Glass and his producers listened to a recording of The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs , and realized they couldn’t simply edit it to fit an hour of airtime. Some aspects, such as certain vocabulary and pacing, wouldn’t translate well to radio. So first Glass and Producer Reed trimmed the stage show to the sections they thought would work on-air (for example, they dropped the material on Jobs), and then together with Daisey honed a TAL script. In mid-December, Daisey went to TAL’s New York studio to record it, but another problem arose.

On stage, Daisey performed in a booming voice. During taping, Glass interrupted Daisey repeatedly and asked him to modulate his voice for the more intimate radio setting. It made no difference; Glass realized another approach was needed. So he reserved a theater for 40 people, where Daisey could perform before a live audience.

On Dec. 20, TAL via Twitter invited New York City listeners to a free live taping of a “mysterious, TAL - related event” in Brooklyn that evening. ^[19] They held a second live taping the same night. ^[20] The two versions would be edited together in a seamless, 39-minute whole. Daisey, says Glass, “was a very good collaborator, just in terms of understanding with a great deal of sensitivity how different it would be to perform his piece on the radio from the way it was performed in the theater.”