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Philadelphia's Jazz Station

T

Those RRRRs

Guest
I was wondering if Philadelphia (or an adjacent city) ever had an authentic Jazz radio station. I remember WRTI years ago played jazz exclusively (I believe), but I'm more interested in knowing about full service, commercial jazz stations from years ago, and if there were any in existence.

Obviously I'm not talking about what is passed off as "Smooth Jazz" in today's cookie cutter world. I'm talking the likes of Miles Davis, Lionel Hampton, etc... WPEN may have played some jazz cuts during its heyday, but they also mixed in big band/swing and adult standards. But how about 24/7 jazz?

My curiousity is peaked on this topic because I've been listening to Jazz on Sirius but never took an interest in it until recently. Was there a time when that format was supported exclusively by a full service commercial station? And is it a viable format to support in today's market?
 
Re: Philadelphia's Jazz Station WWDB

WWDB-FM 96.5 was a full time jazz station for many years until it switched to all talk in 1975. Sid mark was a holdover and did a talk show for a time along with his Sinatra shows. The first week of the talk format was mainly people calling to discuss jazz!

As a side note, Buzz Allen hosted dixieland jazz shows on several stations in the '60's-70's, I believe WIFI, WIBF, WBUX, WNPV.
 
Hey Guys:

Would anybody remember what the date was when Jazz WHAT 96.5 changed to WWDB-FM? I saw on a site that it was late 60's?

Thanks
T.J.
 
From what I can remember, jocks included Alan Michaels, Dave Roberts, Stu Chase, Dave Solomon, J.Peter Volkens, Greg Hall, Alan Waterhouse and Bob Corse. Can't think of anyone else right now.

John1:Right about Buzz Allen. Those were all his stops.
 
My dad listened to WHAT-FM/WWDB through much of the '60s. In the cars he had from as early as I can remember to the end of '66 he had an under-the-dash adapter so he could have FM in the car--FM wasn't available as a factory option on most cars back then. WHAT-FM took a very cool, conversational approach; I can remember some little bits of business like how they'd give the station phone number ("TRinity 8-1212, if you'd care to call") and introduce commercials ("The next five brought to you by Ron Levitt's Ogontz T-Birds"). I suppose most stations that programmed jazz sounded like that, and it probably influenced the presentation on early FM rock stations. Stuart Chase is the one DJ name I can remember besides Sid Mark.
 
"WWDB...Philadelphia's Jazz Station. where people love what we play 96.5% of the time"
 
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