Sunday AM AAA show garners 33 share of men 25-54 in large medium market

[dan.strassberg@att.net]

I was in Syracuse last weekend visiting a friend who 
used to be a principal in The Radio Corp (now Galaxy 
Communications) a regional group with properties in 
Utica, Syracuse, and surrounding smaller markets. My 
friend sold out his stake in Galaxy a year or more ago 
but continues to consult for the company on engineering 
matters.

On Sunday morning, we visited the studios of the 
Syracuse-area stations, which include WTKW Bridgeport 
and WTKV Oswego-Fulton, both class A signals. While 
there, I met PD Mimi Griswold (who grew up in Brockton) 
and sat in the studio as she did her Sunday 9-12 AM AAA 
show, the Blue Moon Cafe, which airs on WTKW/WTKV and 
simultaneously on Class B WKLL Utica.

Mimi informed us that in the latest Arbitron book, Blue 
Moon Cafe has garnered an incredible 28 share among 
adults 25 to 54 and an even more incredible 33 share 
among men in that age group. During the rest of the 
week, I believe the stations air a classic rock format 
and I don't know whether any other stations in these 
markets run AAA at other times.

Mimi could not explain her Sunday show's almost 
unprecedented popularity. As someone who is no expert on 
AAA, I can say, however, that I greatly enjoyed the 
music. If central New York gets only three hours a week 
of AAA, that could explain the show's popularity.

The Galaxy stations are doing something that isn't done 
very widely elsewhere. They are combining voice-tracking 
with live jocks, but all of the voice tracks are done on 
the day the shows air. Also, the stop sets that air on 
WTKW/WTKV are different from the ones that air on WKLL. 
Mimi keeps one set of speakers on WKLL and the other set 
on WTKW/WTKV so she can hear both stop sets when the 
stations separate. The prerecorded stop sets use liners 
from a library that Mimi created to get the timing exact 
and eliminate dead air on either station. Some liners 
use her voice; others use different staff people, and 
still others use Galaxy's voiceover guy, who sounds a 
lot like the guy who does the bumpers on WBIX.

All in all, the sound was very professional and it was 
quite impressive to hear Mimi consistently hit the post, 
although, by avoiding cuts that begin with a vocal at 
the end of stop sets, she was able to accomodate a 
couple of seconds difference in the length of the stop 
sets that ran concurrently.

Within a week, Galaxy will be moving its Syracuse 
operations from its low-rent, but completely adequate 
and rather pleasant space in suburban Bridgeport to 
slightly smaller (and vastly more expensive) space in a 
brand new building at the edge of downtown Syracuse's 
revitalized business district. Of course the Clear 
Channel Syracuse cluster is downtown, but Galaxy's move 
still seems exceptionally boneheaded to me because of 
the huge cost increase. On the other hand, Mimi welcomes 
the move because she lives 45 minutes south of Syracuse 
and the drive to the new location will take 1/3 less 
time.