Will Smooth Jazz radio eventually die? Lets hope not!

[cklw800]

Nock! Bill! 'Cat. You got it goin' on! I'm reading and do enjoy! Great proactive thinking. You guys could head up the next network. Go for it!

 

[Media_Maven]

I'd love to contribute to this, as well. Confident I have a good sense of what many bored NAC/SJ P1s are looking for in a new & improved format. Constantly discovering new artists, and agree with Nock, AnotherCat, Double D, Bill Harmonic, Chuck Tiller, and others about what you've all been saying. Here's two freebies: Do a YouTube search on "Summer Sun" by Koop, then go to this site: http://www.brianhughes.com/shakin.html and have a listen to the track that comes on automatically; this is where I think the format should be going...

Reach out to me at [email protected]

Media_Maven in Michigan

 

[AnotherCat]

The more the merrier..after all this homogenity for 10 years can you imagine how cool it would be to have multiple approaches by multiple people..kinda like radio was pre Telcom

I just adore Brian Hughes. Used to play him a lot on my shows..which had ratings. Hmmmmm....

 

[Nock]

Brian has a new live cd out that is very good.

Remember the days when you would actually heard 3 or 4 cuts in rotation from a cd and not focused on a single? I got to thinking about the days when I listened to Love 94 out of Miami. Late 80's and they were all over the latest David Benoit, Kim Pensyl and Richard Elliot cd's. What made me realize how they were going so deep into these cd's was when I put one on recently. That is where the format needs to revisit. On a side note I actually saw all 3 of these artists at Sunfest in WPB. Those were fun times for the format!! English guy (Hutch?) on Love 94 did a great afternoon drive show.

Nock

 

[spiritof67]

Nock, Hutch is John Hutchinson. For at least three years (1981-84), he worked in the St. Louis market for KWK, when it was an AOR. Hutch also hosted a show here called "Freeform," which played a lot of modern rock cuts mixed with groups like Traffic and Captain Beefheart. In 1998 I heard him on Love 94--he sounded as great as ever. He was working in Boston a few years ago.

 

[Nock]

Actually met him at a remote. I had an Arbitron Diary in my hand with Love 94 cover to cover. Needless to say I left with some swag.

Nock

 

[AnotherCat]

Here's a review of the Brian Hughes live CD.
http://www.smoothviews.com/cdreviews/bhughes-brianhugheslive.htm

 

[salemjedi54]

How do yall feel about Hiroshima and Alex Bugnon? Love Season was the first song I heard when I started listening to KOAI in late 1988. I ran out and got that cassette. I saw Hiroshima on tv one night and just fell in love. I have always be fascinated by Asian culture and Hiroshima's sound always spellbounded me. To me Bugnon and Hiroshima are they best of the format. Of course you just don't hear them on the radio anymore.

 

[orange434]

for some reason a lot of the BA stations still play "one wish" from hiroshima. i absolutely love this song, but it sticks out like a sore thumb inbetween mariah carey and alicia keys. anyone know why that particular song has stuck?

 

[Bill Harmonic]

BA only plays a song for one reason...it tested well enough around the country to get spins. No more...no less. They have no one there who can make an emotional connection and they don't want that. It's all about the numbers. They have 3 instrumental categories. Powers which get beat to death. Secondaries which get a play once an hour...maybe. Then they have a fill category which gets in every blue moon. More so at night or on the weekends. The total active library, including vocals, currents, etc. is around 425 songs in which half of those are the foundation. Simple math! They claim they have a library of over a 1000 songs and that may be true but the movement of tunes in and out of the core is very very small. For them its all about the reps of the library. 

 

[Nock]

around 425 songs

Yikes I have twice that in my playlist in Itunes that I consider my ideal station. Then there is my hard drive. Contemporary Jazz does not need a power rotation in my opinion?

Nock

 

[AnotherCat]

re: what Bill said about BA categories/playlists. Check out the online all-day playlists of any station that has one on their website. If you focus on specific artists the reps get really conspicuous. There will be an Anita, Sade, or Kenny G song played at least once each hour and they have just flogged "Feels So Good" by Mangione to death. That song is older than most of the people that live in my market! Which of course bailed on the BA Network last week.

 

[pkffrom724]

I'm not sure about HD and Satellite. XM has become increasingly conservative over the years and Watercolors was never very innovative, they stuck to the relaxing stuff and whispery voices although they did have a longer playlist. Lee Abrams' exit at XM does not bode well for creativity and innovation. They have been becoming more similar to corporate radio over the last year and whoever is at the helm now will continue in that direction. If the merger goes through the XM channels that duplicate Sirius services will undoubtedly be phased out. Sirius' SJ channel plays just as many oldies and pop vocals as a corporate radio station and is programmed by former BA/Clear Channel people.

HD radio is corporate. The HD signals that are being thrown at disenfranchised listeners in format flip markets seem to be duplicates of the sound that made the format unviable in the first place. covers and oldies..with some Phil Collins and Celine Dion in between and maybe a Kenny G.

Could this be true? If the merger does go through, could this be the very end of WATERCOLORS? I pretty much love that channel because there are NO pop vocals or Urban AC stuff that's on terrestrial radio. It's contemporary jazz (or as they say C-Jazz) and nothing else but! WATERCOLORS was the real reason I got my XM radio in the first place.

 

[salemjedi54]

I'm not sure about HD and Satellite. XM has become increasingly conservative over the years and Watercolors was never very innovative, they stuck to the relaxing stuff and whispery voices although they did have a longer playlist. Lee Abrams' exit at XM does not bode well for creativity and innovation. They have been becoming more similar to corporate radio over the last year and whoever is at the helm now will continue in that direction. If the merger goes through the XM channels that duplicate Sirius services will undoubtedly be phased out. Sirius' SJ channel plays just as many oldies and pop vocals as a corporate radio station and is programmed by former BA/Clear Channel people.

HD radio is corporate. The HD signals that are being thrown at disenfranchised listeners in format flip markets seem to be duplicates of the sound that made the format unviable in the first place. covers and oldies..with some Phil Collins and Celine Dion in between and maybe a Kenny G.

Could this be true? If the merger does go through, could this be the very end of WATERCOLORS? I pretty much love that channel because there are NO pop vocals or Urban AC stuff that's on terrestrial radio. It's contemporary jazz (or as they say C-Jazz) and nothing else but! WATERCOLORS was the real reason I got my XM radio in the first place.

God Help us if that happens.

I was listening to Beyond Jazz 73 on XM over the weekend. It was truly amazing. I know its not smooth jazz but I had it on all through the house as I was doing my chores. Thanks to the 106.1 KOAI The Oasis, I have a strong appreciation for all genres of jazz.

 

[jazzyone]

With New York, Washington, Denver and Dallas dropping the format over the past year what does the future of the radio format bring? Chicago, Phoenix, Maimi, Los Angeles and Seattle still have strong smooth jazz radio stations.

Radio PDs and marketing directors need to now how to market their radio stations or they will die. Another problem with SJ radio stations is that they are hiring inexperienced sales staff who don't know how to sell smooth jazz.

The revenue numbers are in for San Diego, and smooth jazz is missing again despite the ratings which can't make the higherups happy at Lincoln Financial. The kool-Aid is tainted. Your thoughts are welcomed

BIA says the San Diego radio market was off 2.5% in 2007.
Top biller? Clear Channel news/talker KOGO (600), up just fractionally from $14.9M to $14.95M. Second place goes to Clear Channel classic rocker KGB (101.5), off from $14.3M to $14M. (These BIA revenue estimates are courtesy of the San Diego Business Journal, by the way.) #3 biller is a Mexican-licensed sports-talk station – XEPRS (1090), up a hair from $11.7M to $11.75M. Then there’s CBS-owned AC KYXY (96.5), off from $11.6M to $11.4M. And Univision’s regional Mexican KLNV (106.5), up from $10.9M to $10.95M. If you add it all up on the spreadsheet, BIA Financial estimates the San Diego market dipped from $203.7M to $198.6M for the total year.

 

[AnotherCat]

I was listening to Beyond Jazz 73 on XM over the weekend. It was truly amazing

Beyond Jazz is done by Russ Davis, who was one of the pioneers of contemporary jazz on commercial radio in the 80s when he had Jazz Flavors on an A/C station in Atlanta. He did some stints at stations that were becoming smooth, think he even worked a BA station for a while then went and did CJazz somewhere overseas before coming back to get this gig, which had to be pretty tasty back when Abrams and Co were in their creative think tank mode. I can't see this type of quality surviving the forthcoming Mel Karmazin era. You can't hook-test the type of music Russ plays.