Dyana Williams:   The Black Arts Movement was definitely a prolific time for radio personalities and recording artists and the music of the time reflects it. From “The Last Poet” to “Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five,” “Sweet Honey and the rock.” It was the birth of “Earth, Wind & Fire,” with songs like, “Keep your head to the Sky.” The messages were empowering and long-lasting and they survived into this period of time in the twenty-first century. So you had the rise of poets, like Nikki Giovanni, who did ego tripping, she did a whole album and it was played on black radio in heavy rotation. Same thing with artists like, um, Leroy Jones, Amiri Baraka, Sonia Sanchez. These were all the leaders and the pioneers of the Black Arts Movement. But it spilled over into radio, and radio was a primary resource for information, inspiration for the African-American and other communities.

Danielle Fox: In my class seminar, The Worlds of Ntozake Shange, we’ve talked a lot about how the Black Arts Movement was very gendered. I’m wondering how you weigh in on this and about your experiences.

DW: Well, you know, it was reflective, the Black Arts Movement was taking place in a time in America that reflected what was going on. Sexism was big, So you have the Civil Rights Movement, you have the women’s lib movement, which meant women wanted equality with men in terms of payment and recognition for their work rendered. And look, it’s the twenty-first century and it’s still an ongoing battle of inequity. So during the Black Arts Movement, all of these things were informing the Black Arts Movement as well because you could be in the Black Arts Movement and be against the war. And be in the Black Arts Movement and want more liberation rights, recognition and justice for women.So consider, like I said, all of these things were going on at kind of the same time. The anti-Vietnam war, the war against drugs, the Civil Rights Movement. And these things were converging and sometimes, they were bumping into each other, and then they were merging, but men were still the dominant voice in our society, and our world. Period. To this day, women make it work, but men take. And they take the credit for the work sometimes. And, I’m not saying men don’t do any work because they do. But men are in the key decision-making position in this world. Period. And it was no different in the Black Arts Movement even though there were prominent women in the movement. They were not the driving force per say, but I say definitively women were, they were the fuel, you know. Men might have been part of the tank, but women fueled it. They fueled it. As we do in most other areas of life. Not just with children. Period. You know, we make it happen. We’re the shit.

DF: It’s been really hard for a lot of DJs to carve a strong identity for themselves because of the formatting movement, so I’m wondering, how have you established yourself as such a fierce and regarded radio personality? Cause I think, I read an article where you said, “The ’70s were spent really laying the foundation down and establishing myself as a force to be reckoned with,” which I think is awesome, and I’d love to hear you expand upon that.

DW: Wow. Sounds like something I would say. Sounds like me. So I am a product of the Bronx, Harlem, Bayamon Puerto Rico, and uh Culpeper Virginia, which is where my daddy was from. So I had the southern roots, I’m latina–my mother is full-blooded Puerto Rican–and I lived in Puerto Rico as a child for a period of time. My first language was Spanish. My upbringing was in a black, middle-class neighborhood in the Bronx. But it was a black neighborhood, people who owned their homes. And I give you this context because I want to paint the picture of where I came from. To be able to substantiate my blessings. And the beautiful, ongoing, magnificent life and career that I’m having. That I came from those roots. So my father–we used to listen to WABC. The Good Guys. I loved radio. Radio was a dominant force in most black homes. And my daddy would blast the radio. And I also heard WWRL. AM signals for most black stations were not the strongest, but I still heard them. So I heard James Brown, Say it Loud, I’m Black Enough–I heard all this great music growing up-I believe that being a product–because I was born in 1953–and so I grew up as a small child in the ’60s. In the Civil Rights Movement, and I saw the images of protest, I heard the stories of Martin Luther King while he was still alive, speaking, you know, the great march on Washington. I witnessed history. And I was the product of parents invested in me. They kept me informed. They taught me to be hungry for information. And all of these things went into me becoming a radio personality. And me seeing my position on the microphone as more than just playing music. Sure I did that–I played music and I played great music, and I’m talking about a time where people where playing instruments and really singing! There was no auto-tune. There was no faking in the era of music I came up with. I came up with Otis Redding and The Staple Singers and the Isley Brothers, and you know, Aretha Franklin, Coming out of a Church, Sam Cooke. I am a product of Jimi Hendrix. I’m Buddy Miles. I am The Last Poet. I am Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five. I am all of that. So when I had the opportunity as we talk about the juxtaposition of the black arts movement, we talk about the women’s lib, the evolving of feminism. I came out of that. I graduated from high school in 1971, the year that Marvin Gaye released his seminal, signature album–What’s Going On. And that’s what informed me. That kind of thinking. I was a young woman, but I was concerned about the war. I was concerned about pollution. A lot of the same problems we have today still. But at that time, I had a big Angela Davis fro, we were very conscious. We were saying it loud. We were black and proud. And, like I said, I grew up in a home where my parents stressed pride. I was informed of a home of great culture and  with a father who loved black music, and loved radio. And instilled it in me. It was just drilled. I heard it all the time. Music was integral and black radio was integral to our family. So no surprise to my family when I went into it because I knew a lot about music, and I had an appreciation for it, as I still do. And more importantly, I love serving the community. I believe in super-serving the community. So I’m the kind of radio personality that uses the microphone to give information. So, you know, it’s music, plus. But for me the plus part is critical, and I’ve always been that kind of radio personality. So that has lent to my longevity, it has informed my style and approach, for which I’m known–I’m known for this–it’s my signature, it’ll be my signature until I’m dead. You know what, to be on the radio still, I started at WBAI. I started on the radio there, I think it was ’72.

DF:  Yeah, I think it’s been over four decades for you.

DW:  Oh no question about it. ’72 is when I was on the air at WBAI. And at City College at WCCR–our carrier current–I did a radio show there, so I’ve been on the radio a long time. I’ve done internet radio. I’ve done syndicated radio. I hosted my own syndicated radio show years ago. I’ve been doing it a long, long, long, long time. And it’s a blessing to continue to do it. I took a break when I had my first baby. But after that with the other babies, I just kept, I would have the baby and go back to work. And get on the air and say, “Yeah, his name is Soledine, he was eight pounds.” And this is social media. Social networking and stuff, so radio was, that was it.

DF: So to backtrack just a little bit, because I’m curious about when you started at WHUR in ’73, I know your show was called Ebony Moonbeams…I’m wondering, what kinds of artists did you play?

DW: Ebony Moonbeams was a very unique radio experience. It was my first terrestrial J-O-B. I was making 6,000 dollars a year, and you couldn’t tell me anything. I was like, “I am getting paid to be on the radio.” I was the second woman on the air at WHUR. And I was hungry, ambitious, very eager. And I used to play everything from Miles Davis to George Clinton Funkadelic. And you have to remember, the times. These songs were coming out. They were being released. It was not like now music–you know old school music–no this was, it was brand new to music. I remember, I would go from playing maybe Donny Hathaway “Someday we’ll all be free” into Miles Davis, “On The Corner,” something like that, and then go into you know, “Parliament.” And then maybe come back and play Grandmaster Flash. It was a mix. Initially Ebony Moonbeams was on at night. And Ebony Moonbeams was taken from a TV show that I produced in New York when I was at WCCR at City College at our former school. I did a cable TV show on teleprompter cable. It was based in Harlem on 125th street–the public access channel. And I produced an hour-long cultural art TV show. And I named it Ebony Moonbeams because everything was black, you know, ebony, back then, again, the whole pride of blackness. And I was walking down the street with a friend one day, and I saw a spotlight shooting through a full moon and I looked up and I was like, “Whoa, look at that. It’s a moonbeam. It’s so beautiful.” So I put it together. I put Ebony Moonbeams to articulate the spectrum. You know, the beauty I related to. I’ve always related to a full moon. And it’s gravitational pull. And that’s what I thought my show was. It was an array of music, interesting interviews with compelling people, and then my personality. I mean, I found an air check where I was doing some poetry, honey. Dyana poetry. Okay. And I went right back to the music, and I was like, Oh, girl, you were doing that. I was 19. I was a baby! I was a baby.

DF: Can you remember anyone you interviewed while you were there?

DW:  Yeah so I mean, I interviewed Angela Davis, all kind of people. All kind of people. And my show moved from nighttime to daytime, it became so popular, they took it off nighttime, and then I did 10am to I think it was 2 pm. Yup, so I did mid-days. I had Marion Barry, you know who was a councilman and later became the mayor, all kind of people.

DF: So when you started at WHUR, isn’t that the year that Cathy Hughes became General Sales Manager?

DW: You’re good girl. Absolutely correct. Cathy Hughes was when I arrived at WHUR, she was there, and she was in the sales department, and she did elevate to the General Sales Manager and then ultimately became the GM–the General Manager–after I left and went to WBLS in New York in ’75. But that’s where she and I met, and it was love at first sight. We became girls. And we became good girls. And we became good friends, She is the founder of Radio One, TV One, anything with a one in it. I tell the world–look at the dollar bill soon and see her face on it.  WHUR–it was a breeding ground for great talent, and she’s one of the biggest success stories to come out of, out of WHUR, and I will raise my hand as well, but there was several other people who came out of that era, that period, who went onto great successes and other things. So I’m honored to, I’m a graduate of WHUR, I went there for undergrad, and then I did my grad-work at WBLS 107.5 with Frankie Crocker. I graduated from Frankie Crocker University.

DF: Can you tell me a little bit about WBLS, and after that I’d also love to hear about being the first African-American woman rock DJ at WRQX.

DW: First of all, I was going back home. I grew up in New York, so this was an opportunity for my mother and father to hear me daily. And the people I went to school with, the people I grew up with, my teachers–whoever. And it was high cotton honey for me to go to WBLS. The woman who I patterned myself after stylistically–Vy Higginsen— was the first woman on WBLS. When I listened to her, it sounded like she was smiling, it sounded like she was speaking directly to me and that I was sitting in her living room, her kitchen, and we were just listening to music and talking about life. And that became my stylistic approach to radio and still is to this day. I really, when I’m on the air, I’m like, “How you feelin’ today? You good? What’s going on with you?” Even though I know, and my listeners know, I’m talking to hundreds of thousands of people at one time. But WBLS was a breeding ground for the best radio personalities under the very best radio programmer of any genre ever: Frankie Crocker. And he was the sun, we were the planets`that revolved around Mr. Crocker and his programming style, which became WBLS at that time was the number one station, was the top stations in New York City, and so considering that New York is the number one market in the country for television and radio, it was a significant thing for me as a young woman. I had just turned 21 when I moved back to New York to WBLS. A lot of people I went to school with were looking for jobs and couldn’t get them. And meanwhile, I had dropped out of college, had great success in DC, but here I came back, victorious, to my hometown, and that’s it. Most people I know want to work in New York. It’s the number one market. And I felt honored. Even though I did overnight, I was doing midnight to. I didn’t care. I was making more money than my mother and father combined salaries, I was living very well, I had just met Kenny Gamble, who became the ultra love of my life. You know, I had a fine man, who had his own record company, he was producing The O’Jays and Harold Melvin and Billy Paul, and Jerry Butler, all these great people, and I was on the radio, and I was like, uh, uh, honey, Jay-Z and Beyonce step aside. So I felt validated, I felt humbled, super grateful to be in that environment to learn from some of the best, not just Frankie, but my other colleagues, Luciano, Lamar Renee were still there. Although she and I didn’t interact very much. She and I were the only two women on air. And Ken Spiderweb. Sadie Holiday. These were some of my colleagues. Honey, we could go into any club, we were invited to every A-list party. All the artists wanted to talk to us, to be with us. We were breaking the music. So yeah it was great girl, it was beautiful. I was young, in love, doing what I wanted to do, in my hometown, you know I’m smiling quite broadly. Everybody should have that opportunity in life to do what they want. You known to do what they want. And when you do it under the veneer of love, of the passion of romantic love, it enhances the experience.

DF: Why did you leave WBLS for WRQX?

DW: I left to have my first baby. I took a year off, had my first child. Gamble and I had our first baby Caliph, and then I was used to working. I just loved radio. And I started looking around, and after a while, I got the job at WRQX. My program director knew that I had been in New York at WBLS, and it was such a regarded radio station, it gave me a cache, and this was a part time job. I was on only on the weekends. I had, had my second son, Salahdeen, but I wanted to work, I love radio. And this was a great opportunity, and I didn’t know much about rock music, but I was like “Hey, I’m a radio personality, I can do any format! I can do classical music!” That’s what I used to say to myself and I’m glad I had that kind of attitude because I wouldn’t have gotten the job probably and girl my first show was five hours and I had to program my own show. I’m talking Led Zepplin and I mean. I almost collapsed. I remember almost falling out of the studio because it was riveting. I didn’t know the music that well. I mean I knew the James Taylors and that kind of soft rock, but I didn’t know the heavier rock, and we played a mix. But it was a blessing. So the staff was really white, and here I was this latina, afro-rican woman walking up in the joint, but I had cred, I had BLS, I had New York number-one-market credibility, and that conveyed, and it worked. And I enjoyed that job. But Yeah girl! I can rock, I can rock with the best of them!

DF: What are your favorite rock bands?

DW: Rock bands let’s see. I love The Eagles, I used to play The Eagles. I know that’s kind of like–I’m not a heavy rock girl. I like the softer side of rock. My favorite, favorite–I don’t even know if they should be called rock, cause they’re like a hybrid–is Steely Dan, but we played Steely Dan on rock stations, so. Yup, I love, I’m a Hendrix, Buddy Miles, that kind of rock. And black people don’t get their props when it comes to black rock, the creation of rock. Lil Richard, Chuck Barry, I like that kind of rock. Bo Diddley. That was all rock, and it was assimilated by the British artists and American artists, and they created, you know, a hybrid of it. But the founders of rock are black. Muddy Waters, the hybrid of blues. All of that. And British and white rockers took it someplace else. And some of them credit black artists, like The Rolling Stones. They named themselves after a Muddy Waters song. So they know. They knew. Look, Mick Jagger knows. Eric Clapton knows. They know. And they cite black artists as the originators.

DF: Yeah, and going off of that, something I haven’t gotten to ask you about yet, you’ve been a media activist over the years, ultimately earning you the title of, ‘The Mother of Black Music Month,’ so I would love to hear you talk about that and I also, I had watched an interview with you where you were talking about getting the presidential proclamation signed… if you could talk about that a bit, that would be great.

DW: My ex, Kenny Gamble, went to Nashville, which is called Music City, and he was extremely impressed with the Country Music Association. And what they were doing in terms of a development of a place. And he wanted to replicate that in Philadelphia. More importantly, he wanted to replicate the concept of a music organization for black music. So he was one of the co-founders of the Black Music Association. And we were a couple at that time, so I was very involved, very active in the national as well as the local chapter. More in the local chapter. And then he came up with the idea with Ed White and myself. We would talk about the establishment of a period of time, like black history month, where we could acknowledge, and celebrate the achievements of black people behind the scenes, as well as the folks who are well known. The artists, the musicians. And so, the birth of Black Music Month. And then many years after The Black Music Association went out of existence, I started a foundation, an organization called The International Association of African-American Music, and we produced it during Black Music Month, and I wrote president Clinton, asked him to host a reception, much like Jimmy Carter had done in the 1970s. The first Black Music Month event was held on the lawn at the White House, with president Jimmy Carter. At that point, President Clinton’s people came back and said, well we see that President Carter hosted this event, and all the people that were there. But he did not find a presidential proclamation. So from our vantage point, we’re like, “Okay, go get some legislation and come back to us, and we’ll do something.” I mean really, that’s how it went down. And I put some good, comfortable shoes on, and I went lobbying on capitol hill. I didn’t know what I was doing, other than I knew I was passionate about–I wanted people to sign off and say okay. I wanted someone to help me get legislation from congress that said June is Black Music Month, and it is one of our greatest assets, a national treasure, one of our greatest exports. And it’s a multi-billion dollar business. Those are my talking points. And so here this little girl from the Bronx and Harlem–I got senators to sign up. I got congressmen to sign up. I got congressman Chaka Fattah to introduce it into congress, and the bill passed. And then I went back to the Clinton administration. I went back to the White House, and said,”Okay, I got the legislation, it’s called the African-American Music Bill.” And they were like “Okay. We’re setting up a meeting with you and the president in the oval office.” And I went to the White House, and I met with Bill Clinton, and he gave me props, so that was meeting with him in the oval office. My second one took place sometime later with The Isley Brothers. The White House called and said, “The president would like to meet with you, but by the way, can you bring The Isley Brothers.” And I was like, “Okay.” I had two private meetings with Bill Clinton in the oval office during his administration. So this is something my ex and I are passionate about. He and I are still partners in Black Music Month. Last year, I did an interview with him for Billboard Magazine. And, you know, we were talking about Black Music Month, it’s relevancy still after all these years. And the reality is that Gamble is 73, I will be 63 soon. You know, we’re up in life now. The kind of energy and vitality you have, we don’t have it quite the same because we were on the front-lines. We were fighting, pushing, and not that we aren’t anymore, because my ex-husband is a freedom-fighter extraordinaire, and he’s an amazing man. I mean, he’s the most amazing person I know. Other than my mama, it’s him. And you know, he has eleven charter schools, he has all kinds of businesses. He employs hundreds of people. I have great respect for what my ex-husband has done with his money that he made from the music industry. How he recycled it into the very neighborhood he grew up in, and has transformed it. And me, same thing. I’m still president of the Philadelphia chapter of the recording academy–The Grammy’s. I have about almost a thousand people in my chapter. I’m still very engaged in music activism, and all of this came as a result of my relationship with Kenny Gamble, our almost decade-long relationship, and intimate, romantic, family, marriage. But now we are still partners in life in terms of our activism and our perpetuation of black music and culture.

DF: So I was also wondering because I know that you also teach a lot, what advice do you have for young people looking to get into radio?

DW: Pursue your passion if that’s what you want to do. When I first started in radio, people used to say to me, oh it’s male-dominated, it’s so tough, it’s so competitive. Well that went in one ear and out the other. If I had let that–no for real–if I had let that if I had let that bother me and stop me, I wouldn’t be having a 40-plus year, radio, TV, music industry career. Mmmm. Mmmm. I didn’t let it deter me, so what I say to young people is follow your passion. But I wouldn’t encourage to go into radio right now. Because I know so many unemployed radio people. Create a radio station, create a product. That’s what I say.

DF: What do you think about podcasting and the opportunities that provides?

DW: I think they’re great, too. I would say to young people, use the technology, use the internet to your advantage. And podcasts, you set yourself up as an authority, as a source of information. You know, create your following. Knowledge is power, and the more  information, or the more you have a force of something that motivates and encaptures other people, do it. And that doesn’t cost a lot. You don’t need a lot of resources to do podcasts. So use everything you have available to help propel your brand.

DF: I know you’ve been interviewed many times. Is there a question you’ve never been asked about your career that you think is important?

DW: Wow, I just can’t even think. For me to be lost for words, that is such a profound question that would require greater thought and time to respond to. But I’m good girl. It’s a joyful experience. I’m happy. There’s not much, I’m not leaving much on the table. When I leave a body here, it will be said I’ve lived a very full experience. And as far as radio is concerned, it has been the perfect medium for me. I tell you, I walk into the radio station still, Danielle, and I feel fortunate and I feel happy. That is just my environment. It’s like I’m living out loud. My boyfriend came to visit me recently and he saw this book—I’m on the cover of a book.

DF: What book?

DW:  Invisible Stars by Donna Halper. And when I got the book, girl, she had me on the cover! And I did not know she was putting me on the cover. I’m on the cover with legendary women. One of them being Oprah Winfrey. My man was like, “Baby you’re a cover girl!” What an honor to be on the cover with American broadcasters, because that’s what I am, I’m an American broadcaster, whose specialty, whose area of great interest and passion was black music, black culture. That’s just it.