This article about Denis' book points out in the very last sentence something I never knew - he apparently worked briefly at a Toronto radio station. Anybody know which one and for how long?

It also notes that the CRTC intervened to stop stations in Quebec from broadcasting in both official languages. 

"Denis was at CKGM at a time when announcers moved quite easily between French and English. They also played French artists...until the CRTC drove a wedge deeper into the two solitudes, despite the demographic realities of Montreal radio (CKGM’s listeners were 40% Francophone)."

Why they would do this is beyond me. Isn't the idea supposed to be to promote both languages equally? What a stupid ruling, one of many out of the Commission over the years.

When radio was radio: Marc "Mais Oui" Denis

The talented Marc Denis worked in Toronto for five years from 1997 to 2002.  He was at Easy Rock and also Radio Canada's CJBC.

The reason for the "stupid ruling" is because a few English stations like CKGM were starting to play the odd hit French tune in regular rotation and some of their announcers were speaking French more and more in their shows.  This went on for a few years until some of the French stations claimed foul.

French stations in Canada play 60% French music and the English stations were skimming off the best French tunes and playing them whenever they wanted, along with all of the English hit songs.  The franco top 40 stations like CKOI said this wasn't fair and requested that the French requirement be cut drastically.  Also most French material that Quebec stations play is cancon, the French outlets tend to play a lot more cancon than the English stations. Most Quebec French music stations don't play much from France or Belgium. 

Anyway since everything is politically charged in Quebec, the CRTC said English licensed stations should play English music and announcers refraining from speaking French.  Doesn't mean that you never hear any French spoken on  English stations, but just not part of the regular announcer banter like it had become on CKGM and a few others. 

Last edited by paterson1 (July 26, 2023 9:35 am)

RadioActive wrote:

I get that, but I thought promoting bilingualism was the goal of all these federal governments.

But mon Dieu, I guess that doesn't count in radio. 

That's the government's job to promote bilingualism if the want.  CKGM was licensed to serve Montreal and area in English.  Back in the early 70's greater Montreal's anglo community had about 750,000 people.