[BC] Country Music plight in top towns

[Grady]

    I worked for Frank Kramer for three years.  It was the last time
I worked under a more senior engineer.  It was the best three years
of my career.  When I went there, I transferred from KIKK in Houston,
also a Sonderling property.  Viacom bought the place while I was
at WOL - WMZQ.

    Frank was a great guy to work for, and I learned a lot of
stuff during those years.  He basically gave me a budget to buy
parts to "just get things done".  We split the day up, with Frank
working 8 AM to 4 PM, and me working 3 PM to 11 pm, so we
had an hour of overlap each day.  I loved working those hours
back then.  He'd give me a list of things to do, I had a list of
standard maintenance things that got done regularly, and
he didn't care what I did with the rest of my time, as long as
the station got some benefit from it.

    I built a lot of custom stuff, and learned a lot of component-
level tech in the school of "build something and make it work".
Mistakes are the best teacher.

    Frank gave me a free hand with the AM, and I developed
a lot of AM transmitter mods (that I've put in a hundred AM
transmitters since) while working on the old WOL Gates
BC1G.  I did lots of console mods, too.

    Bill Figenshu was the PD for much of the time that I was
there. . . he was great to work with, too; always had a healthy
attitude toward the tech side of the biz, and saw us as a
source of solutions.  I miss those guys.

Grady



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Bob Tarsio" <Bob at Broadcast-Devices.com>
To: "'Broadcasters' Mailing List'" <broadcast at radiolists.net>
Sent: Thursday, September 28, 2006 11:50 AM
Subject: RE: [BC] Country Music plight in top towns


> Grady:
>
> Did you work for Frank Kramer at WMZQ? He was our DOE for Viacom
> Broadcasting which bought the old Sonderling group which WMZQ was part of. 
> I
> was CE of the New York City station which was country when I got there in
> 1982. That lasted but two more years when it switched to Lite FM a runaway
> success and continues to be 23 years later!
>
> We had a lot of fun with the country format though. We did all the same
> stuff that WMZQ did in those days. We had a lot of country artists in for
> guest DJ spots. They were all pretty regular folks.
>
> Ah, the good old days!
>
> Bob Tarsio
> President
>
> Broadcast Devices, Inc.
> 5 Crestview Avenue
> Cortlandt Manor, NY 10567
>
> www.Broadcast-Devices.com
>
>
> Tel. (914) 737-5032
> Fax (914) 736-6916
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: broadcast-bounces at radiolists.net
> [mailto:broadcast-bounces at radiolists.net] On Behalf Of gRAdy Moates
> Sent: Thursday, September 28, 2006 11:20
> To: Broadcasters' Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [BC] Country Music plight in top towns
>
>    Ah, memories. . .
>
>    I worked for WMZQ in the beginning. . .
>
>    I remember distributing balloons at the Waylon & Willie
> concert (promoted by the competition) that had, "I MZQ'd
> at Waylon & Willie" in bright green ink on yellow balloon
> stock.
>
>    I still have a pair of shorts that we used to wear when
> the MZQ softball team would play, that trumped, "I MZQ'd
> in my pants!"  I can't fit into them anymore.
>
>    When was that, 1979?  Before 'MZQ it was WMOD.
>
>> What WMZQ offers to counter the appeal of the thinly sliced niches
>> on satellite radio is local deejays, news and traffic -- and the sense
>> of being part of a community based where listeners live. The
>> station's programming is all local except for the overnight show,
>> which is syndicated fare from Los Angeles.
>
>
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