My show is entitled Overnight Music and Information with The Rootzmaster. My focus is two-fold: (1) music from all the world, all over the US, Central and South America, Africa, the Caribbean, and Europe, and (2) I focus on information to highlight certain endeavors and events. For instance, my show this morning focused on International Women’s day. I played the work of women artists, musicians and poets. I even have a dynamite young poet who came into the WWOZ studio to share her work with the world, her name is Honey Savage.

I’m on WWOZ from 12am-6am on Wednesday mornings. It’s the middle of the night in New Orleans, most of the city is sleeping, so my listeners are all over the rest of the world.

A third to a half of the artistic endeavors I play (it’s not just music, it’s poetry and spoken word) are listener requests. I get requests and dedications from folks from around the globe. That cross pollination between wherever they are and New Orleans is a big part of my show. 99.9% of the time, we have their request accessible in the WWOZ archive! Once I got a call from Krakow, Poland from a listener asking for a Polish waltz. I didn’t think we’d have it, but we did!

If we ever doubted the significance of WWOZ to people all over this country, and all over the world, COVID answered that doubt. I was physically coming into the studio because people wanted to have someone to talk to. I was getting calls from all over the planet earth. Most people didn’t have a song request, they just wanted to chat. They were stir crazy and needed someone to talk to. They needed to be validated as, “I’m still here. I’m still alive. I’m still important.” WWOZ was, and is, a major factor in offering listeners that connection and validation.

In my humble opinion, I feel folks should become members of WWOZ so we can stay viable. We don’t do commercials, so you listeners are our funding source. You are real, you are human! Continue to support us, show your love, and we can show our love back as well. It’s a mutual uplifting endeavor.

You should support WWOZ because it represents you. You being who you are, collectively with other folks, we are a community. As a community we have strength, love, energy and we strive to make this planet a better world through music and artistic endeavors. Thank you for supporting WWOZ during this membership drive at wwoz.org/donate!

-Rootzmaster Koné
Host of Overnight Music and Information with the Rootzmaster
Wednesday mornings from 12am-6am

Listen to the Rootzmaster's show on the 2-week archive: wwoz.org/listen/archive/show.php?date=2023-03-08&time=12AM