekly storytelling monologue, claiming to be a report from Keillor's fictitious hometown of Lake Wobegon.Judith Yaross Lee, Twain's Brand: Humor in Contemporary American Culture (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2012), p. 46 The segment always began with "It's been a quiet week in Lake Woebegone, my hometown."A Place Called Home: Writings on the Midwestern Small Town, eds. Richard O. Davies; David R. Pichaske; Joseph Anthony Amato (St. Paul, MN: Borealis Books, 2003), p. 349 It almost always ended with "And that's the news from Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average."

Sponsors

Because the program is aired on public broadcasting radio, they are not allowed to have real advertisements. Instead, the show produced fictional advertisements for fictional products. The ads were performed in the style of live old-time radio commercials. The show was "sponsored" by fictitious products including "Powdermilk Biscuits", "Cafe Boeuf" and the "American Duct Tape Council".James Kaplan, 'A Garrison Keillor Fan is Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful... Is this New York?', The New Yorker Magazine, Vol. 28, No. 1 (2 January 1995), p. 54

The program celebrated its 40th year in 2014.

 Notes 

 References 

 Other websites 
 A Prairie Home Companion, American Public Media
 A Prairie Home Companion, SoundCloud 

Category:Radio programs