WGBH is abuzz on this cool fall day as engineers adjust microphones and tweak control knobs for a live broadcast of The Walden Chamber Players—one of 150 such broadcasts WGBH delivers to a local and worldwide community every year, now from the expansive state-of-the-art Fraser Performance Studio in WGBH's new Brighton home.
Orchestrating it all is Alan McLellan (right foreground), producer of live classical broadcasts for WGBH Radio's Classics in the Morning and Classical Performances. "Today, I'm the voice in host Cathy Fuller's ear," he quips. "I'll remind her of questions to ask, gigs to cite, and how much air-time remains."
For McLellan, it's always transcendent. "Live music is qualitatively different from the perfect studio-recorded cuts you hear on CDs. Whether it's a Renaissance ensemble or a solo violinist," he says, "there's a special energy between performing artists and the audience that's electric."
And now, WGBH is giving listeners more ways than ever to catch the excitement, including All-Classical WGBH, a 24/7 HD broadcast (89.7 HD2) and online stream, and Classical To Go! podcasts.
At a Brighton senior center event WGBH co-sponsored with UMass Boston, local World War II veterans—galvanized by Ken Burns's The War—scanned family photos, letters, and personal stories onto a Web database to create a permanent archive about our heritage. The gathering was one of dozens of WGBH local outreach efforts aimed at amplifying the impact of our broadcasts on our community.
Promoting science and science education are part of New England's, and WGBH's, DNA. 
This year, WGBH collaborated with the MIT Museum and other local institutions on the Cambridge Science Festival. On screen, WGBH's Science City Summit examined Cambridge's regional impact on technology and science; off screen, a WGBH team engaged 800 kids in hands-on experiments derived from WGBH's children's science series Design Squad and Fetch! with Ruff Ruffman.
A Lexington retiree, an Amherst grad student, and a young Somerville mother—all distanced from the local lecture circuit by age, geography, or circumstance—aren't missing out: They're downloading podcasts from WGBH's Forum Network. The online, on-demand compendium of free public lectures from leading area cultural and academic institutions helps curious minds everywhere continue journeys that WGBH programs begin.
In its four-decade history, WGBH's Basic Black, the longest-running program on public television focusing on the interests of people of color, has never retreated from tackling tough issues. Writer Kim McLarin is continuing the tradition by 
interviewing contemporary authors like John McWhorter (Authentically Black) and Cora Daniels (Ghettonation: A Journey into the Land of Bling), whose commentaries on race, ethnicity, and culture have drawn heat and praise. An Emerson College writer-in-residence, McLarin hosts an energized Basic Black schedule of provocative conversations, along with topical roundtable discussions, "to help new audiences explore the contemporary African American experience."
