R.I.P.: Johnny 'The Duke' Allen, NYC Radio Personality

 

Radio personality Johnny “The Duke” Allen, whose smooth voice took him to top radio stations and whose school raised a generation of disc jockeys, has died of complications from diabetes, his family said. The Baldwin resident was 72.

From R&B to hip hop, Allen spun records for New York FM stations with massive audiences in the African American community — 98.7 KISS, 107.5 WBLS, 92 WKTU, Jammin' 105 and 103.5 KTU. He interviewed the famous, Donna Summer and Jennifer Lopez among them, and was credited with being the first to play just slow love songs at his WKTU Sunday show, before the theme became popular at other stations.

“You’re with The Duke,” he would say on air. “We’re riding all night, high in the music saddle.”

Newsday reports his 45-year on-air longevity, rare in the industry, was attributed to his work ethic. At the time of his death Dec. 6, he had a job at iSoulRadio.com recording introductions to classics from his home studio.

Allen at WKTU

“He loved what he did, and it wasn’t work,” said G. Keith Alexander, a friend and disc jockey who worked with Allen at four stations. “You couldn’t outtalk him when it came to music. He knew his music, he knew his songs, he knew the artists.”

Allen had an “everyman” appeal to listeners, his friend said: "Not only did they think of him as a guy with a great voice but a guy who connected with them. When they saw Johnny coming, they would say ‘Hey, that’s my man! Johnny! Duke!’ ”

In the early ’70s, Allen was spinning records at a Manhattan club when he was noticed by Alexander and Frankie “Hollywood” Crocker, a trailblazing disc jockey at WBLS. Crocker hired him to fill in for a DJ who was going to be away for months, Alexander recalled.

Over the decades, even as he nabbed coveted radio time slots, Allen took on many side gigs. He booked and emceed the entertainment for cruises, family members said. For about seven years, he had a popular radio show in Japan, hosting the music he loved from a Rockefeller Center studio.

But one of his proudest creations was a disc jockey school, the Queen  Broadcasting Center, which he ran from 1991 to 2001, first in Jamaica and later in Manhattan.

“He saw it as a way to help the other young DJs and broadcasters and radio personalities because he was somebody who had people along the way helping him,” said his son, Jay Allen of Maywood, New Jersey.