Jay Kernis'Good parent' Jay Kernis will return to NPR
Originally published in Current, March 12, 2001
By Mike Janssen and Steve BehrensPeople were hugging Jay Kernis. He wasn't sure who some of them were.
Kernis, a key figure in the creation of NPR's morning newsmagazines, is returning to the network as senior v.p. of programming after 14 years at CBS News. He starts work May 7.
As colleagues welcomed him back when he visited at NPR last week, he realized that his absence didn't diminish his passion for public radio--perhaps no hiatus could allow that--but it did wipe some names from memory.
"To me, NPR is still on M Street," he said, sitting in NPR's second-floor lobby overlooking Massachusetts Avenue, as he recalled the old offices where he helped create Morning Edition and the Saturday and Sunday versions of Weekend Edition before departing in 1986.
But, like a divorced dad, he has stayed in touch with NPR, following the lives of "his kids," as he calls the programs he put on the air. Kernis has critiqued tapes, conferred with producers, attended conferences and kept in touch with friends in public radio.
"It's hard to say I ever left NPR," he said. "I simply could not get it out of my system."
Now 48, Kernis started in public radio at the age of 16, when he worked at WRVR, a station licensed to New York City's Riverside Church. There, he met Robert Siegel and Neal Conan, now hosts at NPR.
After college, he joined NPR in 1974 as its first on-air promotion coordinator, and produced 30- and 60-second promo spots for all of its programs. He started creating programs five years later, when he became a founding producer of Morning Edition.
He took a central role in the morning program just weeks before it premiered, said Joe Gwathmey, then director of programming at NPR and now president of Texas Public Radio in San Antonio. NPR spent much of two years planning the new show, but the producers had come up with "a monstrosity," Gwathmey said. "We were too close to a launch to go back and start over again. So a lot of people were let go."
Kernis "stepped into an emergency situation and with great creative energy and sensitivity to what we were trying to accomplish, aided by many others, he got it put together. I think that was as close as I've ever seen to the indispensable man being in the right place at the right time."
He stuck with the program for five years, then created Weekend Edition Saturday with Scott Simon, which he executive-produced for two years. Before leaving NPR, he and Susan Stamberg started Weekend Edition Sunday.
Kernis left NPR for CBS News, where he spent five years as senior producer of live segments on CBS This Morning, and also produced stories for Eye to Eye with Connie Chung throughout the show's four-year run. He now produces for 60 Minutes, where he's worked with anchors Lesley Stahl and Mike Wallace.
While at CBS, Kernis often called his friends at NPR, and he made it a habit to call new executives and let them know he was available to offer advice.
That practice paved the way for his return. Kernis called Kevin Klose a few days before the president started his new job, and when NPR decided to create the v.p. of programming position, Klose called back to see if Kernis was interested.
The timing wasn't right, but when former programming veep Bill Davis left to spend more time with his family and become c.e.o. of Minnesota Public Radio's new California sibling, Klose checked with Kernis again. The talks continued that time, and over the past few months Kernis and NPR have worked together to define the duties of his new job.
His stint in commercial TV did little to dampen his love of public radio. "I really know what I miss," he said. He speaks passionately about the medium's potential, clearly eager to rejoin his former team.
"This is where my heart is," he said.
Colleagues cite his passion as a defining quality. Sandra Rattley-Lewis, now a producer with the WorldSpace satellite radio operation, worked with Kernis on Morning Edition. "In the mundaneness, the routineness of the news business, the possibility of descending into ruts always exists," she said. "Jay is the kind of person who is kind of rut-less by nature."
Cindy Carpien, who worked with Kernis and then succeeded him as producer of Weekend Edition Saturday, said he inspired rather than taught his staff. Like a good parent, she said, "he made you feel like you could do anything."
"Jay was this good parent. He was also a parent who had tantrums. You had to calm him down, he cared so much."
Carpien said it felt strange to move into his Weekened Edition office after he left. "I remember that I called it Jay's office for two years."
"Jay understands the potential of radio not just to inform but also to change people," said On the Media co-host Brooke Gladstone. "Informing is an important goal, but another goal is to bring that reality home. You can portray it, or you can convey it, and Jay knows how to convey it."
Gladstone remembered how Kernis worked with then-NPR reporter John Hockenberry on a Weekend Edition piece about Ryan Martin, a boy who was wounded and paralyzed in a shooting accident. The boy and Hockenberry played ping-pong as they talked, and then Kernis put a little reverb on the sound of ball hitting paddle.
"It was clearly an effect," said Gladstone. "The judicious use of sound, in that case, was not intended to mislead, but to give the listener a moment to reflect on what had just happened."
Kernis returns to a changed NPR, developing shows and plotting strategies for audio media irrelevant to the original Morning Edition crew. Radio, once his sole concern, will now compete with satellite radio, the Internet and even television for his attention.
Stories for 60 Minutes have occupied him for years, he admitted. "I have not thought very big thoughts [about public radio] for a long time."
Kernis said the promise of higher salaries lured him to CBS, and that he'll accept lower pay upon returning. He'll work three days a week in D.C. and the rest of his week in New York, where he lives with his wife and two children.
. To Current's home page . Outside links: NPR's Morning Edition, Weekend Edition Saturday and Weekend Edition Sunday.
Web page posted March 17, 2001
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