NPR debuts music playlist programming

“Our curation game is strong at NPR Music.” –NPR

In a new on-demand audio venture that parallels its podcast activity, NPR has launched a new series of playlists that will be available on its website as well as on Spotify and Apple Music. The website playlists feature 30-second excerpts (presumably to avoid full-song royalty liability), pointing listeners to Spotify or Apple Music for the full experience.

The NPR Music Playlists include programming of the songs played as snippets during episodes of its Morning Edition and All Things Considered shows, as well as genre-focused programming such as Latin and country. The existing playlists will be updated once a week, and NPR said it plans to add more genres and more picks from its music staff in the future.

At the same time, NPR remains the world’s biggest podcast publisher. The broadcaster’s podcast statistics received IAB certification at the end of 2018 and it continues to be the top performer in Podtrac’s monthly monitoring of publishers.

Anna Washenko