Classical / Smooth Jazz

[hahnonemouse]

Please don't flame me for my crummy memory, but I can't remember what the deal is with WCRB moving on the dial. If classical goes dark in Boston, wouldn't that leave a giant gaping hole for a commercially viable smooth jazz signal? Boston is the only "major" market without a smooth jazz station.

 

[jane grant]

according to Clea Simon

http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/2006/06/27/deal_could_keep_wcrb_classical/

Deal could keep WCRB classical
Station likely to get new home on the dial

By Clea Simon, Globe Correspondent | June 27, 2006

If all goes as planned, local classical music fans will be able to keep listening to their favorite radio programming on WCRB-FM. But instead of tuning into 102.5 as they now do, they'll turn to another frequency on the FM dial, 99.5.

The current WCRB-FM is being sold to Greater Media

Louis F. Mercatanti , president and CEO of Nassau Broadcasting, confirmed that negotiations are taking place and his intent to keep a classical WCRB on the air

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[raccoonradio]

Smooth jazz hasn't really succeeded in Boston, though that doesn't mean it isn't worth another try--who
knows. I would hope we'd keep country (WKLB does surprising well) and classical (ditto, WCRB)...is there room
for smooth jazz somewhere? (I could see maybe a WPLM-FM trying it. They have done so before.)

WMWM's Sunday afternoon jazz show has one DJ (Brian Vita, on once a month, at least) who plays smooth jazz.
Here's a podcast of the show:

http://shrinking.250free.com/moodswings072306.mp3

 

[webcastboy]

There's been a lot of speculation that the move putting classical on 99.5 and country on 102.5 is not "optimal" but it "could work"

The problem is that 102.5 is just outside Boston/Cambridge on the Needham tower cluster (where Rt.9 crosses Rt.128/I-95). So it gets excellent coverage of the more affluent metrowest suburbs and (for the most part) good coverage in the city where a lot of businesses have WCRB's classical on during the daytime.

99.5's stick is significantly further north; up between Lowell & Andover (where I-93 crosses I-495). Even though it's a 27kW Class B...that distance from Boston means it doesn't penetrate the city very well, nor does it reach metrowest terribly well, and it doesn't get anything in the South Shore at all. However, it does get into the more urban areas of Lowell and Lawrence, as well as north shore towns like Saugus and Lynn, quite well.

I'm stereotyping somewhat as to which towns have classical fans (more hoity-toity and affluent) and which towns have country fans (more blue collar) but hell, isn't that what Arbitrons are all about? Anyways, the reach of 99.5 is probably "good enough" that a lot of WCRB's classical fans will still be able to hear the station...especially in their cars. But there's no question that country fans are getting the better end of this deal.

What should be interesting is to see what happens on the South Shore. Arguably 102.5 has had signal problems on the South Shore, esp. the shoreline proper, because of tiny Class A 102.3 in Truro skipping across Cape Cod Bay. But regardless, 99.5 has no presence AT ALL on most of the South Shore...so any WCRB classical fans down there are SOL. Are there a bunch of hungry country fans waiting for 99.5's format to suddenly reach them much better on 102.5? Well, that's a $100+ million dollar question, now isn't it?

 

[webcastboy]

Jazz always has problems in the commercial dial in Boston, and I suspect in recent years (at least) it's because of WGBH's "Eric in the Evening". Eric may or may not play jazz you like, but he generally plays much more variety of jazz than anything you hear on commercial jazz stations. Granted "smooth jazz" is about as similar to regular "jazz" as Kenny G is to Thelonious Monk...not very, in other words. But usually enough people find Eric's jazz good enough that it makes billing an entire separate jazz station a very dicey business proposition. Toss in the underground popularity of WERS's jazz shows and it gets even bleaker.

It'd be nice if someone took over all the great non-comm jazz offerings in this city (WBRS, WMWM, WMBR and WMFO all have or have had good jazz DJ's) and consolidated them into one station. I dunno about a commercial station, but a non-comm community station could probably pull it off.

Or a commercial station that's run like a non-comm community station. I won't make the obvious (and tired) WFNX suggestion...but one wonders about several of the other stations in this city. I've heard WZLX has seen better days both in ratings and billing. j/k ;D

 

[JustinT]

Smooth jazz hasn't really succeeded in Boston, though that doesn't mean it isn't worth another try--who
knows. I would hope we'd keep country (WKLB does surprising well) and classical (ditto, WCRB)...is there room
for smooth jazz somewhere? (I could see maybe a WPLM-FM trying it. They have done so before.)

The biggest problem for smooth jazz was, not surprisingly, classical. With the current WCRB pulling such a big share of the instrumental audience, there's no chance for an SJ outlet to be successful. Another issue in the past was the Greater Media ownership, which in the end protected AC WMJX by pulling not only on 96.9 WSJZ but also 96.9 WCDJ.

The new signal of WCRB will change the scenario. For one, 99.5 will have signal issues in the areas where the station's listenership is the strongest. But additionally, with the program director out the door, the station is unlikely to be the same as it is right now. From observing Nassau's operations in Northern New England, they run a tight ship, and it wouldn't be surprising if operations were further merged between WCRB and the W-Bach 99.3/106.3/106.9/107.7 network in Maine (which already gets it's programming from the WCN anyway).

The time will be prime for an SJ station, but will anyone launch one? Probably not.

 

[soxandpats]

What should be interesting is to see what happens on the South Shore. Arguably 102.5 has had signal problems on the South Shore, esp. the shoreline proper, because of tiny Class A 102.3 in Truro skipping across Cape Cod Bay. But regardless, 99.5 has no presence AT ALL on most of the South Shore...so any WCRB classical fans down there are SOL. Are there a bunch of hungry country fans waiting for 99.5's format to suddenly reach them much better on 102.5? Well, that's a $100+ million dollar question, now isn't it?

I'm on the south shore, and the 99.5 signal really isn't that bad if you're using something better than a clock radio. In the car it sounds just about as good as any other major Boston signal.

I wouldn't say that 102.3 in Truro has caused any problems for 102.5 either. It was only on the air for a couple months in the winter of 2003. As far as I know, it hasn't been on the air since then. When it was on the air, it was a tiny signal that barely made it past Brewster on the Cape.