NERW 1/8: FM Flip-Flop in the Pioneer Valley

[Scott D Fybush <fybush@world.std.com>]

------------------------------E-MAIL EDITION-----------------------------
--------------------------NorthEast Radio Watch--------------------------
                              January 8, 2001

IN THIS ISSUE:

*MASSACHUSETTS: WPVQ, WRSI to Switch Frequencies
*VERMONT: WEBK Sold to Pamal
*CANADA: CHWO Debuts on 740

-----------------------------by Scott Fybush-----------------------------
-------------------------<http://www.fybush.com>-------------------------


*The spinning radio dial this first week of 2001 must be especially
confusing to Dar Williams.  In her 1998 song "Are You Out There?," the
Western Massachusetts singer-songwriter chronicled her youthful love
of New York's WBAI and name-checked several DJs at her local AAA
outlet, WRSI (95.3 Greenfield).

Down on Wall Street, things just keep getting more tense at Pacifica's
Big Apple outlet.  The station's Web site had been taken over by
staffers loyal to recently-ousted PD Bernard White and producer Sheran
Harper.  This week, Pacifica national regained the site, replacing it
(for the moment) with not much more than a link to the national
Pacifica home page.  The struggle at WBAI, an echo of the 1999
protests at Pacifica's KPFA in Berkeley, made national headlines this
week, with "Democracy Now!" host Amy Goodman being quoted as signing
off with "From the embattled studios of WBAI."

Meanwhile up in the hills of Franklin County, things are changing for
Jimmy Olsen, Johnny Memphis, and the rest of the gang at WRSI.  On
February 1, their station will switch dial positions with another FM
outlet recently purchased by Vox Media, WPVQ (93.9 Turners Falls).

The idea behind the move, sources inside Vox tell NERW, is to put
WPVQ's country music on a frequency that better reaches listeners on
the north end of the Pioneer Valley.  From its hilltop site in the
town of Leyden, the 95.3 signal penetrates north into Vermont and New
Hampshire more effectively than 93.9 does.

WRSI, known for the last few years as "the River," has a strong
constituency in the college towns of the southern Pioneer Valley --
areas the 93.9 signal reaches better, especially with the aid of
translators W246AM (97.1 Amherst) and W287AK (105.3 South Hadley).  

We hear WPVQ will add more live jocks to the satellite service it's
been using outside drive time, and we're told "the Bear" will be the
new nickname at WPVQ when it makes that move.

As for Dar Williams...maybe it's time for an ode to Haverhill's WXRV,
instead?

[Visit the HTML version of this week's NERW to hear Dar Williams
explain why WBAI was so important to her as a teenager...just one of
the multimedia "extras" available only to NERW's Web readers at 
<http://www.fybush.com/nerw.html>!]

*The WPVQ-WRSI swap isn't the only big news in western MASSACHUSETTS
this week.  Down in Springfield, Clear Channel pulled the talk
programming off WNNZ (640 Westfield) New Year's Day, flipping the
station to all-sports as "640 the Zone."  So far, most of the
programming is coming from Fox Sports Radio; talk fans are being
directed to Clear Channel sister WHYN (560 Springfield).

[A side note, here: we tried to check out the WNNZ Web site to see
what it's saying, but like so many Clear Channel sites, we spent about
five minutes watching our browser try, and fail, to connect to
"ads.clearchannel.com" before giving up.  Somebody's got some work to
do in San Antonio...or some explaining to do to advertisers.]

The big news in Boston is Monday's launch of "Business Radio 1060,"
WBIX (1060 Natick).  We listened to the last Gene Burns show on 1060
in its WMEX incarnation on Friday; station owner Alex Langer made a
brief appearance at the very end to explain the changes and say
farewell, at least for now, to Burns.  Classy...

Meanwhile, some of the talk programming that had been on WMEX, and its
predecessor, WRPT (650 Ashland), is again being heard at that 650
frequency, now WJLT.  The "J-Light" Christian contemporary programming
now runs only until noon on weekdays, followed by talkers such as
G. Gordon Liddy, mostly simulcast with WSRO (1470 Marlborough).

Veteran WROR (105.7 Framingham) overnight jock Chuck Igo is looking
for work; he got word just before the New Year that his shift will
henceforth be handled by automation.  We're hoping a talent as
versatile as Igo won't be out of work long in Boston!

Just before the end of the year, we heard the first rumblings of a
format change at Worcester's WCRN (830), and now it's official: the
Carberry family has ditched the religious programming there, replacing
it with big-band music as "Swing 830."  The only break in the music
comes from 9:05 until 11 AM, when WCRN continues to run Barry
Armstrong's "Money Matters."  

WCRN is in the process of cranking its daytime power up to a full 50
kilowatts, directional straight into Boston.  Kurt Carberry tells NERW
the station is training a staff of DJs and adding liners and IDs.  

"The most important aspect of WCRN," he says, "is that this station is
going to be fun" for him and for his father, veteran broadcaster Ken
Carberry.  Sounds like this one should also be a lot of fun for
Eastern Massachusetts listeners...

Down on Cape Cod, Chuck Reid has left his post as PD and afternoon
jock at WCOD (106.1 Hyannis); no word yet on a replacement.

UMass/Boston's WUMB (91.9 Boston) won't have to worry about any more
signal encroachment on the North Shore; it's been granted a new
license on 91.7 in Newburyport.  The 400 watt station will operate
with vertical polarization only, with sharp nulls to the southwest to
protect co-channel WMWM (91.7 Salem) and to the northeast, likely to
protect co-channel WWPC (91.7 New Durham NH).

*Speaking of NEW HAMPSHIRE, we note a license to cover has been
granted to WLPL (96.3 Walpole).  This construction permit has been on
the books since 1993, and we can't wait to hear from our readers in
the Connecticut River Valley to find out whether Gary Savoie has
finally overcome the NIMBY obstacles that were keeping him from
getting the station on the air.

Over in Farmington, the word from WZEN (106.5) is that they're running
reduced power until mid-month, but gearing up for a power increase in
the spring.

*Across the river into VERMONT we go, only to find changes on the way
at another of the quirky AAA stations that NERW so much enjoys
listening to.

WEBK (105.3 Killington) has been doing its thing from ski country
since 1992, operating from one of the coolest-looking studios we've
ever seen, up above a restaurant on the access road leading to the
Killington ski area.  (The transmitter is on nearby Pico Peak,
blasting out over most of central Vermont.)

In the first station sale in our region this year, Pamal Broadcasting
agreed to pay Killington Broadcasting $1.65 million for the station,
pairing it with Pamal's WJJR (98.1) and WJEN (94.5)/WJAN (95.1
Sunderland) in nearby Rutland.  There's no word yet about any changes,
and Pamal has a pretty good reputation for leaving well enough alone,
so we'll hope to still be enjoying K105 next time Mrs. NERW drags us
up to Vermont for a ski trip...

One new signal on the air, apparently: Christian Ministries was
granted a license to cover for W212BG (90.3 Ascutney), the latest in
its chain of relays for WGLY Bolton (if that's what the primary is
this week...)

Vermont Public Radio has a new news director, and you can't ask for
better Green Mountain State news experience.  John Van Hoesen joins
the NPR affiliate from a 23-year career at the Rutland Herald, most
recently as managing editor.  He replaces Steve Young, who went down
to public-radio startup WCAI/WNAN on Cape Cod and the Islands.

Three Vermont veterans retired just as the new year began: Richard
Cowperthwait left WWSR (1420) and WLFE-FM (102.3) in St. Albans after
a 25-year career as news director.  We hear he'll be doing some
writing and working on a book, and how can we possibly argue with
that?

Michael Carey did his final "Wake Up, Vermont" show on WDEV (550
Waterbury/96.1 Warren) December 29, ending a career that began 40
years ago with a pirate radio station.  The 13-year-old soon moved to
"real" radio when his unlicensed efforts were heard by a WDEV staffer,
and Carey became a full-time WDEV employee a few years later.  WDEV
station manager Eric Michaels continues solo as the morning show's
host for now; Carey says he'd like to come back part-time if he can
overcome the health problems that forced his retirement at age 53.

On the TV side, Tom Hoyt also left the airwaves December 29, doing his
last weather forecast for WNNE (Channel 31) in White River Junction
after almost ten years.  Hoyt is moving into banking as a development
officer for Mascoma Bank.

One more departure: WEQX (102.7 Manchester) PD Kyle Guderian left the
station last week to go to work for the Intrawest ski-company folks.

*Clear Channel spun the ol' format wheel in MAINE last week, dropping
the AAA-ish sound of WBYA (101.7 Searsport) to flip the station to
classic rock.  "Fox 101.7" is challenging Stephen King's WKIT (100.3
Brewer) for the ears of Bangor-area rock listeners, and resurrecting a
station nickname that disappeared back in 1996 when WWFX (104.7
Belfast) went country as "the Bear."

Listeners up that way are again hearing WNSX (97.7 Winter Harbor); the
station has returned to simulcasting WMDI (107.7 Bar Harbor) while its
sale from WMDI owner Scott Hogg to Clear Channel goes through.

*RHODE ISLAND's oldies station has a replacement for Imus in the
Morning.  WWBB (101.5 Providence) dropped the I-man December 29,
sending his show over to Clear Channel sister WHJJ (920).  B101 midday
jock Big John Bina is now handling mornings, with music director Tina
St. John doing middays.

We hear Myrna Lamb is out as mid-morning host at WPRO (630
Providence), with no replacement named yet.

*CONNECTICUT TV viewers had to do some quick remote-control work to
find their favorite WB and UPN shows this week, as WTXX (Channel 20)
in Waterbury picked up The WB, sending UPN down to New Haven's Channel
59, newly renamed WCTX.  We're told the transition happened right on
schedule, and the WCTX Web site is up and running at
<http://www.wctxtv.com>.

The next network change in the Nutmeg State will come March 1, when
Hartford's WUVN (Channel 18) will pick up Univision programming.

Over in the northwest corner of the state, WKZE-FM (98.1 Salisbury)
has named replacements for Andrew DeGiovanni, who left the morning
host and PD posts there last month.  Steve Utterback will do mornings
on the FM, while Hal Lefferts will be program director.  WKZE (1020
Sharon) morning guy and PD Marshall Miles takes on the new title of
sales and production coordinator for both AM and FM.

*We've been talking about it and talking about it and talking about
it, and now CHWO (740 Toronto) is a reality.  The standards station,
nicknamed "Prime Time Radio," signed on at 7:40 AM Monday, with a
brief announcement by station owner Michael Caine and a montage of the
music to be heard on 740.  Just before the sign-on, we were listening
to CHWO's old frequency, 1250, to hear Caine talk about his history
with the station (he put it on the air decades ago) and count down to
a simulcast with 740.  1250 will become religious CJYE after a few
weeks of the simulcast; we'd love to hear from anyone up Oakville way
who might have a better tape of the 1250 half of the switch!

Boston listeners will get to check out CHWO tonight (Jan. 8); Bob
Bittner checked in to let us know he'll be signing WJIB (740
Cambridge) off for the night around 6 PM to give the new station a
chance to say hello to eastern Massachusetts.

[You can hear the CHWO sign-on by visiting the Web version of NERW at
<http://www.fybush.com/nerw.html>.]

Another change in Toronto radio: CJRT (91.1) has reportedly dropped
classical music from its programming to go all-jazz.  Classical lives
on in Toronto by way of the CBC's Radio Two (CBL-FM 94.1),
Radio-Canada's chaine culturelle (CJBC-FM 90.3), and commercial
CFMX-FM-1 (96.3), not to mention cross-border WNED-FM (94.5) from
Buffalo, for those who can pick it out under Hamilton's new CIWV
(94.7).

Up in Owen Sound, Bayshore Broadcasting is applying for a new
country-music FM station.  The 31.6 kilowatt outlet would operate on
93.7 MHz, joining oldies CFOS (560) and AC CIXK (106.5) in the
Bayshore family; we're guessing it would go on the big CBC tower in
Wiarton that's home to CIXK and a bunch of CBC services.

Along the St. Lawrence River, a surprise format change greeted
listeners to Brockville's CHXL (103.7) with the new year.  Instead of
classic rock as "the River," the CHUM Group station is now pumping out
CHR as "the Point," complete with new CJPT calls and a new Web site at
<http://www.1037thepoint.com>.  The station launched with 103 hours of
commercial-free music, with the official start-up at 7 AM last Friday
(1/5).

*Back home in NEW YORK, the FCC has granted a switch to commercial
status for Buffalo's Channel 23.  The station now known as WNEQ(TV) is
being sold to LIN Broadcasting to become a duopoly with CBS affiliate
WIVB (Channel 4).  Western New York Public Broadcasting will keep
WNED-TV (Channel 17) as the area's PBS affiliate, with channel 17 now
holding the noncommercial reservation.  

Had the FCC denied the change to commercial status for channel 23,
WNYPBA would have sold channel 17 to LIN instead; because it began
life as commercial WBUF-TV in the fifties, that channel has always
been allocated for commercial use.  No word yet on when LIN will begin
operating channel 23.

Just to the north, where Niagara County and Lake Ontario meet, WTOR
(770 Youngstown) has powered up to 9000 watts daytime, with a signal
that's now almost listenable in Rochester, though a good receiver can
still pull WABC out underneath.

The new year passed without any major radio changes here in Rochester,
but there was some movement on the LPTV dial: WAWW-LP (Channel 38) has
again disappeared from the airwaves, thus leaving the lone viewer of
its ACN home-shopping programming in the lurch.  WBXO-LP (Channel 15),
like the rest of the affiliates of "The Box," is now an MTV2 affiliate
instead -- though for some reason there's no audio on any of the
music, making it just a bit frustrating to watch!  

Syracuse's "Sunny 102" now has calls to match: WRDS (102.1 Phoenix)
became WZUN last week.  

Up in Watertown, Bob Smith still intends to run Fox programming on his
two LPTVs, W25AB Watertown and W28BC Massena -- but instead of doing
it in partnership with his old station, WWTI (Channel 50), which he
sold to Ackerley in 1999, he's partnering with crosstown WWNY (Channel
7), which will program the Fox station, complete with 10 PM news, from
its studios downtown.

Albany's "Point" has another new morning show: this time WCPT (100.9)
is pairing PD J. Davis with Terry Cordingley, of sister station WKLI
(94.5 Ravena).

February will bring a new format to Schenectady, when Ernie Anastos'
WVKZ (1240) splits from its simulcast with adult standards "The Moon"
(WUAM 900 Saratoga Springs) to become "Sun Country," playing the
classic country that WGNA (1460/107.7 Albany) doesn't.  The Moon will
move to Anastos' newest station, WMVI (1160 Mechanicville).  (Hey,
wouldn't the old WSNY calls be perfect for Sun Country if they were to
return to Schenectady?)

Speaking of Anastos, he started his new gig on WCBS-TV (Channel 2) in
New York last week, returning there from several years anchoring over
at WWOR (Channel 9).  Replacing Anastos at 10 PM on WWOR is another
New York TV veteran, Rolland Smith, who's been up in the Hudson Valley
at WRNN (Channel 62 Kingston) for the last few years.

New calls arrived in the Hudson Valley for Clear Channel's new "Kiss"
CHR simulcast: mark down WPKF on 96.1 Poughkeepsie, most recently WCTJ
(though the FCC's confused database still had it as the prior call,
WTND) and WFKP on 99.3 Ellenville, lately WTHN.  Clear Channel must be
running out of "Kiss"-like calls, though it's trademarked the name and
has been suing stations that adopted the moniker in the last year or
so (Omaha's new country "Kiss" flipped to "Max" last week for just
that reason!)  Stations that were using "Kiss" before 1998 are safe,
though...so New York's WRKS and Washington's WKYS, among others, can
breathe easy.

Leslie Gold is looking for a new radio home.  The "Radio Chick" was
fired from her midday slot on Infinity talker WNEW (102.7 New York)
last week, though she was allowed to stay on the air to do a farewell
show Friday.  Boston listeners will remember Gold as half of "Two
Chicks Dishing" on WRKO before her departure for the Big Apple.

Back on the air: John R. Gambling.  The scion of WOR's morning dynasty
will be doing Saturday mornings on WABC (770) beginning January 13, as
well as contributing pieces to the Curtis and Kuby morning show.
Gambling was fired from WOR last fall, you'll recall, ending some
seven decades of "Rambling with Gambling" on that station.

The longtime voice of Knicks basketball, Jets and Giants football,
UConn sports, and much more fell silent last week.  Marty Glickman was
83 when he died January 3.  In addition to his years as a
sportscaster, Glickman was a track champion in the thirties, though he
was barred from competing in the 1936 Berlin Olympics because he was
Jewish.

*Finally this week, a quick update on where things stand here at NERW
and fybush.com as we enter our first full year as a fully independent
operation:

First, some good news: there's a lot coming to NERW and fybush.com in
2001.  If you haven't checked out the "Tower Site of the Week," you're
missing out on a page that's becoming a weekly stop for thousands of
radio fans.  This past week, we began a series of visits to New York
City's AM sites; starting January 10, you'll get a look inside the
home of Toronto's new (and old) 740 AM.  The Year in Review page will
remain up on fybush.com all year, and we're now posting your responses
to this year's Rant.  If you haven't chimed in to this discussion of
radio's future, what are you waiting for?  (Soon, this will evolve
into a full-fledged Mailbag page...stay tuned!)

NERW will grow geographically this year, too.  We've been sniffing
around the edges of Pennsylvania and New Jersey for the last few
years, and now we're jumping in with both feet.  There are already
excellent sites focusing on Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, but we
believe there's room for more news from places like Erie, Du Bois,
Williamsport, Scranton, and Morristown -- so you'll find it all on
NERW in 2001.  

This week's Web version of NERW is the first to contain audio clips,
but it won't be the last.  In 2001, we hope to offer regular weekly
audio bites to our readers at fybush.com, along with the photos,
logos, and other enhancements that we've been providing in the HTML
version of the column.

For those of you reading NERW on the mailing list: it's not going
away, I promise.  Many of you have expressed a strong desire to
continue receiving NERW as plain-text e-mail, and we listened.  But if
you haven't checked out NERW at fybush.com, please come visit; I hope
you'll like what you find.  (And if you read NERW at the Archives
site, www.bostonradio.org, you're missing out on each week's fresh
column until it's a week old!  Come over to fybush.com and check it
out...)

Speaking of the Archives: there's much more in store there as well.
Garrett Wollman and I are working to add content to the site,
including new station and market histories, updated technical
information, an archive of Tower Site of the Week, and more to come.
The Archives site is designed to go hand in hand with fybush.com (or
perhaps that should be the other way around), so be sure to make both
a part of your weekly Web diet.

Now the bad news: All these developments depend on you, the readers.
This is a tough time for content-based Web sites (just ask the folks
at RadioDigest.com), not to mention the market as a whole.  Even so,
I've been pleasantly surprised at the dozens of you who responded to
my initial plea for voluntary contributions to keep NERW coming each
week.  To those of you who have already contributed, my most sincere
thanks and appreciation.

To those of you who haven't: Your support matters.  The fybush.com
site is now registering close to 30,000 hits a week, along with
thousands of NERW page views at bostonradio.org and hundreds of you on
the mailing list.  That means, by my math, that perhaps one in 100
NERW readers is donating -- and that's not enough!  

Please visit <http://www.fybush.com/support.html> to learn more about
why your support matters, and how you can help.  In addition to
subscriptions, we're looking for in-kind donations (especially a used
Pentium laptop to help us keep NERW coming during this summer's
travels) and, especially, advertisers!  Inquire about our low charter
rates, won't you?

Enough with the sales pitch; we'll be back in seven days with much
more radio news from around the region.  See you then!

-----------------------NorthEast Radio Watch------------------------
                       (c)2001 Scott Fybush
                          www.fybush.com

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