Full Expression

Craft lives in the hands. And in a world increasingly shaped by speed, automation, and abstraction, what does it mean to dedicate your life to making things slowly, by hand? In this episode of Full Expression, host Dan Imhoff sits down with Angelo Garro, Sicilian-born blacksmith, sculptor, forager, and founder of Omnivore Salt, for a conversation about craft, culture, food, and the creative life. Angelo traces his journey from a small village in Sicily to apprenticing with a master metalworker in the Swiss Alps, before building a life in North America as an architectural blacksmith and artist. He developed a deep connection to the natural world—through foraging, hunting, cooking, and community—that would eventually place him at the center of California's early slow food movement. The conversation moves between worlds: from the history of ironwork in Europe to the philosophy of creating, from the realities of running a small food business to the challenges facing organic producers today. Angelo reflects on immigration, identity, and the role of culture—food, art, and craft—in shaping both personal meaning and collective freedom. We also explore what may be lost—and what could be rediscovered—in an age of artificial intelligence, as Angelo makes a case for the return of traditional skills and the enduring value of working with your hands.  

Behind Pink Martini's unmistakable sound is a simple idea: music can bring people together across cultures. In this episode of Full Expression, host Dan Imhoff sits down with Thomas Lauderdale—pianist, bandleader, and artistic director of Pink Martini, the "little orchestra" that blends classical, jazz, pop, and world music into a style that feels both timeless and global. Thomas traces the unlikely path that led him to the band. Raised on a plant nursery in rural Indiana, he began piano lessons at six and later studied history and literature at Harvard, originally planning a career in politics. But in 1994, while working on a political campaign in Portland, he started a small band to play fundraisers for progressive causes. What began as a festive antidote to dreary political events slowly grew into Pink Martini—a genre-defying ensemble that now performs around the world with songs in more than 25 languages. Thomas shares the philosophy behind the band: treating music as hospitality, learning songs in the languages of the countries they visit, and creating what he describes as a kind of "United Nations of sound." The conversation also explores the creative process behind Pink Martini's recordings—from recording live on tape and chasing the "magical accident" in the studio to building a musical family that has stayed vibrant for more than three decades.    

Behind every unforgettable performance is great casting. Today, we explore this often invisible process that's part intuition, part logistics, and part relentless creative problem-solving. In this episode of Full Expression, host Dan Imhoff talks with legendary casting director Mindy Marin, whose career spans four decades and more than a hundred films, including Juno, Drive, Nightcrawler, the upcoming Matchbox, and multiple Mission: Impossible projects—along with a long history in television that helped shape the industry from the inside. Mindy walks us through what casting actually is: breaking down scripts, searching for talent, building trust with directors and producers, and running chemistry tests that determine whether a story truly works on screen. She reflects on how the job has evolved from a fully analog world of in-person auditions and endless binders of headshots to today's Zoom-driven, global casting landscape—and why the core skill is still the same: taste, discernment, deep belief in people and a love of actors and film.  She shares stories from her early days hustling into Hollywood, the art of turning "no" into "yes," and why casting directors and actors are fundamentally on the same side. With casting now becoming eligible for Oscar recognition for the first time, it's a timely look at one of filmmaking's most essential—and least understood—creative roles.

Sparkling wine is one of humanity's most enduring creative rituals. In this episode of Full Expression, host Dan Imhoff travels to California's Anderson Valley to sit down with Arnaud Weyrich, the French-born winemaker behind the méthode champenoise wines at Roederer Estate. Arnaud brings a rare, ground-up perspective: trained in agronomy, viticulture, and enology in France, and shaped by three decades of harvests on both sides of the Atlantic. He walks us through the great complexity of sparkling wine—early picking for acidity, blending with intention rather than recipes, second fermentation in bottle, disgorgement, dosage—and why every decision is part science and part intuition. The conversation opens into bigger questions about creativity and adaptation: how climate change is reshaping vineyards and harvest timing, why note-taking and institutional memory matter as much as lab data, and how emerging tools like automation and AI can assist decision-making without replacing the winemaker's palate. We also explore wine as a cultural artifact—rooted in place, tradition, and shared pleasure—and why sparkling wine, with all its labor and precision, has become the sound and symbol of celebration itself. It's a conversation about what it means to keep creating something joyful in a rapidly shifting world.

#36: Artificial intelligence is here, whether we're ready or not. In this episode of Full Expression, host Dan Imhoff sits down with UCLA professor and Utopias podcast host Ramesh Srinivasan to ask what that reality means for creativity, culture, and everyday life. Ramesh brings a rare perspective: he's lived inside the tech world as an engineer and AI developer (including time at the MIT Media Lab), and he's spent decades studying the social, political, and environmental impacts of technology.  The conversation expands into the big questions shaping our moment: AI as pattern recognition and surveillance, the power of tech oligarchs, the rise of disinformation, and the hidden environmental costs of data processing.  We also dig into what it means to stay creatively dignified in an AI-saturated world: when (and if) these tools can be useful, and why practices like writing longhand, movement, and meditation matter now more than ever It's a conversation about power and possibility, fear and literacy, and the urgent case for a "new Bauhaus," a way of designing technology that supports connection, care, and a future that's actually worth living

#35: An epic wolf journey becomes a lens on everything from ecology to migration, borders, and what it means to coexist with the wild in modern Europe. In this episode, writer and adventurer Adam Weymouth joins us to talk about his book Lone Wolf: Walking the Line Between Civilization and Wilderness. Weymouth retraces the thousand-mile path of an iconic wolf named Slavc, tracked by GPS as he traveled from Slovenia across Austria and the Alps to northern Italy—moving through deep wilderness, but also skirting suburbs, airports, and working farmland. Along the way, we explore the long, complicated history between humans and wildlife, the politics shaping species repopulation and rewilding across Europe, and the cultural stories that still cast the wolf as the villain.  We dig into Weymouth's reporting and creative process: walking the route in stages, translating conversations across languages, balancing science with storytelling, and resisting the urge to turn the wolf into a mythic hero or monster. It's a conversation about nature and culture, fear and fascination, and the hope embedded in a species finding its way back.  

#34: Before The French Laundry became a culinary landmark, there was Sally Schmitt, a quietly radical cook whose life helped shape what we now call California cuisine. In this episode, Sally's daughter Karen Bates and grandson Byron Hoffman join us to tell that story through their book Six California Kitchens. Part family history, part cookbook, Six California Kitchens traces Sally's journey from a Depression-era homestead in Citrus Heights to a scrappy food-and-wine hub in Yountville, and eventually to the Apple Farm in Anderson Valley. Karen and Byron walk us through the early days of the original French Laundry, the teaching kitchen that drew people from all over the world, and the hands-on life of running a small farm and hospitality business for forty years. We dig into how the book came together: Sally's yellow legal pads, eight years of photographing recipes with nothing but family linens and pottery, and the challenge of weaving memoir, archive, and recipes into one seamless visual story.  

#33: Nick Casey is a staff reporter for the New York Times Magazine based in Europe. He writes about geopolitics, threats against democracy and armed conflict. Raised in California by a single mother, Nick earned a degree in anthropology from Stanford University and started his journalism career as a cub reporter for the Half Moon Bay Review in Northern California. A few years later he was recruited by the Wall Street Journal and launched an impressive career that has included nine years in Latin America, several stints in the Middle East and five years in Europe. With the New York Times since 2015, Nick Casey is the rare correspondent who writes in long-form, telling the stories of people carving a path through a world that is either changing or collapsing. In 2025 Nick Casey was a member of a New York Times team awarded the Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of the war in Sudan. He is also hard at work on a memoir titled Vagabonds, about the decades he spent searching for his father, who disappeared when he was just seven years old. Nick lives in Madrid with documentary filmmaker Jacqueline Baylon, who was interviewed for Full Expression in late 2024.

#32: Mary Gabriel is an American author and biographer whose books include Love and Capital: Karl and Jenny Marx and the Birth of a Revolution, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. She worked in Washington and London as a Reuters editor for nearly two decades and currently lives in Ireland. Her book Ninth Street Women is a deep exploration of the mid-20th century Abstract Expressionist in New York City. Ninth Street Women is a chronicle of not just one — but five American women artists: Lee Krasner (wife of Jackson Pollock), Elaine De Kooning (wife of Willem de Kooning), Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell and Helen Frankenthaler. I spoke with Mary Gabriel about her work habits and the era when non-representational abstract painting came of age in the wake of world war, nuclear weapons and a changing America.

#31: Few guitarists have shaped the emotional landscape of modern music the way Bill Frisell has. Across five decades, his playing has stretched the boundaries of jazz, Americana, folk, film scoring, and improvisation. In this episode, we trace the artistic philosophy behind one of the most quietly revolutionary careers in contemporary music. Frisell reflects on his formative years at Berklee in the early 1970s, where he studied under giants like Herb Pomeroy, Gary Burton, Michael Gibbs, and John Damian—and how the real education often came from the hallways, jam sessions, and friendships that shaped him. He talks about leaving Denver to chase possibility, the intimidating brilliance of a young Pat Metheny, and the long thread that led to his 30-year collaboration with drummer Paul Motian. We explore what it means to remain true to your own experience: why Frisell ultimately opened his jazz vocabulary to the music of his childhood—The Beatles, Beach Boys, Brian Wilson, James Bond themes, folk songs, surf melodies, and hymns. His interpretations feel both familiar and completely revolutionary.  

#30: Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska stands as one of the starkest, most haunting records in American music—a raw home recording that reshaped how we think about artistry, fame, and solitude. In this episode, author and musician Dr. Warren Zanes joins us to unpack how he captured story behind it. Zanes' book, Deliver Me From Nowhere, chronicles the winter of 1982, when Springsteen retreated to a creaky farmhouse in Colts Neck, New Jersey, armed only with a guitar, harmonica, and four-track recorder. Out of that isolation came a collection of songs that felt more like short stories than rock anthems—narratives of working-class struggle, violence, and grace that still echo today. Now being adapted into a major motion picture starring Jeremy Allen White, Deliver Me From Nowhere captures a rare moment when an artist turned inward at the height of success to find something more raw, stripped to the bone.  We talk about his writing process, the power of longevity as an artist, and how to reinvent yourself in life and in art.     

#29: American democracy is in trouble. In this episode, constitutional scholar Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of UC Berkeley School of Law, joins us for a sobering conversation about the structural flaws embedded in the U.S. Constitution—and how they're driving today's political polarization to the brink. Chemerinsky's latest book, No Democracy Lasts Forever, argues that the compromises made more than two centuries ago have created a fragile system ill-equipped to meet the demands of modern governance. From the Electoral College to the Senate's skewed representation to the lifetime tenure of Supreme Court justices, he lays out why these outdated structures are accelerating a democratic crisis. We explore what reforms could make the system more resilient, the political realities that make change so difficult, and why understanding the Constitution's design flaws is key to grappling with the turbulence of our time.

On October 8, Full Expression goes deeper. In its third season, Host Dan Imhoff will interview artists, musicians, winemakers, writers, filmmakers and civic leaders on the edge of discovery. Tune in every other Wednesday for new episodes. 

Roman Cho is a Los Angeles-based photographer who specializes in portraiture. Born in Korea, Roman immigrated with his family at a young to Richmond, Virginia. He studied percussion at Cal Arts in Southern California and later transitioned to a career in photography. In addition to a career at Apple, he has initiated numerous projects: documenting The Good Food Movement, photographing legendary Americana musicians, and most recently, taking portraits and traveling on a bicycle along the 1700-mile Route of the Parks in Chilean Patagonia.  Follow along on Roman's journey through Patagonia and check out some of his stunning photos on his Instagram: @romanchophoto

Jaqueline Baylon is a journalist and filmmaker. As a young child she crossed into Texas across the Rio Grande river, and was deported several times before earning her dual U.S. citizenship at the age of 9. She attended Texas State University, as well as the School of Visual Arts in New York. Jaqueline has worked at the New York Times and other newspapers covering healthcare, criminal justice and immigration. Her documentary film, Until He's Back, explores the fate of a Moroccan man, who attempts to cross the straights of Gibraltar into Spain. It has won numerous awards, and was on the short list for an oscar in the Documentary Short category in 2025. 

Heidi Gustafson is an artist and writer, but is perhaps best known as an ochre whisperer. Based in the Pacific Northwest, she curates the  Early Futures Ochre Archive, a growing collection of over 600 samples of ochre from around the world. Her debut book, Book of Earth: A Guide to Ochre, Pigment, and Raw Color, explores our ancient relationship with color, creativity, and the land. Heidi is dialed in on the lesser known world of minerals upon which our world revolves. It's a discipline that bridges science, anthropology, spirituality, history, poetry, and captivating photography. 

Marina Krut is a Ukrainian born composer, poet and singer who also plays the bandura, a 64-string instrument, weighing 15 pounds. Marina's story is one that everyone needs to hear. These days, the 28-year-old leads a double life. From her temporary home in the west of Ukraine, she travels to the front lines of the war to perform for soldiers. She spends much of her time abroad, performing and relating what she has seen on the front lines. Influenced by traditional Ukrainian music, her bandura playing also incorporates non-traditional sounds, particularly jazz, to accompany her powerful voice. 

Matt Goulding is a co-founder of the independent media company, Roads and Kingdoms and the co-author of the New York Times best selling series Eat This, Not That! With Roads and Kingdoms, Matt Goulding has written a number of books that merge food culture, politics and history in engaging, creative formats: Grape Olive Pig (about Spain) Rice Noodle Fish (about Japan) Pasta Pane Vino (about Italy). He currently divides his time between the tapas bars of Barcelona and the barbecue joints of North Carolina.    I spoke with Matt Goulding about his journey to becoming a food writer, what makes a great title, and how a tweet from Anthony Bourdain changed his career. You can find out more about Matt Goulding's work at www.roadsandkingdoms.com.

David Quammen is an American non-fiction writer and the author of 17 books about the history of science, evolutionary biology, zoonotic diseases and the outdoors. His articles have appeared in Outside Magazine, National Geographic, Harper's, Rolling Stone, The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, and other periodicals. David Quammen's highly acclaimed books include Spillover, The Song of the Dodo, The Tangled Tree and his most recent work, Breathless, about the Covid-19 pandemic. This is a conversation about David's lifelong journey into nonfiction writing and extensive field reporting. 

Alondra Bentley is a British-born songwriter and illustrator living in Madrid. She was raised in southern Spain, studied fine arts before launching her music career, and has recorded five studio albums (with a new release pending). For over ten years, Alondra has taught children art and music based on the Montessouri methodology which emphasizes the discovery and understanding of our emotions.