LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — KOKY. Four letters with more than 50 years of history and music.
“We came in as a race radio station in 1956,” DJ Mark Dylan explained. “KOKY has been an advocate for this black community for many, many years.”
It was Arkansas' first radio station devoted to reaching a black audience. Initially focused on religious programming, the station eventually tapped into a different audience, teenagers.
And one of them was, of course, Al Bell, a high schooler who was still in school when he was given a job as a disc jockey.
“I knew, that within the coverage area of that radio station, that I was playing music that the people wanted to hear and I knew why they wanted to hear it,” former DJ Al Bell said. “That gave me confidence to play the music.” It was music that Bell said connected people in a dark time.
“Kids would come into Studio A, look at me play the music, and dance. And they were black kids and white kid,” Bell recalled. “This was 1957, 1958.”
But he couldn’t understand why things were so different outside of the station.
“At that time, in my mind, I was saying ‘Well, why are we having all these black and white problems, when I don’t see that every morning with these young people?’” Bell asked himself.
Fast forward a few years.
Bell moved on and 12-year-old Mark Dylan started as an intern at the station.
He's been in the industry for more than forty years and says there's something about R&B that speaks to people.
“The history of the music, if you stop and think about it, the table setters, those baby boomers who were born post World War II,” Dylan said. “The ‘Johnny Cashs,’ the ‘Elvis Presleys,’ the ‘Al Greens,’ and people like that, they brought a lot of greatness and soul into the music.
A lot of that sound was rooted in Arkansas.
“Al Green is a Forest City, Arkansas native. He was a part of that Memphis sound that just changed the whole evolution of soul music. It forces you to pick up your game and sing,” Dylan said.
“There have been many. Johnny Cash is an Arkansan. Glen Campbell is an Arkansan.”
And according to Dylan, their music influenced everything we hear in 2020.
It’s that idea and soul that drives KOKY. “Over the years we’ve been able to matriculate into the general market as well,” Dylan explained. “We make sure to create an atmosphere of no color lines. So, if there’s a record with soul, we want to be involved in it.”
But Dylan says the station wouldn't be what it is without the people listening.
“We know that there are so many choices nowadays. It’s not always terrestrial radio anymore,” Dylan said. “We’re fortunate the parents who listened to us over the years have taught their children to listen to KOKY.”
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