Here's the Line-Up!

On Friday, November 8, and Saturday, November 9, the third edition of DS Podcastfestival will take place in Ostend. This time, the festival is not confined to Kursaal, but also extends to De Grote Post. The podcast festival, a collaboration between De Standaard and Visit Ostend, is also increasingly looking beyond the country's borders, featuring podcasts from the Netherlands, the UK, the US, and Canada.

A podcast festival remains something special. There are few of them - even abroad. And aren't podcasts better between your two ears anyway? But after two sold-out editions in Kursaal Oostende, our audience knows better. The DS Podcastfestival visitor is a young, enthusiastic, and remarkably social animal who wants to catch new things in that ocean of podcasts. And that's why this year, we went even more in search of undiscovered gems.

That is not to say that, as always, there aren't also popular Flemish podcasts on the bill. Such as Achter de schermen, in which Pieterjan Marchand and Jeff Bronder wittily dive into the backstage of the world of media. Or Vrolijke vrekken, which tackles inflation in an equally entertaining way. Or Koken met Classics, in which radio host Korneel De Clercq and musician Senne Guns enthusiastically stir the pots of timeless pop and rock songs. Each of these three podcasts also brings a high-profile guest along. But just like last year (Zwangere Guy, Elisabeth Lucie Baeten, Pommelien Thijs, ...), we won't announce them until the end of September.

At the same time, the festival invites several international heavyweights, such as Avery Trufelman and Josh Baker. The first is the host and producer of the fashion podcast Articles of Interest, which regularly appears in the year-end lists of The New York Times and The New Yorker. And the second made the most celebrated podcast in BBC history with I'm Not a Monster - about a woman who moved with her family to Syria to join IS. Or what about Michael Safi, who authored the brilliant AI podcast Black Box? Or Anthony Baxter, who battles with Donald Trump in Trumped. And The New York Times reporter Kim Barker, who created the excellent true crime podcast The Coldest Case in Laramie for Serial?

Several notable podcast makers from the Netherlands also descend on Ostend. The most well-known? Pepijn Lanen of De Jeugd van Tegenwoordig! In his disarming podcast V4der, the musician talks to Dutch celebrities about parenthood. Although, at the festival, he does so with a famous Belgian. Other stellar Dutch podcasts include En niemand blijft onaangeraakt (about the AIDS crisis in the 1990s), Waar is Sarah? (about the search for a baby saved in the Mediterranean) and Blauwe M&M's (full of juicy music industry stories).

A live recording of the latter will take place in AB Café, a stage of the legendary music venue AB featuring only music podcasts. The AB's actual café in Brussels is currently in scaffolding, which is why the country's most music-loving pub is heading to Ostend. Also on the AB Café lineup is Last Goodbye, in which Joris Hessels talks to famous guests about the music they want to play at their funerals.

What else? A book panel including Wim Oosterlinck (Drie boeken) and Helena de Groot (The Paris Review). A debate on podcasts and elections. We have a judge, a lawyer, and a detective listening to some iconic true crime podcasts. For the first time, we're also serving up a film screening (Meet the Masters) and a concert (Koken met Classics). And there's a panel on death and grief - themes that are increasingly being addressed in podcasts. As in Stoffelijk, soon to be released by De Standaard, in which Veerle Duflou wonders what happened to her late husband's body after it was donated to science.

Other podcasts from De Standaard include its daily DS Vandaag and the just-released Roadtrip to Auschwitz, in which journalist Evelien Rutten travels to Auschwitz-Birkenau with her teenage daughter. They follow in the footsteps of her Polish grandmother, who stood face to face with Josef Mengele there.

Finally, the festival will also premiere some exciting new podcasts, including Reis door de ruis by Natalie Welleman and Wederik De Backer (about tinnitus) and Oostende met één o by Eva Moeraert (about the coastal city of Ostende in Argentina). Not to forget The Margate Murders, the British remake of The Blankenberge Tapes - with over a million listeners, one of the most popular Dutch-language podcasts ever.