In this week’s issue… NAB Show wrap-up – CBC makes big cuts – WHN towers down – CRTC to station: “sell or die” – Norm Peters, RIP
By SCOTT FYBUSH
*Some NAB Shows bring with them big changes in the broadcasting industry’s outlook. Some come with exciting new technological developments. And some, like NAB Show 2014, are purely evolutionary. Sure, there were some interesting new developments in the integration of radio into streaming audio (my colleague Lance Venta covered some of those on his RadioInsight live blog), and sure, we got to hear iBiquity explain how this year, finally, was the year when HD Radio will break through to mass-market status (and, yeah, there actually was an HD receiver in our otherwise stripped-down, manual-window-crank Toyota Yaris rental).
But if we don’t have a whole lot new to say about last week in the desert, it’s largely because the 2014 edition of the NAB Show, at least for local broadcasters, was more of an evolutionary event. So what did we learn?
On the radio side, we learned that broadcasters – at least most of the ones we talked with – are finding their place in the digital landscape. The revenue picture on the terrestrial side is still surprisingly strong, and we heard from lots of stations, even in smaller markets, that understand that their future lies not just in a transmitter attached to a tower but in being a local source of audio (and sometimes video) content across all sorts of platforms. Is your station selling space on digital signage at local arenas and event facilities? It’s bringing in good money for some operators, and it’s become a platform some automation vendors can now support.
We met “GatesAir,” which looked an awful lot like Harris Broadcast, at least for now. There are new transmitters in the works there, and of course our Nova Scotian friends at Nautel had their new GV series of high-efficiency FM transmitters on display for the first time, too. And it was nice to see new FM antenna products from several NERW-land vendors, including a new high-powered broadband antenna from Shively and several new offerings from their Maine competitor, Dielectric, back from its near-death experience with a fairly vibrant show presence under new owner Sinclair.
(Our old friend Barry Mishkind picked up on more floor goodies in his NAB report at TheBDR, including a water-cooled FM offering from Rohde & Schwarz and the 50th anniversary celebration, complete with cake in the booth, for Arno Meyer and his Pennsylvania-based Belar.)
For stations waiting for FCC action on the AM improvement proceeding, there’s more waiting still ahead. Audio Division chief Peter Doyle says they’re still working through the flood of filings and replies, which will likely mean a subsequent rulemaking proposal perhaps this summer or early autumn.
On the TV side, the multimillion dollar question (quite literally) is what will become of the many TV station combos that are threatened by the Commission’s new ruling abolishing most joint sales agreements. At the annual Garvey Schubert Barer breakfast on Monday, Media Bureau chief William Lake said the Commission will listen to waiver requests, but demonstrating a continued justification for combined operation may be a high burden for stations to overcome. Lake sharply denied the claim that the FCC is trying to end JSAs in order to push more stations into the upcoming TV spectrum incentive auction; he notes that the stations most likely to be in JSAs instead of legal duopolies tend to be in the smaller markets where auction demand for spectrum will be minimal to nonexistent.
It was, as always, a valuable chance for station owners and managers to renew old acquaintances and learn from one another, and we saw plenty of NERW-land radio people there, including a very Boston-centric panel on radio and social media that featured WEEI’s Tim Murphy and Greater Media market manager Rob Williams, who admitted (in public, yet!) that he’s a Yankees fan. On the floor, we spotted faces such as WATD’s Ed Perry, Finger Lakes Radio Group’s Alan Bishop (in what we’re told was his first NAB Show visit) and station owner Bill Blount, just to name a few.
Did you spot something at NAB that we missed? Weigh in in the comments, or on our Facebook page!
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*Meanwhile, the biggest news of the week came from north of the border, where CANADA‘s state broadcaster responded to years of federal budget cuts and the loss of a major programming franchise by announcing some big cutbacks. Over the next two years, the CBC will reduce its staffing by 657 positions (about 8 percent of its total) and trim C$130 million out of its budget.
The lost programming franchise, of course, is the NHL, which has become far too expensive a ticket for the CBC. The $5.2 billion, 12-year deal between the NHL and Rogers spelled the impending end of the CBC’s “Hockey Night in Canada” rights deal, and the CBC now acknowledges that with the exception of the Olympics, it’s not going to be going after any sports rights deals in the future. (Some hockey will still be seen on CBC TV, but it will be essentially a pass-through deal to bring Rogers-produced games to the wider nationwide reach of the CBC’s full-coverage network.)
Adding to CBC’s woes are the current Conservative federal government, which has been succeeding in its quest to cut the network’s funding, and the disappointing results thus far of CBC’s attempt to generate extra revenue by selling ads on Radio 2 and its French-language counterpart.
This round of CBC cutbacks means the network won’t be pushing forward with local programming expansion in smaller markets like London, Ontario. About 115 of the cut positions will be in local and national newsrooms; in all, about a third of the cuts will come from the big production centers in Toronto and Montreal.
*Speaking of Montreal, or at least of suburban St.-Constant, the CRTC is cracking down on CJMS (1040), the French-language country station that’s been beset by technical and financial problems and has been on and off the air lately. Now the CRTC has taken the rare step of issuing “compliance orders” that essentially tell the station’s owners, the Azoulay family, to shape up or else. Because the Azoulays have been openly disrespectful of the CRTC and its rules, the agency says it might have been inclined simply to pull the license, but it’s willing to give them a few months to complete what they say is a planned sale of the station to more compliant owners. If they don’t do so by July 10, the CRTC says it’s likely to pull the plug on the station.
Another Montreal-area station has been granted a format change of sorts: CKLX (91.9) has had to continue programming jazz and blues in off hours ever since RNC Media bought the station and began transforming it into a clone of its French hot talk “Radio X” (CHOI 98.1) from Quebec City. Now the CRTC has granted a license amendment that removes the jazz and blues format and allows CKLX to become full-time talk instead.
*In Toronto, CILQ (107.1) is still rocking as “Q107,” but it’s a different flavor of rock: Corus has slid the station from its longtime classic rock format to a more active, current mix of rock. There’s no change to the station’s talent roster or specialty shows.
*Way, way up north, veteran broadcaster Lee Marshall was all ready to get into station ownership by putting a new station on the air at 107.9 in the historic mining town of Cobalt, Ontario. Marshall had big plans for a format aimed at older listeners – but the CRTC had other ideas. Just up the road in New Liskeard, existing broadcaster CJTT (104.5) objected to Marshall’s plans, saying the Cobalt station would serve the same area CJTT already reaches and arguing that there’s not enough of an economy in the area along Lake Temiskaming to support two stations. The CRTC agreed with CJTT, and now Marshall’s application has been dismissed. (More’s the pity, too – a lot of radio people were waiting excitedly to hear what a guy like Lee could do if he owned a station.)
In Ottawa, there’s a followup on that weird story from 2009-2010 about teen radio pirate Jayhaed Saade and the “Mix FM” operation he ran from his father’s hotel. You’ll recall that after Saade began openly taunting the police – and aiming on-air death threats at several commercial broadcasters – the police moved in and shut him down, hauling him off on mental health charges. Now Saade is suing the Ottawa police for $1 million, saying they broke his arm and used unnecessary force when they arrested the then-14-year-old. Back in 2011, Saade was acquitted of charges that he assaulted the police, but was convicted of threats, harassment and unlicensed radio operation. Being underage, he was given probation, and Canadian media outlets are barred from reporting his name. (Since it was widely reported at the time, and since we’re not subject to the court’s orders, we’ve chosen to continue using it here.)
Back in Quebec, Societe d’information Lac St-Jean has been granted a license for a new French-language community station on 101.3 in Dolbeau-Mistassini, where it will run 395 watts/28.2 m. It fills the frequency last occupied by CKII, which has been silent since 2010, reports Dan Sys’ Canadian Radio News.
*It was a quiet week stateside with so many broadcasters out at the NAB Show, but here’s what we can report:
*One of the oldest AM transmitter sites in the NEW YORK market is now history. In 1941, WHN (1050) moved from a site in Astoria, Queens to a new 50,000-watt facility in what was then the untracked swamp of East Rutherford, New Jersey, and it stayed there through call changes (WMGM, back to WHN, then eventually WFAN, WUKQ, WEVD and finally WEPN) and ownership changes, surviving a 1950 storm that toppled its towers and the 1970s construction that built an entire sports complex right next door.
(at right: WEPN’s East Rutherford site, circa 2005)
In 2009, though, some even closer construction – the massive (and, to many, massively ugly) Xanadu shopping and entertainment complex – finally forced WEPN to move. The developers of Xanadu paid ESPN to build a new three-tower site across the Turnpike on the Secaucus/North Bergen line, then took control of the East Rutherford site before collapsing in a morass of lawsuits and bankruptcy filings that left the mammoth complex uncompleted and vacant right through the Super Bowl that took place right next door in January.
Now development is once again moving forward on Xanadu, renamed American Dream Meadowlands, and that sent the bulldozers to work last week, removing the three towers that were once prominent landmarks along Routes 3 and 120.
With the old WHN/WEPN site now gone, who’s the oldest transmitter site remaining in the metro area? Believe it or not, the stations that have been in the same place the longest aren’t AMs: WNBC (Channel 4) and WQHT (97.1, ex-WNBC-FM) have been at the Empire State Building since the 1930s. After that, we think the oldest site still standing is WADO (1280)’s facility on the other side of the Meadowlands sports facility, built in 1934 for then-WNEW. And if you argue, as we might, that the 1934-vintage tower that once stood there has long since been replaced by a much newer and quite different antenna system, then the next oldest would be WQEW (1560) in Maspeth, Queens, portions of which date back to 1936 and W2XR, predecessor to WQXR. Next up would be WMCA (570) in Kearney, vintage 1940, followed by WINS (1010) in Lyndhurst and WABC (770) in Lodi, both circa 1943, though the current WABC tower was moved to that location from the old WJZ site in Bound Brook where it was erected in 1938.
Want to get a closer look inside the old site? We toured it for Tower Site of the Week, and featured it again last week here on the site.
*Radio People on the Move: at Salem’s WNYM (970 Hackensack NJ), the afternoon slot vacated by Curtis Sliwa back in January finally has a fulltime occupant again. Former Illinois congressman Joe Walsh, known for his combative town hall meetings with constituents, has been doing talk on Salem’s WIND (560 Chicago), and now he’s moving to New York to do a 5-6 PM local hour, followed by a 6-9 PM show that will be heard in both New York and Chicago.
With the ownership change from YMF to Emmis at WLIB (1190 New York), former New York mayor David Dinkins is calling it quits. His “Dialogue with Dinkins” had been running for 20 years there, most recently for an hour on Saturday mornings at 8.
At Peekskill’s WHUD (100.7), they’re mourning longtime weekend jock Dave Martin, who’d been battling health issues for several years before his death April 9. Martin, who was just 64, had been working for the American Lung Association during the week.
In Poughkeepsie, New York Catholic Radio has been granted its CP for a new LPFM on 94.7; meanwhile, Sabor Latino’s application for a 105.3 LPFM in Amsterdam has been dismissed after the group couldn’t show evidence that it’s a legally-qualified nonprofit entity.
On Long Island, Connoisseur’s WWSK (94.3 Smithtown) now has a full airstaff: Drew Kenyon’s been doing voiceover work ever since leaving his last on-air gig, mornings at the old WLIR (92.7), back in 2000. Now he’s joined “the Shark” to host “Wake-up with Drew,” followed by Raven in middays, Harrison in the afternoons and PD Rob Rush moving from afternoons to evenings.
Upstate, a belated congratulations to Brian Kerkan, who’s been promoted from Ithaca market chief engineer to corporate director of engineering for Michigan-based Saga Communications.
*There’s a new LPFM coming to NEW JERSEY: SRN Communications has been granted 107.9 in Woodbridge.
*Former CONNECTICUT governor John Rowland is now, as expected, “indicted former governor Rowland.” The now-former WTIC (1080 Hartford) afternoon talker pleaded not guilty at his arraignment Friday on federal conspiracy charges. Bond was set at $250,000 for the ex-governor.
Down the road in Bridgeport, Robby Bridges is saying goodbye to WEBE (107.9 Westport) after just under a year back in the PD chair at the Cumulus station. He’s staying within the company, relocating to Detroit and WDRQ (93.1), where he’ll be PD and afternoon host at that link in the nationwide “Nash” country chain.
*Radio People on the Move in MASSACHUSETTS: Dana Marshall is returning to the morning chair at Steve Silberberg’s WXRV (92.5 Andover), replacing Rita Cary, who was fired at the end of March after a decade with “The River.” Cary told the Globe that she was dismissed because station management said she was talking too much on the air; Marshall, a WXRV veteran, returns to full-time status there after spending the last couple of years as a part-timer.
In Worcester, Chuck Perks has been promoted from part-time to fulltime middays and PD at WWFX (100.1 Southbridge).
As WBUR-FM (90.9 Boston) chugs away on its tight deadline to put its new Cape Cod FM construction permit on the air, the class B FM signal now has a callsign: it’s WBUH on 89.1 in Brewster,
In Springfield, Above the Rim Inc. has been granted a construction permit for a new LPFM, which will be on 98.5 instead of the originally-proposed 98.7. The move (and a shift of the Above the Rim transmitter site deeper into Agawam) made way for another LPFM grant on 98.7 in Chicopee, where Church of New Covenant also won a CP last week.
*In Springfield and Hartford, they’re mourning Norm Peters, veteran radio and TV news anchor at stations including WTIC (1080) and WTIC-TV/WFSB (Channel 3) in Hartford and then at WWLP-TV (Channel 22) in Springfield. Peters, whose real name was Norman Polman, suffered a stroke on Sunday at his home in Florida and died Wednesday at age 84.
*In NEW HAMPSHIRE, Bill Binnie keeps adding talent at his “New Hampshire One” statewide news operation. In addition to consultant Clark Smidt (who we saw out at NAB in Vegas, and who we inadvertently left out of our last rundown on the hiring at Binnie), there’s a new news director, as Jeff Wade crosses the state line from Saga’s WGAN (560) in Portland, MAINE.
Over at WGAN, Frank Alosa gets promoted from afternoon anchor/reporter to news director to replace Wade, and he’s got a new signal, too: at least for now, WGAN is also being heard (by way of WMGX 93.1-HD2) on new translator W288CU (105.5) in Portland.
New calls for a new LPFM: Sonlight Media Group’s 100.7 in Waterville will be WTNP-LP.
Back to the Granite State: Matt Perrault has exited as GM/afternoon host after three years at WGAM (1250 Manchester)/WGHM (900 Nashua), leaving as new managing partners take over operations at the stations.
*In VERMONT, Glenda Hawley is the new GM at Pamal Broadcasting’s Rutland stations (WSYB/WZRT/WJJR), moving up from sales manager/multi-media director to replace Debbie Grembowicz, who exited in February.
*Radio People on the Move in PENNSYLVANIA: in Philadelphia, longtime WMMR (93.3 Philadelphia) weekend/fill-in jock Robin Lee has retired after 33 years on the air, complete with an on-air tribute for her last shift April 6.
In Erie, Mark Feather is the new PD/afternoon guy at WEHP (Happi 92.7), moving east from Impact Radio’s cluster in Boise, Idaho.
Down the road in the Pittsburgh market, W292DH (106.3 Uniontown) is planning some big changes. The EMF Broadcasting-owned translator already had a pending application to move into town, but now it’s also telling the FCC it plans to relay Clear Channel’s WBGG (970 Pittsburgh), giving that signal-challenged ESPN outlet a 250-watt home on the FM dial from the tower above Calvary Cemetery in Hazlewood, southeast of downtown Pittsburgh. EMF and Clear Channel have similar translator deals elsewhere in the country, typically involving the use of a Clear Channel station’s FM HD subchannel to feed EMF’s K-Love or Air 1 networks to surrounding translators.
Near Wilkes-Barre, GEOS Communications has filed for a license to cover the upgrade on its “Gem 104” translator W283BJ (104.5 Mountain Top), which goes to 99 watts from the Penobscot Mountain tower farm east of Wilkes-Barre.
North of Philadelphia, Hope International has been granted a CP for a new LPFM on 106.5 in Warminster.
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The landmark 24th edition of the world-famous Tower Site Calendar is in production, and your support will determine whether it will be the final edition.
It’s been a complicated few years here, and as we finish up production of the new edition (including a cover reveal, coming later this week!), we’re considering the future of this staple of radio walls everywhere as we evaluate our workload going forward.
The proceeds from the calendar help sustain the reporting that we do on the broadcast industry here at Fybush Media, so your purchases matter a lot to us here – and if that matters to you, now’s the time to show that support with an order of the new Tower Site Calendar. (And we have the new Broadcast Historian’s Calendar for 2025 ready to ship, too. Why not order both?)
Visit the Fybush Media Store and place your order now for the next calendar, get a great discount on previous calendars, and check out our selection of books and videos, too!
From the NERW ArchivesYup, we’ve been doing this a long time now, and so we’re digging back into the vaults for a look at what NERW was covering one, five, ten and – where available – fifteen years ago this week, or thereabouts. Note that the column appeared on an erratic schedule in its earliest years as “New England Radio Watch,” and didn’t go to a regular weekly schedule until 1997. One Year Ago: April 15, 2013 *We’re back from our annual sojourn to Las Vegas and the NAB Show – check out our post-show wrapup here, free for all readers today. As usual, with much of the industry’s attention focused 3000 miles to the southwest, it was a fairly quiet week back home in NERW-land. Here’s what was going on back east while we were out west:
Jon Rish *What was keeping the MASSACHUSETTS radio landscape buzzing during NAB Show week? One big story, of course – a morale problem at Entercom’s WEEI that’s burst into the open in a big way with two prominent talent departures. It started with Jon Rish, who’s been holding down what’s traditionally been a plum gig, hosting pre- and post-game Red Sox coverage on Entercom’s WEEI and filling in on play-by-play for the Sox at times, too. But as we told you in a mid-week update from Las Vegas, Rish wasn’t willing to stick around and take a reported 30% pay cut just to stick around at WEEI, and so he gave his notice just a few hours before the home opener. Coupled with the reported threat from longtime Sox/WEEI sponsor Giant Glass to pull its very considerable ad dollars away from Entercom, the miasma of bad news brought the company’s head honcho, David Field, up to Boston on Friday for a town hall meeting with employees – though even that brought with it some negative coverage when unhappy staffers leaked word that Field was insisting that questions be submitted in advance. And if Field hoped the Friday meeting would put a lid on the disgruntlement at Guest Street, he wasn’t counting on weekend host Pete Sheppard. Just after 6 Saturday night, Sheppard tweeted his followers that “Hey all, got something special for you at 6:15 on WEEI” – and then proceeded to quit on the air, reportedly telling listeners he couldn’t take it anymore at the station and pinning the blame on upper levels of Entercom management above local manager Jason Wolfe. “You will hear me again shortly,” Sheppard told his Twitter followers a few hours later, saying he’s “off the sinking ship” and hinting that “there are more changes coming” at WEEI. *The week’s big format change came from CANADA, and it came by surprise: at 9:53 Wednesday morning, Corus flipped CING (95.3 Hamilton) from classic hits “Vinyl 95.3″ to hot AC “Fresh FM.”
*In Binghamton, Clear Channel’s plans for its cluster’s format shuffle are becoming a little clearer. After some construction delays due to windy early-spring weather, translator W221AX (92.1) moved to its new home on 96.9 from the tower of sister stations WBNW-FM (105.7)/WBBI (107.5) last week. But instead of signing on as a simulcast of sports sister WENE (1430), as the original application had requested, 96.9 has instead shifted its primary station to oldies WINR (680). So what about the report a couple of weeks back that 96.9 would be picking up the classic hits format from “Big 107.5″? It’s doing that, too – sort of. There’s a temporary three-way simulcast of WINR’s “Real Oldies” on 680, 96.9 and 107.5 right now, and when the dust settles, that simulcast will shrink down to 680 and 96.9 while 107.5 takes on a new format. Stay tuned… MONDAY MORNING UPDATE:It’s country for 107.5, going right up against Townsquare’s market leader, WHWK (98.1). The new “B107.5″ revives a format last used on the frequency a little more than a decade ago, before it flipped to classic rock “Bear” and then to the oldies format; new calls are reportedly on the way. Five Years Ago: April 13, 2009 When the new One World Trade Center rises in a few years as NEW YORK’s tallest building, it won’t have the city’s TV stations broadcasting from its spire 1,776 feet above ground level. The Metropolitan Television Alliance (MTVA), the group formed by the stations after the 9/11 attacks destroyed their old sites atop the original 1WTC, is pulling out of a deal to build a new master-antenna site at the top of the new building. MTVA president Saul Shapiro says technology and circumstances have changed since 2001, making the new site (and its reported $10 million annual rent) unnecessary. 2014 update: even without the MTVA brokering a full-market deal, the managers of the now-completed 1WTC mast, the Durst Organization, are still actively marketing the site to prospective TV and FM tenants. The big news from MASSACHUSETTS turned out to be no news at all: both NBC and WHDH-TV (Channel 7) assumed radio silence last week as, presumably, negotiations were going on behind the scenes over whether or not channel 7 will carry Jay Leno’s new 10 PM show after all. Is WHDH caving in to NBC’s pressure after finding no other Peacock affiliates ready to follow its lead and pre-empt or delay the Leno show in favor of local news at 10? Stay tuned… Fitchburg’s WEIM (1280) has a new set of calls and a new identity. The station scrapped the only callsign it’s ever had last Tuesday, becoming “The Heart of New England’s Pulse,” with a new format of “talk, sports and information,” new calls of WPKZ – and maybe a new FM relay on the way as well. Owner Central Broadcasting Company has just applied to buy translator W243CD (96.5 Gloucester) from Radio Assist Ministry for $45,000 after an earlier sale of the license failed to close over the winer, and there’s a newly-filed application to move the translator down the dial to 95.9. Will the next step be a series of hops to move that translator west into the Fitchburg market? (2010 answer: yes, and it took 13 steps to get to 105.5 in Fitchburg!) In Springfield, last Monday’s flip of “True Oldies 1450” to “1450 AM, ESPN the Hall” also came with a change of venerable calls: the station that had been WMAS since its 1932 debut is now WHLL, for its studio home in the Basketball Hall of Fame. Unlike its crosstown competitor, WEEI affiliate WVEI-FM (105.5 Easthampton), WHLL has a local show in afternoon drive. And while WVEI carries the Red Sox, WHLL is now part of the Yankees network (last heard in town on WNNZ 640, before it was LMA’d to public radio WFCR.) In RHODE ISLAND, we jumped the gun a bit on our report last week of a format change at Citadel’s WPRV (790 Providence). The flip from oldies to talk/business in fact happens today, and here’s how it plays out: Don Imus remains in place in morning drive, followed by Citadel’s Joe Scarborough at 10 AM, Bloomberg business news at noon, Dave Ramsey at 2 PM, more Bloomberg at 5, then a local show, “The Making Money Show” at 5:30. When evenings aren’t occupied by Yankees baseball, “AM 790” will be carrying Lou Dobbs’ talk show at 7 PM, followed at 10 by Citadel’s Curtis Sliwa. J.J. Jeffrey’s Atlantic Coast Broadcasting has shuffled its programming lineup again in southern MAINE, pulling the WEEI feed off the 95.5 signal in Topsham most recently known as WGEI. 95.5 is now WLOB-FM, simulcasting the talk format of WLOB (1310 Portland) – which means it’s essentially swapped formats with the former WLOB-FM on 96.3 in Gray, which is now sports WJJB-FM, the same call and format that used to be on the smaller Topsham signal. Atlantic Coast is still carrying WEEI, via the Saco-licensed 95.9 signal (ex-WRED-FM) that’s now WTEI. Ten Years Ago: April 12, 2004 CHUM Television is going national. Just after NERW initially went to press Monday morning, the company announced that it’s buying Craig Television, giving it the “A-Channel” stations in Edmonton, Calgary and Winnipeg and CKX-TV in Brandon, Manitoba, as well as MTV Canada. Craig went into competition with CHUM in Toronto with last year’s launch of “Toronto 1” (CKXT), which will have to be spun off because CHUM already owns flagship CITY-TV and Barrie’s CKVR in the Toronto market. Much more next week! Now that Nassau Broadcasting is in control of the former WMTW Broadcast Group radio stations in southern MAINE, the company has set the dial spinning in a big way for Portland listeners. No sooner did Nassau take over last Tuesday than it ditched the news-talk formats at WMTW (870 Gorham), WMTW-FM (106.7 North Windham) and WLAM (1470 Lewiston), as well as the hot AC “Kiss” at WMEK (99.9 Auburn). The former news-talk stations have been running a repeating heartbeat sound effect, interspersed with Howard Dean speeches (or so we hear), while WMEK has picked up the country format (“The Wolf”) that used to be on WTHT (107.5 Lewiston). 107.5, in turn, has been broadcasting a repeating message sending listeners to 99.9 (and its Portland translator on 96.9.) WMTW’s seven-person radio news staff is out as a result of the changes, which a Nassau memo to advertisers says will end up with new – and separate – formats on each of the three former news-talk facilities. (From Nassau’s memo: “One format is an ‘old favorite.’ One format will provide a nice counterbalance to a big name already in the market. One format will ‘shock and awe.'” There’s a new LPFM on the air in NEW HAMPSHIRE: WLLO-LP (102.9 Londonderry) began testing late last week from Londonderry High School, playing a variety of songs about radio. “Leo 103” was scheduled for an official launch Saturday (April 10). Concord’s WKXL (1450) is getting new owners, as Warren Bailey’s Embro group sells to a partnership of former Republican senator Gordon Humphrey and George Stevens. The pair will pay a reported $830,000 for the station, and they’ll keep Bailey on to run things for them, promising to add more local news coverage – and to keep talk host Deborah “Arnie” Arnesen, whose politics are about as far from Humphrey’s as it’s possible to get. NEW YORK lost one of its best-loved morning men last week, with the death on Thursday (April 8) of Gene Klavan, who woke up New Yorkers on WNEW (1130) from 1952 until 1977, most of that time with partner Dee Finch. Klavan came to WNEW as the replacement for Gene Rayburn, who left to launch the TV career for which he’s best remembered. Klavan’s partnership with Finch lasted until 1968, and he remained at 1130 solo for another nine years before leaving for WOR, where he put in three more years before retiring in 1980. Klavan had been suffering from cancer; he was 79. Fifteen Years Ago: April 9, 1999 We’ll start again this week in MASSACHUSETTS, where a week of suspense for listeners of WBOS (92.9 Brookline) ended Thursday afternoon without much change in the station’s AAA-ish AC format. You’ll recall that the DJs were given a “week off” (not really — they were still behind the board on Morrissey Boulevard, just not opening the mic) on April Fool’s Day; the only big change in their absence was the addition of some more mainstream classic rock, apparently in an attempt to fill the gap just up the dial created by the end of the Eagle at 93.7. Speaking of WEGQ (which has yet to be formally granted the rumored WQSX calls), we understand the airstaff there are also still on the job, again without opening the mic, as they apply for their jobs again at the new “Star 93.7.” The rumor mill suggests that former Kiss disco guy Vinnie Perruzzo could end up doing afternoons on Star; we’ll keep you posted. Obituaries: Tom Shovan, the VP of New York’s CD Media, died Friday morning (April 9) after suffering a fall at home earlier in the week. Shovan began his radio career up in New Hampshire, at Concord’s WKXL, in 1954. In 1958, he came to Boston as one of the several “Melvin X. Melvin”s on WMEX (1510). Shovan was 59. |
In this week’s issue… iHeart axes Boston, NYC morning shows and more - Cumulus cuts in central PA - Southern Tier combo saved from silence - Ottawa FM relaunches - K-Love buys in the Burgh - Scranton gets "Loud" -...
In this week’s issue… "Hot" cools down in Providence, CT studios closed - GBH to sell Cape studios - A HEBA in Hamden? - New HDs in New York - Another Canadian AM to close
In this week’s issue… GBH shuffles mornings, prepares new show launches - NYSBA inducts Hall of Famers - More news-talk in the Hudson Valley - Remembering Dan Sys
In this week’s issue… Beasley cuts claim veteran jock - FCC releases LPFM decisions - AM towers coming down - New voices at Indie 88
