Episodes
What It Takes is a podcast series featuring intimate, revealing conversations with towering figures in almost every field: music, science, sports, politics, film, technology, literature, the military and social justice. These rare interviews have been recorded over the past 25 years by The Academy of Achievement. They offer the life stories and reflections of people who have had a huge impact on the world, and insights you can apply to your own life. Subscribe to the What It Takes podcast...
Published 09/15/15
Published 09/15/15
Andrew Young was the pastor of a small country church when he faced down the Ku Klux Klan to organize a voter registration drive in South Georgia. He became the leading negotiator for the national Civil Rights Movement, enduring death threats, beatings and jail time to win for African Americans the rights of full citizenship they were promised by the Constitution, rights they had been long denied. Alongside his friend, Martin Luther King, Jr., he marched through the most dramatic episodes of...
Published 08/14/13
Audra McDonald is unparalleled in the breadth and versatility of her artistry as both singer and actress. With a record-setting six Tony Awards, two Grammy Awards, and a long list of other accolades to her name, she is among today's most highly regarded performers. Blessed with a luminous soprano voice and an incomparable gift for dramatic truth-telling, she is equally at home on Broadway and opera stages as in roles on film and television. In addition to her theatrical work, she maintains a...
Published 12/09/12
Aretha Franklin is known the world over as the Queen of Soul Music. In the 1960s, her hit recording "Respect" became an anthem of the civil rights struggle and a theme song for the dawning women's movement. He musical career began in the New Bethel Baptist Church in Detroit, Michigan, where her father, Rev. C.L. Franklin was the pastor. Young Aretha sang and played piano, and the passion of Gospel music has remained with her through her subsequent triumphs in secular blues, rock and...
Published 10/28/12
This autumn, Natasha Trethewey took up her duties as United States Poet Laureate, the 19th poet to serve since Congress created the position in 1985. Also known as the Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, the Laureate is responsible for all the public poetry programs of the Library, as well as an annual lecture and reading. With her appointment as Poet Laureate, Trethewey crowns a career steeped in the complexities of American history. The marriage of her white,...
Published 10/27/12
One of the most distinguished musical artists of our time, the singer Jessye Norman was born in Augusta, Georgia. As a ten-year-old child, she was spellbound by a recording of the great contralto Marian Anderson. Inspired by Anderson's recordings and autobiography, she resolved to become a classical singer herself. At age 16, she won a full scholarship to study voice at Howard University. After graduate music studies at Peabody Conservatory, she went to Europe, where she was soon discovered...
Published 07/22/12
One of the most gifted and admired actors in America, Morgan Freeman was born in Memphis and raised in Mississippi. At an early age, he found his calling acting in school plays. In the seventh grade, he won the state championship in a student theatrical competition. In his teens he was appearing on Nashville radio. He turned down a college scholarship to join the Air Force; on leaving the service in 1959, he headed to Hollywood, where he auditioned unsuccessfully for eight impoverished years....
Published 06/04/12
Johnny Mathis was only 19 years old when a Columbia Records executive heard him singing in a San Francisco nightclub and decided to sign the teenage singer on the spot. After his first album, recorded in a jazz style, failed to register with the public, producer Mitch Miller guided Mathis to a more straightforward romantic sound, leading to hits like "Wonderful, Wonderful" and "It's Not For Me to Say." A series of appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show made Mathis a national star, and at age 22...
Published 12/10/11
Since she first hit the charts with "Don't Make Me Over" in 1962, the unmistakable voice and flawless musicianship of Dionne Warwick have made her an international musical legend. Her soulful blend of pop, gospel and soul styles has transcended musical and cultural boundaries. She began singing in church in her home town of East Orange, New Jersey. While attending Hartt College of Music in Hartford, Connecticut, she began working as a back-up singer on recording sessions in New York City....
Published 05/14/10
In 1995, when retired General Colin Powell took himself out of the running for President of the United States, he was leading every candidate in every poll. At the time, his autobiography, My American Journey, was a national bestseller. Millions of Americans have been inspired by his life story, from his boyhood in the South Bronx, through service in Vietnam, to his term as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. General Powell was the first African-American and the youngest...
Published 03/24/10
In 1995, when retired General Colin Powell took himself out of the running for President of the United States, he was leading every candidate in every poll. At the time, his autobiography, My American Journey, was a national bestseller. Millions of Americans have been inspired by his life story, from his boyhood in the South Bronx, through service in Vietnam, to his term as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. General Powell was the first African-American and the youngest...
Published 03/24/10
In the rock and roll pantheon, Chuck Berry stands alone. Every element of the music existed before he ever stepped onstage, but no one can deny he was the first writer and performer to put it all together. In the 1950s, he combined stinging guitar licks with a jumping rhythm section, sly lyrics and an audacious stage presence to create a sound and style that proved irresistible to both black and white audiences at a time when radio and performance venues were still largely...
Published 07/04/08
Hailed as the greatest team player on the greatest team of all time, Bill Russell led the Boston Celtics in the longest championship streak in U.S. sports history. With a flair for defense never before seen on a basketball court, allied with an uncanny ability to excel under pressure and an indomitable will to win, Russell dominated the game of basketball from his earliest days as a student athlete to his triumphant career in the pros. As captain of the Boston Celtics, he led the team to nine...
Published 07/03/08
On November 4, 2008, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois was elected President of the United States. The first African American to be elected to the nation's highest office, his victory is a milestone in American history. The son of a white mother from Kansas and a black father from Kenya, Obama grew up in Hawaii and Indonesia. After graduating from Columbia University, he moved to Chicago to work as a community organizer. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he served as...
Published 06/21/07
It would be difficult to name another athlete who dominated his sport as long or as completely as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. The greatest all-around player in the history of professional basketball, he ruled the sport through speed, agility and a devastating ambidextrous "sky hook" shot that sportswriters dubbed "the ultimate weapon." In the three seasons he played for the UCLA Bruins, he led the team to three NCAA championships and was named Most Outstanding Player in all three years, the only...
Published 06/21/07
In novels such as the modern classic, Beloved, Toni Morrison has fused history and legend, realism and fantasy, to craft an epic saga of African American life. Although her work is steeped in local history and folklore, the fundamental human values of her art have captured the hearts of readers around the world. After earning a Master's in English from Cornell University, Morrison taught at Howard University in Washington, D.C. for many years, and first took up writing as a form of escape...
Published 06/21/07
The most exciting and acclaimed playwright in American drama today, Suzan-Lori Parks is the first African American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Audiences across the country relish her rich blend of fantasy, humor, history and legend, bursting with the music and wordplay of African American vernacular speech. The powerful theatricality of her work forces audiences to re-examine their thinking about race, sex, family, society and life itself. Her plays, Imperceptible Mutabilities...
Published 06/21/07
"There is no such thing as an average human being. If you have a normal brain, you are superior. There's almost nothing that you can't do." When Benjamin Carson was in fifth grade, he was considered the "dummy" of his class. His classmates and teachers took it for granted that Ben would take an entire quiz without getting a single question right. He had a temper so violent that he would attack other children, even his mother, at the slightest provocation. "I was most likely to end up in jail,...
Published 06/21/07
He has recorded in a dazzling variety of styles, from the hard bop of his youth to the free jazz, avant-garde, fusion, Latin jazz, funk and R&B of subsequent decades. A formidable composer and bandleader, he is unparalleled in his imagination and expressiveness as a soloist. A 1956 album title still captures his enduring stature in the world of jazz: Saxophone Colossus. As he enters his ninth decade, he is still going strong. Always spontaneous, always unpredictable, with Sonny...
Published 06/02/06
When Desmond Tutu became General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches, he used his pulpit to decry the apartheid system of racial segregation. The South African government revoked his passport to prevent him from traveling, but Bishop Tutu refused to be silenced. International condemnation forced the government to rescind their decision. He had succeeded in drawing the world's attention to the injustice of the apartheid system. In 1984, his contribution to the cause of racial...
Published 06/02/06
"There is no such thing as an average human being. If you have a normal brain, you are superior. There's almost nothing that you can't do." When Benjamin Carson was in fifth grade, he was considered the "dummy" of his class. His classmates and teachers took it for granted that Ben would take an entire quiz without getting a single question right. He had a temper so violent that he would attack other children, even his mother, at the slightest provocation. "I was most likely to end up in jail,...
Published 06/02/06
In 1995, when retired General Colin Powell took himself out of the running for President of the United States, he was leading every candidate in every poll. At the time, his autobiography, My American Journey, was a national bestseller. Millions of Americans have been inspired by his life story, from his boyhood in the South Bronx, through service in Vietnam, to his term as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. General Powell was the first African-American and the youngest...
Published 06/02/05
In 1995, when retired General Colin Powell took himself out of the running for President of the United States, he was leading every candidate in every poll. At the time, his autobiography, My American Journey, was a national bestseller. Millions of Americans have been inspired by his life story, from his boyhood in the South Bronx, through service in Vietnam, to his term as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. General Powell was the first African-American and the youngest...
Published 06/02/05
One of the most acclaimed singers of our time, Kathleen Battle's glorious voice and unique artistry have captivated audiences in concert halls and opera houses around the world. This radiant soprano has earned many honors for her performances and recordings, including Grammy Awards for Outstanding Individual Achievement in a classical program and Best Performance by a Classical Vocal Soloist. In this podcast, recorded during the Academy of Achievement's 2005 Summit in New York City, Kathleen...
Published 06/02/05