In an outstanding international coup, two of LiSTNR’s Australian-produced original podcasts have been nominated for the prestigious global awards show, the New York Festivals Radio Awards.

The new, original audio docu-series from the LiSTNR News team, Secrets We Keep: Shame, Lies & Family, is nominated in two categories – Narrative or Documentary Podcast and Documentary: Social Issues. In addition, the team behind the audio drama Gripped: You Don’t Know Me has been nominated in the Mystery Podcast category.

The New York Festivals Radio Awards has been celebrating world-class storytellers for 68 years, recognising innovation and excellence in broadcast audio content across all genres and platforms globally. The 2024 winners will be announced at the Storytellers Gala virtual ceremony on 16 April, 2024.

Last year, LiSTNR’s The Children in the Pictures won GOLD in the Narrative/Documentary Podcasts category at the same awards, against a shortlist of 30 of the world’s greatest documentary makers including the BBC, ABC in Australia, ESPN, Crooked Media, and Radio Canada.

Listen to these internationally-nominated podcasts here: You Don't Know Me - LiSTNR Podcasts and Secrets We Keep: Shame, Lies & Family - LiSTNR Podcasts.

Secrets We Keep: Shame, Lies & Family is the story of journalist Amelia Oberhardt who thought she knew her mum. That is, until she died. In digging deeper into her family background, Amelia delved into a subject both extraordinary and surprisingly common – the hidden history of secret pregnancies, shotgun marriages and forced adoptions in Australia in the 1960s and 1970s. It is the story of what happens when young women, from just a generation ago, are put in impossible situations, and where this messy knot of secrets leaves families decades later.

Reflecting on the nomination, LiSTNR Head of News and Information, Melanie Withnall, said: “The first season of Secrets We Keep was a deeply personal journey for its host Amelia and a companion podcast for anyone seeking to untangle their own family secrets. We have been amazed by the remarkable response to the series and its content, and it is an honour to receive a double nomination from the New York Festivals Radio Awards.

“The LiSTNR News team worked extraordinarily hard traversing a dark era of 1970s Australia and, knowing the extreme sensitivity of the subject matter, took exceptional care and applied a best practice, trauma-informed approach to tell the stories shared by the women, the adoptees and others affected by this terrible practice.”

Gripped: You Don’t Know Me is a six-part original audio drama podcast series about the mysterious disappearance of a character, Lizzie Burdett. Adapted from a novel by award-winning Australian crime writer Sara Foster, it’s a dark and brooding fictional podcast series set in Sydney’s Northern Beaches, with unseen twists that allow listeners to immerse themselves in the mystery and play ‘armchair detective’. Think Big Little Lies meets Agatha Christie, in a compelling and immersive audio-storytelling format.

LiSTNR Original Podcasts Head of Factual and Drama, Jennifer Goggin was thrilled with the nomination for the innovative series.

“Gripped: You Don’t Know Me is a fast-paced crime-thriller fictional podcast, that gives listeners the voyeuristic excitement of being ‘in’ a live crime-investigation as it unfolds, allowing them to play along and solve the mystery as an ‘armchair detective’. We wanted listeners to escape their surroundings via their headphones and become totally immersed in this fictional world through audio-first storytelling techniques. A lot of passion and hard work went into this series and the LiSTNR Audio Drama production team and I are thrilled to see it nominated for the prestigious New York Festivals Radio Awards,” she said.

About LiSTNR:
LiSTNR is a curated and personalised, free app offering radio, podcasts, music, and news, creating a new audio destination for all Australians. Featuring a fun and intuitive onboarding process, LiSTNR delivers an audio destination that is built for individual listeners’ routines and preferences. Highly personalised, it provides listeners a new world of audio entertainment, with their own daily feed of audio and easy discovery of new content through curated recommendations. Available across a large array of devices including both iOS and Android, CarPlay and Android Auto, Google Assistant and Alexa and Android TV, LiSTNR enables a fantastic listening experience, anytime and anywhere. Open your Ears to a new world of audio – download the free app today. LiSTNR.com