Several of Sonja D. Williams’ broadcast productions have been award winning, including a 2009 Gracie Award for her work as a Co-Executive Producer of Uncrowned Queens: Voices of African American Women, a 13-part radio series about extraordinary black women community leaders living in Buffalo and Western New York.
Below is a selective list of the documentaries, articles, and specials written and produced by Williams.
Audio/Broadcast Productions
Co-Producer, BIO Podcast, An ongoing series of interviews with award winning and first time authors of biographers from throughout the world, in association with the Biographers International Organization, iTunes, February 2019 – Current.
Producer, Kitchen Table Talks, a three-episode podcast series from the Suffrage, Race, Power: Black Women Unerased initiative, celebrating the political engagement of women during this centennial year of the woman’s right to vote. August 2020.
Executive Producer, From the Archives: Programs Produced by Howard University Students, Faculty, Alumni and Staff, weekly series, HBCU Channel 142, Sirius XM, October 2016 – 2018.
Co-Executive Producer, Uncrowned Queens: Voices of African American Women, 13-part series, WNED-Buffalo, October 2008 – March 2009.
Co-Producer, Voices of Change: Communications and Resistance in Apartheid South Africa, Bush Radio, Cape Town, South Africa; Voice of America, January 2003.
Associate Producer/Writer, Jazz Singers, 13-part series, Smithsonian Productions/Public Radio International series, January – April 2001.
With a Little Help From My Friends: Jazz Vocal Groups, February 1, 2001
It’s Our World…Sometimes: Women Jazz Singers, March 1, 2001
Today, Tomorrow, Forever?, March 29, 2001
Audio Consultant, Freedom Never Dies: The Legacy of Harry T. Moore, WUFT-TV/PBS, January 12, 2001.
Producer/Writer, Jazz Profiles, NPR series, 1996-2000.
Louis Armstrong’s World: Ambassador Satch, November 1, 2000
Andy Bey, October 12, 1999
McCoy Tyner, December 10, 1998
Betty Carter, October 16, 1997
Jaki Byard, June 12, 1997
Melba Liston, December 24, 1996
Producer, Affirmative Action and Higher Education: An Aural History, NPR, March 14, 1998.
Producer/Writer, Chicago Matters: What’s Working series, WBEZ-FM, 1997.
Routes Out Of Poverty, April 23, 1997.
Associate Producer, Making The Music, 26-part series, NPR, 1996.
Duke Ellington’s Harlem Suite, March 18, 1996
Associate Producer, Black Radio: Telling It Like It Was, 13-part series, Radio Smithsonian/Public Radio International, December 1995-March 1996.
In the Beginning, December 26, 1995
Pride and Enlightenment, January 2, 1996
A Woman’s Touch, February 6, 1996
In Control, February 13, 1996
Other Voices, March 19, 1996
Producer, On Sacred Ground, NPR, 1996, Sweet Honey in the Rock special, January 25, 1996
Editor, Billy Taylor’s Jazz at the Kennedy Center, NPR series
Antonio Hart, March 19, 1996
Stanley Turrentine, March 26, 1996
Associate Producer/Writer, Wade In The Water: African American Sacred Music Traditions, 26-part series, NPR/Smithsonian Institution,, January – June 1994.
Songs and Singing as Church, January 4, 1994
The Power of Communal Song,February 1, 1994
Swing Low, Sweet Chariot: The Fisk Jubilee Singers and the Concert Spiritual Tradition, February 15, 1994
There Is A Balm in Gilead: African American Composers and the Concert Spiritual Tradition, Feb. 22, 1994
I’m So Glad Trouble Don’t Last Always: The African American Spiritual and the Struggle for A New Classical Concert Tradition, March 1, 1994
Precious Lord: The Gospel Song Legacy of Thomas Andrew Dorsey, April 19, 1994
The Chicago School of Gospel: The Music of Roberta Martin and Kenneth Morris, April 26, 1994
Crossing Over: African American Sacred Songs and the Search For Wider Audiences, May 10, 1994
Instruments in the Service of the Lord, May 17, 1994
The African American Jazz Tradition and the Wider World of the Sacred Part I – May 24, 1994 The African American Jazz Tradition and the Wider World of the Sacred Part II – May 31, 1994
We’ve Come This Far By Faith: The Story of the California Gospel Movement, June 14, 1994
Contemporary Gospel Composers: Stretching the Boundaries, June 28, 1994
Producer, Alternatives: One Woman’s Fight Against AIDS, NPR, March 12, 1992.
Executive Producer, In Touch, Howard University series, WHUR-FM, 1990-1992.
Leadership in the African Americans Community, April 26, 1992
African Americans and Education, February 24, 1991
AIDS In The African American Community, April 28, 1991
Black Music Then and Now, February 18, 1990
Blacks in the Arts, March 25, 1990
Blacks in Politics, April 29, 1990