Michael Eric Dyson Show Debuts Next Monday

Now that NPR's "News and Notes" has ended, the African American Public Radio Consortium, which sparked "The Tavis Smiley Show" and "Tell Me More" with Michel Martin, all on National Public Radio, is launching "The Michael Eric Dyson Show" on Monday in partnership with Baltimore's WEAA-FM, the Morgan State University station.

The author, college professor, minister and talk-show pundit, hosted a show syndicated on Radio One until March 2007. He was eventually replaced by Warren Ballentine. The show will air Monday through Friday, in 18 markets including: Atlanta (WCLK), Raleigh-Durham, N.C., (WSHA and WNCU), Las Vegas (KCEP) and Houston (KTSU). Air times will vary according to the market, the consortium said.

Dyson will do “newsmaker” interviews and talk about issues of the day, from politics to religion. His first guest next Monday will be Oprah Winfrey.

“I feel this opportunity with public radio suits me just fine,” said Dyson. As a cerebral academic, Dyson seems like a good fit with public radio. Yet he is a pop culture fan. At Georgetown last fall, he taught a class on hip hop culture.

From his first stint at Radio One as a radio host, he said he learned “that I love doing this. And this is an extension of my work in other spheres, whether it’s TV like the Bill Maher show [on HBO] or publishing a book.”

For now, the show is one hour a night but he hopes to eventually go two hours so he’ll have time to take calls from listeners.

So how did he get Oprah? “A lot of begging, brother!” he joked. More seriously, he said, she’s “a dear friend. It’s an opportunity to talk to the empress of the media universe.” He also plans to talk to the likes of Donna Brazell, Spike Lee, Hill Harper and Samuel L. Jackson.

He’s looking forward to talking for longer periods of time than in commercial radio since he’ll have fewer breaks: “This facilitates greater depth of conversation.”
Some info from Journal-isms and ajc.