Faith Salie

Author, journalist, and contributor to NPR's 'Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me' Faith Salie discusses her new one-woman show, 'Approval Junkie.'

How gendered messaging affects kids and why we need to raise boys to be more empathetic. 

Are you an approval junkie? 

In this second installment of our musical mysteries series, Soundcheck contributor Faith Salie attempts to discern rap from hip hop. She talks with Duke University professor Mark Anthony Neal about the difference between the two terms -- which, as it turns out, is fairly complex. 

"When we talk about hip hop, we're talking about a larger cultural experience," says Neal. "Rap music is part of that larger aspect of hip hop culture, but it's also the part of the culture that's perhaps most visible and most well known to the average person."

Salie and Neal discuss the origins of the terms and how they've evolved over time. And, Neal tells us which categories artists like Will Smith, KRS-One, Nas and Eminem fall into. 

How do you define the terms "rap" and "hip hop"? Leave a comment below. 

Inspired by contributor Faith Salie's discovery about the music she listened to as a child, we ask our listeners to call up their folks to find out how they chose music they grew up w...

Contributor Faith Salie volunteers to get to the bottom of your unanswered musical questions. Such as: Why do accents seem to disappear in song?  We hear from three experts: Bill Bee...

Contributor Faith Salie finds out the truth about the music she listened to as a kid.

Recently, our regular contributor Faith Salie took to the Soundcheck blog to air her grievances about bad grammar in music. From Paula Cole to Eric Clapton to Leonard Cohen, it turns out that musicians can be rather careless when it comes to grammatical rules and their song lyrics. We talk with Faith, as well as Mignon Fogerty -- founder of the Grammar Girl website and podcast -- about examples of poor grammar in music. Plus, our listeners chime in with their favorite... er, least favorite... examples as well. 

We each have songs that, to our particular ear, sound like nails on a chalkboard. And some songs should be deconstructed on a chalkboard…for bad grammar. I’m not talking about slang, colloquialisms, or innovative language. I’m not being punctilious about making sure you don’t end a lyric line with a preposition. In fact, the first dance song at my wedding reception was “You’d Be So Nice To Come Home To.” I think it would have lost a little something if it were “To You It’d Be So Nice To Come Home.” Nobody wants to sound sort of like Yoda.

What I’m talking about is crappy syntax. Artistic license is one thing, language mangling is another. Bad grammar is jarring; it takes me out of the flow of the song.

Here’s how I define unnecessarily bad grammar in a song: when it wouldn’t change the rhyme scheme to use the correct word or when the syntax results from being lyrically lazy.

Like this, from the Paula Cole song “I Don’t Wanna Wait”:

"So open up your morning light / And say a little prayer for I"

That lyric makes me say a prayer for the objective case.

"I honestly don’t remember watching Saturday morning cartoons when I was kid," Faith Salie says, "but I do remember Schoolhouse Rock. Conduct a poll of 35-45 year-olds, and I guarante...

With Schoolhouse Rock turning 40 this month, Soundcheck contributor reflects on the lasting impact and charm of the beloved children's cartoon. Have you used lessons learned from Scho...

Has this ever happened to you? Things are going great in a relationship. And then, you find out that your significant other loves music that you hate. Or doesn't understand your taste...

Have you ever heard music that your significant other loved but you hated? Or that they couldn't stand, but meant something to you? Tell us your musical "red flags" that may send up a...

contributor Faith Salie joins us to share her own feelings about creepy holiday classics that deserve a perhaps more scrutinous listen.

Part two of our three-part series on "Free to Be... You and Me" looks at the album's gender-neutral messaging and its limitations.

 

Songs that mention you by name have a funny way of sticking around. Contributor Faith Salie talks about songs that mention her by name (actually, by noun) -- plus, we hear from the pe...

Over the next few weeks, Soundcheck is looking for our first Musician In Chief. Special guests nominate musicians and make a case for why that artist should become commander in chief. So far, Keith Richards and Patti Smith have been nominated. Today, we turn to CBS Sunday Morning contributor Faith Salie for her pick, Dolly Parton.

START THE CONVERSATION: Who do you think should become the first "Musician In Chief"? Fill out THIS questionnaire into our comments section, or email your response to soundcheck@wnyc.org

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Soundcheck bullpen contributor Faith Salie recounts her time as a singing mutant on Star Trek.