Biography
Although his name seldom registered with American audiences, Willis Conover ranks among the most consequential figures in the history of jazz broadcasting. After working at stations in Washington, D.C., and New York from 1939 through 1954, he forged his most enduring connection when he joined the Voice of America in 1954. His programs carried jazz to listeners across Europe, particularly behind the Iron Curtain, at the height of the Cold War and thereby helped open doors for U.S. musicians who toured the continent in the 1960s and 1970s. Among the millions who first encountered the music through his voice was pianist Adam Makowicz. Conover further shaped the jazz scene by hosting the Newport Jazz Festival for more than a decade, by staging Duke Ellington’s 70th-birthday concert at the White House in 1969, and by serving as the influential chair of the jazz panel at the National Endowment for the Arts. His role in carrying jazz to audiences worldwide remains impossible to overstate.