The life of a traveling musician isn't a walk in the park, which may explain why there are countless songs written about long journeys, late nights and lonely gigs in strange places. That's why I'm always amazed at how musicians can pull up the van to the door of our radio station, load their gear into our studio and perform in front of an audience of one.

That one visible person the band unfortunately sees is me, and in this past year, I had the pleasure of interviewing a bunch of singer-songwriters and their bands in our recording studio. Some musicians drove all day to get to St. Paul, Minn., in time to do the interview and then make it to the gig in time for the sound check. Some even came in the morning after the gig, did the interview and then got back in the van to head to the next city several hours away. But they all showed up and left with smiles on their faces, and that's what amazes me.

I got to do more than 30 interviews this past year, but I'd like to offer just a few highlights from Radio Heartland's most recent trip around the sun:

All of the musician interviews I do here are a team effort. Our engineering staff are the best in the business (Michael DeMark, Corey Schreppel, Cameron Wiley, Michael Osborne and Jalen Russell). Nate Ryan and Leah Garaas are responsible for the photos and video. And Luke Taylor ties a bow around all of the audio, video and writing for our online features. Thanks All!

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• Mandolin Orange perform in the Radio Heartland studio
• Courtney Marie Andrews performs in the Radio Heartland studio
• Billy Bragg and Joe Henry put down railroad tracks in the studio
• Sarah Jarosz performs in the Radio Heartland studio
• Mary Gauthier performs in the Radio Heartland studio