A question about the music programmer

[Dal85]

First off, im not in radio, never have been. Just allways been a big fan of radio happenings.
My question is, for this example going to use ZPS and KZEP in S.A.
2 Classic rock stations. But ZEP has a seemingly to me, much larger playlist than ZPS.
ZEP plays Sabbath, Triumph, Hagar, Maiden, Dio...Just a few I noticed last weekend while i was in that area. I go once or twice every other month or so.
ZPS seems to me to play the same old tired insert southern rock band here. ZEP does as well along with your Aerosmiths,Foreigners,and other classic rock staples.

The question is, does the music programmer have a list of music he can play and picks and chooses which out of that list can be in the rotation?
Can the guy at ZPS play 3 Lock Box by Hagar but just chooses not to cause some survey says that people dont give a dang about that song or he just personally dosnt like it?

 

[charles123]

First off, im not in radio, never have been. Just allways been a big fan of radio happenings.
My question is, for this example going to use ZPS and KZEP in S.A.
2 Classic rock stations. But ZEP has a seemingly to me, much larger playlist than ZPS.
ZEP plays Sabbath, Triumph, Hagar, Maiden, Dio...Just a few I noticed last weekend while i was in that area. I go once or twice every other month or so.
ZPS seems to me to play the same old tired insert southern rock band here. ZEP does as well along with your Aerosmiths,Foreigners,and other classic rock staples.

The question is, does the music programmer have a list of music he can play and picks and chooses which out of that list can be in the rotation?
Can the guy at ZPS play 3 Lock Box by Hagar but just chooses not to cause some survey says that people dont give a dang about that song or he just personally dosnt like it?

 

[charles123]

First off, im not in radio, never have been. Just allways been a big fan of radio happenings.
My question is, for this example going to use ZPS and KZEP in S.A.
2 Classic rock stations. But ZEP has a seemingly to me, much larger playlist than ZPS.
ZEP plays Sabbath, Triumph, Hagar, Maiden, Dio...Just a few I noticed last weekend while i was in that area. I go once or twice every other month or so.
ZPS seems to me to play the same old tired insert southern rock band here. ZEP does as well along with your Aerosmiths,Foreigners,and other classic rock staples.

The question is, does the music programmer have a list of music he can play and picks and chooses which out of that list can be in the rotation?
Can the guy at ZPS play 3 Lock Box by Hagar but just chooses not to cause some survey says that people dont give a dang about that song or he just personally dosnt like it?

I agree, ZPS needs to play the 80's hair bands. Like Maiden and Dio.

 

[bturner]

The music director, under the authority of the program director, determine every song played on a radio station. The decision is generally focused on how to meet the objective of gaining a certain audience and keeping them. Certainly the success in pulling in listeners and retaining them is how your job performance is rated. Do well and you're the hero for a day. Do poorly and you better have that resume ready to hand out.

Since your job depends on it, music selection is a very careful process. When building a station's audience (ie: after a format flip) it is even more important although I might argue that it is easier to become the top dog in your format than it is to retain your position as once you are at the top you become the model that is used to build a better mouse trap, so to speak.

Generally the DJ has no option as to what is played. Very few stations allow for any decisions at the DJ level.

KZEP had a long history in the format and that allows some 'greater chances' to be taken but with that said, those chances are likely very well calculated to position the station for continued success.

To put it bluntly, building a station's base library and playlist has nothing to do with your personal tastes or whims. It is all business.

 

[LibertyNT]

KZPS doesnt play those because I assume it would Cannibalize sister station 97.1 The Eagle, which plays those quite often.

 

[davideduardo]

The question is, does the music programmer have a list of music he can play and picks and chooses which out of that list can be in the rotation?
Can the guy at ZPS play 3 Lock Box by Hagar but just chooses not to cause some survey says that people dont give a dang about that song or he just personally dosnt like it?

Here is the general way that most music stations are programmed.

A music station will select its format based on the local competition, competency or specialization of the owner or owner corporation and, in some cases, a research project that defines the format, its target and its "borders."

The base for the music is some kind of audience research. For the non-current songs, a music test will be done where listeners who listen to the station (or who would listen in the case of a new format) hear snippets of songs and score them. In the case of new music, there is always a point where the PD or music director has to take a risk on a new song, often guided by what other market stations are doing. Other currents are tested online or on the phone.

So the station knows the best songs, and also knows which ones will drive many or most listeners away. The library is retested as often as possible as songs get crispy and need to be rested or killed... and some songs may age out of the target demo, etc.

Almost all stations schedule using a specialized computer program. The program tracks when songs played, and tries to play them in different dayparts before coming back. It also keeps songs by the same artist well separated (unless the station wants to do an artist two-fer or three-fer) and looks to maintain things like era, tempo, texture, etc. Songs will be put in categories or coded so that the bigger songs play more often, and the weaker ones less; in some cases, a PD will feel that certain songs "stick out" more than others, and will make a judgment call on slowing such songs down in rotation.

The program then can create a daily log. The PD or MD will then manually massage the hour by hour logs of music for the best flow and feel by editing. Editing is a very subjective process and is usually done by a person who understands the format and also knows how and when to make exceptions to the broader rules set up in the computer program.

Obviously, there are many individual ways of doing what I describe. And there are exceptions to some of my broad points. Of course, specialty shows, feature weekends and such are handled differently.

 

[davideduardo]

KZPS doesnt play those because I assume it would Cannibalize sister station 97.1 The Eagle, which plays those quite often.

Stations in a commonly owned cluster may have extensive song overlap in the case of tunes that were hits among a variety of taste or lifestyle groups.

When I first worked in a 5-station cluster in the same market in 1963, I was surprised to find that among two of the stations there was an overlap of about half of the titles. I quickly learned that what defined the station was not the shared music, but what one station played that the other did not... those songs were the ones that both stations were defined by, and which were, in each case, not liked by the listeners of the other station.