Join BirdNote tomorrow, November 30th!
Illustrator David Sibley and actor H. Jon Benjamin will face off in the bird illustration battle of the century during BirdNote's Year-end Celebration and Auction!
Jasmine "Jazzi" Johnson develops and oversees the editorial voice and production of longform podcasts and special projects for BirdNote. She is a multi-disciplinary creative who began her career in journalism as a writer, editor and manager with networks such as BET, Oxygen TV, Blavity, The Grio, Genius, Yahoo! News, and more. Following a pivot, Jazzi continues to further her career in storytelling with audio and scriptwriting, combining her love for writing, research, management and production. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Liberal Arts and Journalism from The New School’s Eugene Lang College in New York City. Currently residing in Los Angeles, she indulges in all of her favorite pastimes like hiking, yoga, songwriting - and now, birding!
We sat down with Jazzi to get to know her and her work here at BirdNote!
Q: How did you end up at BirdNote? What was your journey to here?
A few years ago, I was looking to pivot from hard news/digital journalism to something that really made more use of my creativity as a writer, my love for audio (and journalism), and overall could make me feel like I was bringing more light into the world. I had just spent two years as an Editorial Manager at Yahoo! News during the height of COVID in Los Angeles – and I was looking for a mental break. BirdNote has really provided me with that and so much more.
Q: What does a day in your life at BirdNote look like?
As a manager and producer, there’s honestly no day that looks the same, but there are a few tasks during production season that I check on nearly everyday: the amount of interviews banked, scheduled and pending; that everyone on the team is clear about their tasks for the day or the week; a clear view regarding deadlines and timelines for each episode, sponsor, deliverables, etc.; the progress of each script (which typically are always in different stages) and what needs to be done to get them all to the finish line; and of course that I don’t forget to eat and drink water before the end of the day (bad habit that I’ve gotten much better at achieving since working here) - lol!
Q: What was your Spark Bird?
The very same week that I was interviewed for BirdNote in 2022, I randomly discovered an all-white peacock online named after Michael Jackson (hey, I didn’t name it!). MJ is also one of my favorite artists, so it really caught my attention. And the video wasn’t even popular, it had like 300 views or less at the time and I just thought it was the coolest bird I had ever seen. Anywho, it sparked my interest and I ended up deep-diving into the history of the bird when I realized that Los Angeles, where I live, is actually quite the hub for peacocks. They were imported here from India and Sri Lanka around the 1870s – which also meant that I could actually see one in person – and did.
Q: What is your favorite BirdNote episode?
Truthfully, it’s hard to choose, but “The Noise Report,” “Radical Joy with Dr. J. Drew Lanham,” “The Forgotten Flock: Female Birds” and “Celluloid Birding with Christian Cooper” are among my favorite Bring Birds Back episodes.
Q: What would be your bird-themed super power?
Similar to the Northern Mockingbird’s ability to mimic the sound and song of so many different birds, in human form, I’d compare that to being able to quickly adapt and learn other people’s languages. So my bird-themed super power would be having the ability to speak any language I hear.
White Peacock © Jamie Sanford