Voice of America (VOA) is the official external broadcast institution of the United States federal government. It is one of five civilian U.S. international broadcasters working under the umbrella of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). VOA provides a wide range of programming for broadcast on radio and TV and the Internet outside of the U.S. in 43 languages. VOA produces about 1,500 hours of news and feature programming each week for an estimated global audience of 123 million people, "to promote freedom and democracy and to enhance understanding through multimedia communication of accurate, objective, and balanced news, information and other programming about America and the world to audiences overseas." Its day-to-day operations are supported by the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB).

A 1976 law signed by President Gerald Ford requires VOA to "serve as a consistently reliable and authoritative source of news." The VOA Charter states: "VOA news will be accurate, objective and comprehensive." However, the service has been criticized as an instrument of American propaganda.

Jacqueline Marie "Jackie" Evancho ( /iːˈveɪŋkoʊ/ ee-VAYNG-koh; born April 9, 2000) is an American classical crossover singer who has gained wide recognition at an early age.

Between 2008 and 2010, Evancho entered several talent competitions; made singing appearances, mostly in Pennsylvania; issued an independent album, Prelude to a Dream; and attracted interest on YouTube. Later in 2010, at the age of 10, she gained wider popularity with her performances in the fifth season of the America's Got Talent (AGT) competition, finishing in second place. With the subsequent release of her O Holy Night EP, she became the best-selling debut artist of 2010, the youngest top-10 debut artist in U.S. history and the youngest solo artist ever to go platinum. In June 2011, her first full-length major-label album, Dream With Me, debuted at #2 on American album charts, and she became the youngest top-5 debut artist in UK history. Billboard ranked Evancho the top Classical Albums Artist for 2011.

Evancho impressed composers Tim Janis and David Foster, each of whom included her in his concerts beginning in 2009. Foster later produced Evancho's album, Dream With Me, and subsequent PBS special for the television series, Great Performances. Evancho performed in front of U.S. President Barack Obama at the 2010 National Christmas Tree lighting in Washington, D.C. She is the ambassador for "Mission: Humane", a Humane Society program which encourages children's involvement in the protection of animals. She features songs from Dream With Me in a 2011–12 concert tour with symphony orchestras. Evancho released another studio album, Heavenly Christmas, in November 2011. The same month, she became the youngest person ever to give a solo concert at Lincoln Center in New York City. A national cotillion organization listed her as one of the "ten best-mannered people of 2011".

Douglas Gene "Doug" Stanhope (born March 25, 1967) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, and author known for his on-stage drinking and abrasive comedy routines.

Stanhope quit high school after his freshman year. His comedy career began in 1990 in Las Vegas.

Stanhope has made appearances at several major comedy festivals, including the Montreal Just For Laughs, US Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen, Colorado, the Chicago Comedy Festival and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland, where he won the Strathmore Press Award in 2002.

Stanhope was the winner of the 1995 San Francisco International Comedy Competition where he edged out notable comedic actor Dane Cook in a three-week contest. He's appeared in dozens of national and international standup comedy television specials. He claims that his appearance on the BBC television show, Live Floor Show, (broadcast March 20, 2003) was fueled by "ecstasy". According to Stanhope, "TV is just for the money; live performance is where it’s at."

In 2003 and 2004, Stanhope co-hosted the fifth and sixth seasons of The Man Show with Joe Rogan.

Taylor McDowell Mali (born 28 March 1965) is an American slam poet, humorist, teacher, and voiceover artist.

A 10th-generation native of New York City, Taylor Mali graduated from the Collegiate School, a private school for boys, in 1983. He received a B.A. in English from Bowdoin College in 1987 and an M.A. in English/Creative Writing from Kansas State University in 1993. He also studied drama with the Royal Shakespeare Academy at Oxford. One of four children, his mother was children's book author Jane L. Mali, a recipient of the American Book Award, and his father was H. Allen Mali, vice president of Henry W.T. Mali & Co., manufacturers of pool table coverings. He is the great-great-grandson of John Taylor Johnston, founding president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In 1993, he married Rebecca Ruth Tauber, who died in 2004. On May 13, 2006 he married Marie-Elizabeth Mundheim, a high school friend.

As a slam poetry performer, Taylor Mali has been on seven National Poetry Slam teams; six appeared on the finals stage and four won the competition (1996 with Team Providence; 1997, 2000 and 2002 with Team NYC-Urbana). Mali is the author of What Learning Leaves and the Last Time as We Are (Write Bloody Publishing), has recorded four CDs, and is included in various anthologies. Poets who have influenced him include Billy Collins, Saul Williams, Walt Whitman, Rives, Mary Oliver, and Naomi Shihab Nye. He is perhaps best known for the poem "What Teachers Make."

Billie Holiday (born Eleanora Harris April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959) was an American jazz singer and songwriter. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and musical partner Lester Young, Holiday had a seminal influence on jazz and pop singing. Her vocal style, strongly inspired by jazz instrumentalists, pioneered a new way of manipulating phrasing and tempo.

Critic John Bush wrote that Holiday "changed the art of American pop vocals forever." She co-wrote only a few songs, but several of them have become jazz standards, notably "God Bless the Child", "Don't Explain", "Fine and Mellow", and "Lady Sings the Blues". She also became famous for singing "Easy Living", "Good Morning Heartache", and "Strange Fruit", a protest song which became one of her standards and was made famous with her 1939 recording.

Billie Holiday was born Eleanora Fagan on April 7, 1915, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Sarah Julia "Sadie" Fagan (née Harris). Her father, Clarence Halliday (Holiday), a musician, did not marry or live with her mother. Her mother had moved to Philadelphia when thirteen, after being ejected from her parents' home in Sandtown-Winchester, Baltimore for becoming pregnant. With no support from her own parents, Holiday's mother arranged for the young Holiday to stay with her older married half sister, Eva Miller, who lived in Baltimore.