WXPN's Helen Leicht celebrates 40 years of loving Philly music

Everything Helen Leicht says and does has something to do with connectivity. Watch the DJ host the Free at Noon concerts at World Cafe Live. Listen to her midday show or her Tuesday-night "Local Music Hour" on WXPN-FM (88.5). Jog with her (which you can do Sunday at a 5K run for another of her causes, Musicians on Call). Or just blab with her on the phone.

You'll find it's connection this and connectivity that.

"Connection is what matters most, the connection between life and music," she says softly but seriously in her familiar radio voice - equal doses den mother and come-hither siren. That's why she's getting the Connector Award next Thursday at World Cafe Live for her 40 years in Philadelphia radio and her longtime support of local music by LiveConnections - a nonprofit group of artists, educators, and entrepreneurs who combat the decline of music education in Philadelphia schools.

"Helen's lasting impact on Philly's scene is an obvious sincerity in her devotion to supporting music she believes in," says Andrew Lipke, local chamber-pop prince.

Lipke - like Amos Lee, Ben Arnold, Dr. Dog, Melody Gardot, Mutlu, a bunch of Hooters, and many others - has appeared often on Leicht's radio shows. Lipke originated "Bridge Sessions" for LiveConnections, a program of interactive, educational performances at World Cafe Live in collaboration with members of the Philadelphia Orchestra.

"She's driven by what moves her, sticks with artists she gets behind, and supports their development. Sometimes, they break out of the local scene and become international touring artists. Sometimes, their careers are built more regionally, like myself," Lipke says. "Either way, her support is steadfast, and I think the community of music lovers and supporters see this as a reflection of her integrity and love her even more for it."

Lipke adds, too, that there's "that voice," one that anyone old enough to know better remembers from Leicht's on-air start at WIOQ-FM in 1976, when that station was ferociously independent AOR (album-oriented rock) rather than the dance/hip-hop behemoth it is now.

" 'XPN now is what 'IOQ was back in the day," Leicht says, thinking about the station where she started. David Dye, host/creator of the World Cafe syndicated radio show, was at WIOQ during those heady days, and he brought Leicht to 'XPN after he went there in 1989.

"I respect Helen at 'XPN for the same qualities that made her a great music director when we worked together at 'IOQ: She can listen to a stack of music and find the ones that the listeners are going to respond to. You would think that was easy, but it's not. She is uncanny. A real connection," Dye emailed from Australia, where he and 'XPN general manager Roger LaMay were, in LaMay's words, "gathering World Cafe content."

Before her WIOQ stint, Leicht was a production assistant at KYW-TV when it was on Walnut Street, and she was around in February 1972 when John Lennon and Yoko Ono cohosted The Mike Douglas Show. (Watch a clip of John and Yoko backing Chuck Berry on the show here.)

Considering that Leicht became the first Beatles-only broadcaster when she started at WIOQ, with the Sunday-morning Breakfast with the Beatles, meeting Lennon was a big deal. (She met Paul McCartney, too, in 1984: "I could hardly speak from just staring at him.")

Leicht is also the niece of the late Philadelphia radio great and WIBG general manager Joe Conway, so her destiny had that leg up. "He was the start for me," she says.

Talking about her days at WIOQ and morphing into a role at 'XPN (two separate times, with a stop in between at WMMR), she laughs about her first gig at 'XPN - a Saturday-afternoon slot "between Car Talk and Afropop Worldwide."

A strange slot, but she made it click by asking then-'XPN program director Mike Morrison whether she could play local music and bring in Philly musicians. "We were still on 39th Street in 1990, and I think the early musicians like Ben Arnold and John Flynn had a hard time finding the station," she said.

"She has always been a very warm, authentic, and straightforward person, and I feel lucky to call her a friend," says Arnold, a local soul-folkie who has appeared on Leicht's shows many times." Helen's willingness to give otherwise unknown musicians a chance on radio and closely mentor their careers has been invaluable."

Leicht finds and promotes musicians she loves - international artists such as repeat Free at Noon visitors Adele, Joe Jackson, and Ray LaMontagne, and locals like Lipke, Kate Gaffney, and Mutlu, whose acquaintance she made when WXPN moved into new digs with World Cafe Live on Walnut Street in 2004 - and says simply, "I'm just attracted to good people."

Case in point: Her 34-year marriage to Biff Kennedy, a onetime Sony label PR-boss-turned-artist-manager (e.g., Birdie Busch), who has had faculty roles at Millersville University, Drexel and, currently, the University of the Arts. "Yeah, he's a good guy," she says, laughing. They have a son and a daughter, both college-age.

Family plays a role in Leicht's collaboration with the Musicians on Call program (and its enrollment of Philadelphia artists to play for patients at seven local hospitals). It was her mother's 2009 death from lung cancer, and Leicht's own diagnosis of ovarian cancer, that made her aware of the healing power of music.

"When the shock wore [off], I was able to conjure great memories that I had with music," Leicht says. "I did the same for my mom playing Sinatra records - her favorite. This is important: Music can make a bad day good and a good day better."

Emailing from Australia, LaMay said: "Helen has been the leading edge of 'XPN's continuing push to engage, support, and give national exposure to Philadelphia artists. Our growing membership is an endorsement of that commitment. We connect artists and audiences. Local artists get a boost here that few other cities offer, and Helen is their chief advocate."

That's the whole point, as far as Leicht is concerned, connecting artists to audiences - local artists in particular - and building community. "This is old-fashioned radio," she says with a laugh. "I never played an instrument, so I love making the connections between Philly artists and bigger artists and making them connect to an audience.

"I love making music matter."

We asked Leicht to list some of her favorite local songs and artists, current and past. First up was a favorite new album, Amos Lee's Spirit. Here are some songs she likes, too:

Jesse Hale Moore, "Every Time." It's a current fave, and she says she's "waiting for more new music" from him.

Mutlu, "Gone Forever," from his new EP, Caffeine & Whiskey.

Vita & the Woolf, "Brett."

Hemming, "All I Want."

Cole Redding, "Save Me." Says Leicht: "This is the first song I played from Cole . . . waiting for his debut album."

Liz Longley, "Weightless," title track off her new album.

Ginger Coyle, "Rise Up," a new song from her forthcoming album.

The Youngers, "Morning Sun," from their new album, Picture of You.

Heart Harbor, "Hate Nothing."

American Babies, "What Does It Mean to Be," from their latest album, An Epic Battle Between Light and Dark.

"Neighborhood Struggles" from A Day in My Life, a collaboration between students at the Henry H. Houston School and LiveConnections, with Andrew Lipke.