New NPR Program Offers Listeners Live, Updated News From Around the World, Nation and Here in Texoma
June 17, 2013 – Beginning on July 1, KCCU will broadcast Here & Now from 1 to 3 pm to meet growing audience demand for midday news and analysis. A live production from NPR and WBUR, Boston, in collaboration with public radio stations across the country, Here & Now reflects the fluid world of news as it’s happening, with timely, smart and in-depth news and conversation.
Here & Now has a successful track record: it began at WBUR in 1997 and is carried today by over 180 stations nationwide. Here & Now will expand from one to two hours on July 1 in collaboration with NPR. The expanded program will serve as a bridge in midday, between NPR's signature news magazines, Morning Edition and All Things Considered. This marks the first time NPR has collaborated with a member station on a daily news program.
KCCU is one of 180 stations nationwide carrying the expanded Here & Now, presenting listeners the opportunity to hear more NPR news from around the world and across the country every weekday. The program’s daily lineup will include interviews with NPR hosts, reporters, editors and bloggers as well as news from stations across the nation. In the midday timeslot, Here & Now will often function as public radio’s first source for breaking news coverage with NPR.
Here & Now has been hosted by Robin Young for more than a decade. A Peabody Award-winning journalist, she has reported for NBC, CBS and ABC television, and was substitute host and correspondent for The Today Show. Starting July 1, Young will be joined by co-host Jeremy Hobson, most recently host of Marketplace Morning Report. Hobson has broad producing, reporting and hosting experience at the station, program and network level. Additionally, Meghna Chakrabarti, co-host of WBUR's Radio Boston, has been selected as the program's primary back-up host.
To ensure that Here & Now reflects what’s happening in a diverse geographic range of communities, NPR and WBUR have invited other public radio stations across the nation to contribute to the show. These contributions may be presented as feature packages, interviews or straightforward collaboration when news is unfolding in a specific market.
Since the NPR collaboration with WBUR was announced, numerous NPR journalists have already been on Here & Now, including Morning Edition Host Steve Inskeep, Senior Washington Editor Ron Elving, International Correspondent Peter Kenyon and White House Correspondent Scott Horsley. Digital-first productions, like NPR Music and Monkey See, NPR’s pop culture blog, are being developed as regular weekly on-air segments for Here & Now.
About Here & Now
NPR, WBUR, Boston and public radio stations across the country are joining forces to bring listeners news and analysis in midday with Here & Now. Here & Now offers a distinctive mix of hard news and rich conversation featuring interesting players from across the spectrum of arts and culture, business, technology, science and politics. Here & Now, produced by WBUR since 1997, is expanding to two hours on July 1 with co-hosts Robin Young and Jeremy Hobson.
