The piece practically works as a radio play. You could listen to it again and again, now or a year from now. Actually, that’s the goal: Abumrad has often said that he edits with the fourth or fifth listen in mind.

I asked Abumrad what a traditional radio producer would make of his meticulously constructed bruup bruup fhewm fhewm . “They would say it’s insane,” he said. Early on, he had to deal with “radio people” who thought he was wasting time on “artsy-fartsy namby-pampy” technical distractions. “But do you want to know why ‘Radiolab’ has worked beyond... See more