The Hugo Winterhalter Orchestra and piano soloist Eddie Heywood had a #2-ranked instrumental hit in 1956 called "Canadian Sunset". I remember daytime AM stations signing off with that tune in the late 1960's , perhaps into the early 1970s. Besides the Star Spangled Banner it seems that "Canadian Sunset" was the big tune for US daytimers. Was that only a regional thing or nationally?
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Canadian Sunset (Signoff Instrumental)
- Thread starter RF101
- Start date
I began AM (MW) DXing in 1958, and by 1962 had logged over 2500 stations from Ohio. I never heard a daytimer sign off with that song, and I loved DXing for "Sunset Skip".
It must have been a Northwest thing...
Could be. The farthest away I ever heard a daytimer signing off (from my QTH in Ohio) was Montana, Wyoming and New Mexico.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
I never heard any station, on either band, use "Canadian Sunset" as the sign-off music.
Back in the mid-70's, when KGBS-AM/FM simulcast until sunset and the AM signed off, the late Dave Hull used to make a five-minute production out of the sign off ... using Deodato's "Also Sprach Zarathustra" as the background and ending with the line "and now, with the playing of our national anthem 'Hail to Mr. Storer', we leave the air!" (He then proceeded to pretend to run up several flights of stairs "to the palatial KGBS-FM studios" to continue his show.)
I used the instrumental theme following "Walk On Water" from Neil Diamond's "Moods" album as the sign-off music for three different stations early in my career.
Back in the mid-70's, when KGBS-AM/FM simulcast until sunset and the AM signed off, the late Dave Hull used to make a five-minute production out of the sign off ... using Deodato's "Also Sprach Zarathustra" as the background and ending with the line "and now, with the playing of our national anthem 'Hail to Mr. Storer', we leave the air!" (He then proceeded to pretend to run up several flights of stairs "to the palatial KGBS-FM studios" to continue his show.)
I used the instrumental theme following "Walk On Water" from Neil Diamond's "Moods" album as the sign-off music for three different stations early in my career.
A lot of Neil Diamond songs want to make me sign off!
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
You must have missed WTTF in Tiffin Ohio. We played an instrumental called Sunset at every sign off. The program director was adamant that it was always played. LOL
I've heard daytimers use "Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me" as their sign-off song.
At KIBS in Bishop, I used The Beatles' "Good Night" as a buffer between the last hit and the religious minute "Be Still and Know", which then went straight into the National Anthem. I laid the 30-second pre-recorded signoff recorded years before, which used to run cold between "Be Still and Know" and the National Anthem, over the intro to the Beatles track.
And then, the deep baritone voice intones: "Be still....and know."
The only other station I worked at that wasn't 24/7 was KUKI, Ukiah, where we signed off at midnight. There was no pre-recorded signoff and no formal script. I was told that all that was legally necessary was a station ID, so I'd say goodnight over the intro to the last record, and then either at the cold ending or as it faded, say "It's 12 midnight at KUKI, Ukiah".
There was one other sign-off I was involved with. At KTNV-TV, the ABC station in Las Vegas, we signed off one night a week at 2:00 a.m. for maintenance (I believe it was early Monday morning). Our recently-arrived Creative Services person wanted to do a longer-form signoff, but less formal and stodgy than the old one, done over a station ID slide.
Her idea was a really artsy montage of the city lights at night and since she knew I'd been in radio, she asked if I had any ideas for music. I immediately suggested the Box Tops' "Neon Rainbow", which she wasn't familiar with. I played it for her, and that became the signoff, with the verbal signoff laid over the 20-second fade at the end.
Because it was 1985, we actually got calls and letters from people who said they kept tuning in at the end of "that music video show you guys have on" and wanting to know when it started.
And then, the deep baritone voice intones: "Be still....and know."
The only other station I worked at that wasn't 24/7 was KUKI, Ukiah, where we signed off at midnight. There was no pre-recorded signoff and no formal script. I was told that all that was legally necessary was a station ID, so I'd say goodnight over the intro to the last record, and then either at the cold ending or as it faded, say "It's 12 midnight at KUKI, Ukiah".
There was one other sign-off I was involved with. At KTNV-TV, the ABC station in Las Vegas, we signed off one night a week at 2:00 a.m. for maintenance (I believe it was early Monday morning). Our recently-arrived Creative Services person wanted to do a longer-form signoff, but less formal and stodgy than the old one, done over a station ID slide.
Her idea was a really artsy montage of the city lights at night and since she knew I'd been in radio, she asked if I had any ideas for music. I immediately suggested the Box Tops' "Neon Rainbow", which she wasn't familiar with. I played it for her, and that became the signoff, with the verbal signoff laid over the 20-second fade at the end.
Because it was 1985, we actually got calls and letters from people who said they kept tuning in at the end of "that music video show you guys have on" and wanting to know when it started.
Never heard a song used in a daytimers sign-off, except The Star-Spangled Banner.
I do recall 1580 WPGC Morningside, MD (outside Washington, DC) , they were LOUD in Northern NJ at night just before their sign-off on 1580 AM . . . they would tell people that "If they had an FM radio they could keep "rockin" with WPGC-FM" . . . then the AM was gone. This was around 1967.
Also WIOO on 1000 in Carlisle, PA (near Harrisburg) would sign off at sunset telling people to keep their dial on 1000 because in about a 1/2 hour to an hour you'll hear 1000 WCFL in Chicago "rockin" . . . then they'd say . . . we will be back at sunrise tomorrow morning - then gone, this also around 1967.
I do recall 1580 WPGC Morningside, MD (outside Washington, DC) , they were LOUD in Northern NJ at night just before their sign-off on 1580 AM . . . they would tell people that "If they had an FM radio they could keep "rockin" with WPGC-FM" . . . then the AM was gone. This was around 1967.
Also WIOO on 1000 in Carlisle, PA (near Harrisburg) would sign off at sunset telling people to keep their dial on 1000 because in about a 1/2 hour to an hour you'll hear 1000 WCFL in Chicago "rockin" . . . then they'd say . . . we will be back at sunrise tomorrow morning - then gone, this also around 1967.
The radio station in my mom’s hometown (KTTN, Trenton, Mo.), an AM daytimer, closed out its day with “God Bless America”. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the original march, but also not the sludgy funereal dirge that people have turned it into.
At KFRU in Columbia, Mo., we were 24/7 (since 1961!) but just before the 6 am ABC-I news, there was The Lord’s Prayer, as sung by Jane Froman (Smith), an actress and singer originally from St. Louis who survived a plane crash in 1943 and who, after retiring, lived in Columbia. In 1984, the longtime co-owner of KFRU retired and there was a changing of the guard along with multiple programming changes. One of those changes was to move The Lord’s Prayer from 6 am to 5 am. We were inundated with complaints about that change. There was a compromise. The Lord’s Prayer thenceforth was played at 5:30 am.
To my astonishment, that piece of music is on YouTube but you can seek it out if you really want. I’ve heard it enough already.
At KFRU in Columbia, Mo., we were 24/7 (since 1961!) but just before the 6 am ABC-I news, there was The Lord’s Prayer, as sung by Jane Froman (Smith), an actress and singer originally from St. Louis who survived a plane crash in 1943 and who, after retiring, lived in Columbia. In 1984, the longtime co-owner of KFRU retired and there was a changing of the guard along with multiple programming changes. One of those changes was to move The Lord’s Prayer from 6 am to 5 am. We were inundated with complaints about that change. There was a compromise. The Lord’s Prayer thenceforth was played at 5:30 am.
To my astonishment, that piece of music is on YouTube but you can seek it out if you really want. I’ve heard it enough already.
John Garabedian, at his Natick, MA startup WGTR in the early '70s, always ended his show, and the broadcast day, with "Stairway to Heaven."
I don't think KCTE signs off with anything specific but I haven't listened in awhile, I might listen tonight. WOI-TV in Ames used to sign off at 2 AM with the Star Spangled Banner over a montage of the Blue Angels.
KTBS Shreveport produced this beautiful signoff video in the mid-'70s. The song is Mickey Newbury's "American Trilogy," which is better known as an Elvis Presley show stopper.
If we're including TV signoffs, NJN had a video montage and theme song ("Positively New Jersey") for their midnight sign-off, before they went to 24/7 operation in the late '90s:
1010 WHIN in the early 1970's use to sign off with "The Stripper"
GPTV had a really cool sign off with Ray Charles' "Georgia On My Mind"
GPTV had a really cool sign off with Ray Charles' "Georgia On My Mind"
You made me think about how many stations I had worked for that did not run 24 hours a day.
My first job as go-fer at WJMO / WCUY in Cleveland saw an AM that was 24/7 (not even the normal sign off at Midnight Sunday that was common back then). Buy the FM operated 4 PM to 11 PM, Monday to Saturday!
My first station in Ecuador in 1964 ran its first 5 or 6 months with a Midnight sign-off. I got tired of "it won't turn on" calls at 6 AM and went 24/7. That was 1964. My first FMs (the first in the country, too) were initially... until we turned one on at 6 AM and the rat sleeping on a still-warm plate high voltage transformer exploded and created the most nasty cleanup job I ever had. Went 24/7 after I bathed in antiseptic and deodorant.
Never had a station that was not 24 hours a day since.
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Was that pronounced "kooky"?