CHAY's huge highway 400 billboard was situated just north of Toronto and was designed to look like an actual provincial highway sign.  "CHAY FM 93.1 for the next 300 km" was the first version.  Here is the second version!
share picture

As programming elements and people were being slashed all around me, ( including me!!) a former Corus sales manager said to me that he didn't care what anything sounded like as long as he made more money.  The full service newsroom at that station was eliminated.

I thought the Subaru wolf howl commercial was brilliant!  Nice to hear some creativity!

We used DAT for a brief period of time in the new CHAY-FM studios after seeing DAT tapes in use at CFQR-FM in Montreal.  The quality was excellent but it was always difficult for the announcer to cue to the beginning of the song. Shortly after the brief DAT experiment we dumped all of our music on to DCS hard drives for playback.  

I applaud the transformation of Zoomer radio.  The same formula is in play ... we just fit the demo now!  And I really am glad to listen to a radio station that still delivers excellent newscasts and isn't afraid to operate with a large inventory of songs ... not just the same 200 songs the bean counter programmers of today cling to that charted in the number 1 and 2 position.  What's wrong with playing a song from 1976 that peaked at 22 on Billboard?  Nothing!  The 9 o'clock Mix with Robbie is a great creative hour of radio!  I'd ditch the 80's at 8 and go with the Mix for 2 hours from 8pm until 10pm if I had access to the Zoomer suggestion box!!!  

Photograph - Ringo Starr - 1973
Diamond Girl - Seals & Crofts - 1973
Sister Golden Hair - America - 1975

Note:  Our version of Photograph had a skip in it near the end of the record so our listeners just thought that was the way it was produced!

Veteran broadcaster John Harada has passed away.  Up and down the dial John had made major contributions at stations in Halifax, Ottawa, Kitchener-Waterloo, Toronto and most recently as Johnny H and Suncoast Mornings at The New SRQ on the gorgeous Suncoast.  He was one of the good guys, gone too soon.


https://www.srqfm.com/onair/johnny-h/


 

I was saddened to hear of the recent passing of Wayne Bjorgan. I last spoke to Wayne following the occasion of CKCB Collingwood’s 50th anniversary. We shared many laughs about the cast of characters that sat behind the microphones at Barrie Broadcasting. Many laughs … many characters!Wayne was the General Manager of CKBB 950 Barrie – CKCB 1400 Collingwood when I began my broadcasting career as a high school student in the 1970’s.  He was an outstanding broadcaster.

http://www.collingwoodliving.com/long-time-barrie-collingwood-broadcaster-wayne-bjorgan/
 

I have a great deal of respect for Mike Richards.  I listened to him on the TSN 1050 morning show and stopped listening to the station after he left.  He worked through his illness because he respected his audience.  Good for him for speaking out.  

CHAY, operated by the folks who knew it best, would exist today but would have evolved to meet audience demands as it did for the first 24 years of its life before Corus blew it up in 2000.  Yes, when it signed on in the 1970's it played schlocky elevator music, but the playlist was very current for the final years of the station's existence and the audience numbers were still in the 250,000 listeners per week range and growing.  Sales numbers were still solid, so I believe a regional soft rock non-corporate sounding station with a meaningful news component would still serve the region well.  The station spent a great deal of time and money on programming and was dedicated to serving the local and regional audience first.  Isn't that what is missing from today's corporate radio formats?  Tune in to it today if you want to hear the exact opposite.  

... and don't forget about WBZ's Bob Lobel - CALLING ALL SPORTS!  He was great.  

Larry Glick's producer was "Muck"

Does anybody remember listening to Brian Henderson (pre-CHUM days) as "The White Night" on CKBB 950 in Barrie?  He hosted a show called SPINOUT from 7pm to 11pm Monday to Friday.

splunge wrote:

gee, and just look at it now....

... not sure what they are now.  No regional focus, no newsroom, lots of people and format changes over the past decade.

Yes ... George Jonescu is still hosting Big Bands Sunday Night on Zoomer Radio.  The show began as Big Bands Saturday Night on CHAY-FM many years ago.  I'm having lunch with him tomorrow ... it is his turn to buy!

The quick recap of Corus and CHAY-FM is:  About 15 years ago, Corus took over the popular soft rock station from Shaw Communications that boasted a regional audience of a quarter million listeners, a 2 share in Toronto and sold out dayparts seven days a week, dumped the format (and the audience), dismissed the talent, and began the process of flipping formats every year or two.  Energy Radio drove any remaining listeners in the 25-54, 25-64 demo away and wiped out the large advertising base. Corus Barrie has been spinning in circles ever since.  The latest format flip, Fresh Radio, is a canned juke box that is making many of the same deadly mistakes Energy Radio did by ignoring the real size and potential audience of the market.  Wiping out the newsroom at a 100,000 watt station that can be heard from Toronto to Huntsville is unbelievable.  What will they do next?  Probably network the Fresh Radio format, program it from London and fire a few more folks.