
Insights from recent episode analysis
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Insights are generated by CastFox AI using publicly available data, episode content, and proprietary models.
Total monthly reach
Estimated from 1 chart position in 1 market.
By chart position
- 🇺🇸US · Music History#1695K to 30K
- Per-Episode Audience
Est. listeners per new episode within ~30 days
2.5K to 15K🎙 Weekly cadence·13 episodes·Last published 1w ago - Monthly Reach
Unique listeners across all episodes (30 days)
5K to 30K🇺🇸100% - Active Followers
Loyal subscribers who consistently listen
2K to 12K
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* Data sourced directly from platform APIs and aggregated hourly across all major podcast directories.
On the show
Recent episodes
INVASION OF THE LUTES!
May 6, 2026
Unknown duration
The Lute of Har-Mose
Feb 17, 2026
Unknown duration
Ur U Experienced?
Feb 3, 2026
Unknown duration
Where Does Guitar Come From?
Dec 12, 2025
Unknown duration
Sinners: People & Vampires & their Guitars
Dec 2, 2025
Unknown duration
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| Date | Episode | Description | Length | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5/6/26 | ![]() INVASION OF THE LUTES! | This episode is about Lutes.Not the Lute we know, but the Lutes we call Lutes that aren't the Lute we know, which came before the Lute we know, which is a Lute that led to the guitar...which is also a Lute. The episode spans a couple of thousand years, and thousands of miles, to paint a picture of ancestors of the guitar that were common among many ancient peoples, and which connected the musical cultures of the ancient middle east, the near east, and the far east, via the Silk Roads.There's a little sex, and a pinch of violence, and I had a ridiculous amount of fun making this episode, which is part of the reason it took me so f++king long to produce. Enjoy, and learn something in the process.Support the project here! This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 2/17/26 | ![]() The Lute of Har-Mose | From The Lyres of Ur in episode 10, this episode takes us 1,000 years into the future, and 1,000 miles to the west of Mesopotamia, to ancient Egypt. Once we're there, we'll find a 3,500 year-old musical instrument, played by the in-house musician of the architect and polymath, Sen-en-Mut, who was in the employ of the first female Pharoah, Hat-Shepsut.Sen-en-Mut's favorite musician was named Har-Mose. His instrument was a type of Lute, and it was buried at his side. This accident of history meant that this ancient, delicate instrument, made of wood and animal byproducts, survived the centuries, alongside the stone pyramids and temples of ancient Egypt.The Lute of Har-Mose is the second-oldest extant string musical instrument in the world. The way it was designed, constructed, and played makes it a critical step in the long history of people and their guitars: it's not just a distant cousin of the guitar, it's almost a kind of prototype. It points us directly to the guitar, and the episodes to come, when we'll move through the ancient world and the Middle East, to North Africa and southern Europe, as we continue to follow the trail of the guitar's DNA and the cultures it helped to create.------Click here to support A People's History of the Guitar! Even $4/month, or a one-time contribution, goes a long way. If you want to see where this goes as much as I do, it'll help me build this project, create more episodes, license music, conduct interviews, and reach more people.I'm always interested in direct feedback and ideas, so get in touch at aphotguitar@gmail.com.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 2/3/26 | ![]() Ur U Experienced? | In this episode we uncover the oldest existing examples of the kinds of string instruments that led to the guitar. They're called The Lyres of Ur, they're over 4,000 years old, and they were discovered in the 1930s by someone with the best name ever for a British archaeologist, alongside his extremely interesting wife. Filled with a couple of distractingly curious side-stories, this episode also speculates about how those ancient instruments might have introduced distortion to the sonic palette of string instruments. Trust me, you'll find it to be a fun and interesting way to spend 25 minutes of your life.Click here to support A People's History of the Guitar! Even $5/month, or a one-time contribution, goes a long way. If you want to see where this goes as much as I do, it'll help me build this project, create more episodes, license music, conduct interviews, and reach more people.No paywalls yet, but when exclusive content starts to appear, anyone contributing any amount in 2025 and 2026 (monthly or one-time) will have lifetime access to everything. Thanks for listening and for thinking about supporting A People's History of the Guitar.Get in touch at aphotguitar@gmail.comThis podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 12/12/25 | ![]() Where Does Guitar Come From? | Episode nine about the word guitar. That's not bad grammar, its a question: what is the origin of the word, guitar? It's an odd word with deep roots, and the evolution of the word tracks with the evolution of the instrument itself. Join me for a slightly speculative, and ultimately inconclusive, exploration of one word that might have come from more than one place, because no word comes out of no-where.----Learn about how to support the project here!Check out all previous episodes below. Episodes appear in order of publication (oldest first rather than newest first) because that's how I want it, ya know? Anyway, to get a clearer sense of what this thing is about and where its going, start with episode one, below, and listen in order. But feel free to bounce around as much as you like, because you can do that without any interference from me. But maybe at least listen to Episodes one and five, OK?Episode related playlist on the way!This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 12/2/25 | ![]() Sinners: People & Vampires & their Guitars | This episode goes off-road a little. I'm late to the party, but when I recently (finally) saw Ryan Coogler's Sinners, I couldn't not do an episode on this movie. Sinners is a cracking good vampire movie that also happens to be a micro-history of Black Music, with details that can tell us a lot about the history of string instruments in the United States. Its about the guitar, people and their guitars, and the guitar and its people...even if some of those people aren't people anymore. ----Learn about how to support the project here!Check out all previous episodes below. Episodes appear in order of publication (oldest first rather than newest first) because that's how I want it, ya know? Anyway, to get a clearer sense of what this thing is about and where its going, start with episode one, below, and listen in order. But feel free to bounce around as much as you like, because you can do that without any interference from me. But maybe at least listen to Episodes one and five, OK? Episode related playlist on the way!This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 7/14/25 | ![]() Strung Theory II: The Musical Bow | This is the second in a short series of episodes and interviews about that thing we made, that if we hadn't made, there would be no guitar. Episode six is about how we learned to make a string and pull it tight between two fixed points to make a weapon. The bow and arrow changed the way we lived, ate, and killed each other. And the bow part of the bow and arrow might be a prototype for future stringed musical instruments (chordophones). That's because until we taught ourselves how to make string, and pull it tight enough to do something, we would never have learned to pull those strings tight enough to make pitched sounds when we pluck, strum, and bow them.Without tensioned strings there are no bows and arrows. Without bows and arrows, there are no harps, lyres, lutes, shoelaces, or Diddley Bows. And there are no guitars. So let's travel from an obscure book from 1899 back to a hunter on a grassy plain 65,000 years ago, to a guitar player in New York in 1978, and think about why and how each of our guitar strings might have an ancient weapon inside of it.Click here to support A People's History of the Guitar with a one-time or recurring contribution, or maybe both. If you want to see where this goes as much as I do, you can help me to produce unique new content and reach more people with a broader perspective on an instrument that changed the world.Go back and check out the previous episodes in order if you haven't already, because this thing is initially best understood if you go from first to last. Thanks for being curious about what I'm trying to do here.This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 5/20/25 | ![]() Strung Theory I: Cordage/Chordage | This is the first in a short series of episodes and interviews about how we turned cordage into chordage. According to the Hornbostel-Sachs System for Musical Instrument Classification, the guitar is in the Chordophone category. And it wouldn't be there if it weren't for something we found, and manufactured, over tens of thousands of years, called cordage.The story of cordage is under-told and overlooked, but it's everywhere, and it's one of our most important tools and materials. We take it for granted, but we shouldn't do that. It holds your shoes together. It's the stuff your clothes are made of. It's the thing that burns in the center of a candle. One type of cordage, called string, turns silent bows, boxes and slabs into stringed musical instruments, and that's why we're here. Here's a link to a complete interview with a scholar mentioned in the episode, which should make for good supplemental reading.Click here to support A People's History of the Guitar with a one-time or recurring contribution, or maybe both. If you want to see where this goes as much as I do, you can help me to produce unique new content and reach more people with a broader perspective on an instrument that changed the world. Go back and check out the previous episodes in order if you haven't already, and thanks for being curious about what I'm trying to do here. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 4/1/25 | ![]() Some German Guys Figured it Out | Episode five is about one of the ways we organize human knowledge. It's also about two German musicologists who created a system for categorizing musical instruments, before the Nazis fucked it all up. And you bet it's relevant to the development of the guitar, because in the Hornbostel Sachs system, the guitar is barely a blip among the hundreds of tools humans use to make music. And if that's the case, why is the guitar...everywhere?As we get into this long history, it's important to maintain a sense of humility.Support the project here!This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 3/4/25 | ![]() Why Music? | This episode takes us from the evolution of human musicality into the realm of music itself, and its origins. That story is big, controversial, and messy. So, I've sorted it into easily digestible summaries of the ideas of Charles Darwin, Steven Brown, and Steven Pinker: three thinkers whose work is important for understanding how and why we started making music. It could have been really long, but I've cleverly limited it to under 25 minutes. Support the project!Here's a link to a brief and delightfully tension-filled conversation between Police drummer Stewart Copeland and Harvard Linguist/Psychologist Steven Pinker, referenced in the last third or so of the episode. Episode playlist here. I'll be tinkering with these playlists periodically, so feel free to add them to your library and revisit from time-to-time. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 2/4/25 | ![]() Hit It! (About Hitting Things) | You don't make musical sounds by just sitting there. You have to fight for them. Music begins with little acts of violence, and we've been learning how to do that for a very long time.This episode is about turning kinetic energy into mechanical energy into sound energy. It's about force. It's about electrical circuits and stone arrowheads. It's about how we learned to make fists and hold guitar necks. It's about Stanley Kubrick and the Ramones, and how we learned important skills from breaking things, blowing speakers, and abusing musical instruments. Some of it's about me in 5th grade, and it's all about the fact that the guitar is...inevitable. Support the project!Episode playlist here. I'll be tinkering with these playlists periodically, so feel free to add them to your library and revisit from time-to-time. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
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| 1/7/25 | ![]() Walk This Way | This episode is about one of the things that launched us on our journey toward making music, which would eventually get us to the guitar. That one thing is our feet. Which is really two things. When we began to walk upright, we introduced something new into our lives. Becoming bipedal, millions of years ago, gave us one of the foundations of music, and Disco, and CPR. It also helped to make our brains bigger, which made us smarter, and our walking feet and smarter noggins pointed us toward becoming musical beings. Support the project here!Episode playlist here. I'll be tinkering with these playlists periodically, so feel free to add them to your library and revisit from time-to-time. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 12/3/24 | ![]() There is No Origin Story | In this episode we'll go back in time, into a cave with a Greek God, where a mythical stringed instrument was created, and on to Wisconsin, California, and Mississippi, in search of an origin story for the guitar. The title might give you a hint of where we'll end up. Support the project here!Episode playlist here. I'll be tinkering with these playlists periodically, so feel free to add them to your library and revisit from time-to-time. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 9/4/24 | ![]() Intro to A People's History of the Guitar | A People's History of the Guitar is about people, the guitar, people and their guitars, and the guitar and its people.In this introductory episode, you'll find out about what the podcast is about, why I decided to do it in the first place, and who the podcast is for. Spoiler alert: it's for everybody.I'm just getting this going, and episodes are coming as I finish them. My goal is a minimum of three episodes each month. We'll get there, especially if you keep listening, and if you'll consider supporting the project, so support the project here!Episode playlist here. Some guitar-based music that means something to me. I'll be tinkering with these playlists periodically, so feel free to add them to your library, and revisit from time-to-time. This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
| 9/3/24 | ![]() Trailer | A taste of the sound and purpose of the show.If you want to see and hear where this goes as much as I do, I hope you'll think about supporting the project with a one-time or recurring contribution, or maybe both! Click here to help me create new and unique content, and reach more people. Thanks for listening, and for considering support for the project!This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis: OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy | — | ||||||
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Chart Positions
1 placement across 1 market.
Chart Positions
1 placement across 1 market.
