Contact jazz radio stations in the USA

[Phil Meloy]

If any jazz musicians are touring in the States and would like to get in touch with radio stations that are programming locally produced jazz programmes in the towns or regions that they will be visiting in order to send them their gig dates, promo CDs, arrange possible interviews, etc., or perhaps you may wish to promote your latest CD in areas you have previously toured, you can contact me on this thread as I have nearly 200 such stations across the USA on a database and would be happy to try and suggest some useful contacts in your target areas. All of these stations independently produce their own jazz programs. I have not included stations that simply broadcast centrally produced networked programmes such as "Jazz with Bob Parlocha" or "Jazz After Hours". Many of the stations on the database are in relatively small places while others cover large areas of various states. No smooth jazz stations are included in the database. This database is also far more comprehensive and up-to-date than the NPR jazz stations list and the All About Jazz Radio Station Directory appears to have been wiped out as a result of their recent hacking problems. I have sent my list of stations and contact information to Michael at AAJ so maybe the information will get added to the AAJ site at some stage but in the meantime feel free to ask. I'm afraid I don't have much information about Canadian jazz stations at the moment however this is the next project so if you know of any good jazz stations in Canada let me know and I'll add them to the Canadian jazz radio database which I'm starting to get together.

[gregk]

Many CBC stations in Canada play jazz at night. I forget the name of the program now but there is one show broadcast nationally at around 9 or 10 pm, from Toronto more than likely (like most other things in Canada)

[Phil Meloy]

Hi gregk,

Thanks for the info. Is the show you're referring to "After Hours" hosted by John Reid on CBC Radio 2 on weeknights at 10.05pm? If it is, their production address is actually in Winnipeg. I've now added "After Hours" to the database in any case. They seem to have a reasonable mix of both vocal and instrumental jazz. As the program is broadcast right throughout Canada it would be a useful one to have your CD played on.

"After Hours"
PO Box 160
Winnipeg MB
R3C 2H1
Canada

www.cbc.ca/afterhours

Thanks again.

[Phil Meloy]

Another resource that musicians might like to investigate for jazz radio contacts is the Jazz Services website at www.jazzservices.org.uk Jazz Services is the national support and information agency for jazz in the UK and has one of the biggest jazz related websites in the world. This is a free service. Not many Canadian stations are on the site yet but if you go to Database, then Media (not Media (Local) - this is only UK media contacts) you will find nearly the 200 previously mentioned US radio stations listed that are programming jazz. Some such as WBGO in Newark are 100% jazz, others may just have a few hours long jazz programme once a week. As already mentioned no smooth jazz stations are listed on the site! When you click on Media the alphabet will appear at the bottom. The majority of the US stations will appear under either "k" or "w" but a number of others such as Alabama Public Radio will of course appear under their respective letters so to check them all out you'll have to trawl through the whole alphabet. Networked jazz programmes such as "Jazz with Bob Parlocha" & "Jazz After Hours" are also listed. Also only stations who are broadcasting locally produced jazz programmes are listed. Stations that are only carrying networked jazz programmes are not. Station descriptions, contact details, and links to the radio stations own web sites are suppied. A few other stations progamming jazz around the world are also listed such as Blu FM in Sydney, Australia and Fine Music Radio in Capetown, South Africa. If you know of any other good jazz stations or programmes around the planet please let me know about them.

PS You'll also find the radio stations that have websites (virtually all of them) listed in the Media section of the Links section of the Jazz Services site. Its easier to see in this section which media contacts are in which countries but the actual contact details are more readily accessible if you use the above approach. If however you are searching for station in a particular area you would probably be better off putting a post on this thread.

[Lazaro Vega]

Lazaro Vega
WBLV FM 90.3/WBLU FM 88.9
Blue Lake Public Radio
300 East Crystal Lake Road
Twin Lake MI 49457

Jazz nightly and Saturday mornings, about 35 hours locally produced.

www.bluelake.org

(not streaming on the web: Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp is in the Manistee National Forest, far far from the world of T-1 lines...)

[Phil Meloy]

Hi Lazaro,

Thanks for the reply. You'll find that WBLU is already listed in the Jazz Services web site media section www.jazzservices.org.uk but you might like to add a few more notes about your various jazz programmes. You can send further info to newdata@jazzservices.org.uk

[Phil Meloy]

A site that also might be of interest to jazz musicians is www.ozzyjazz.com which is based in South Australia and features live jazz concerts. It is not restricted to Australian jazz musicians so if you are a jazz musician or band and have a good quality recording of one of your live performances you might consider sending it to them for possible inclusion on the site. They have listeners from just about every country imaginable, but predominantly the USA, followed by Australia, UK, Canada, Germany, Japan etc. Although people can listen to the music they cannot download it. This combined with the fact that the audio is radio quality rather than CD quality means that if they really like it there is a good chance they might want to buy it if it is available on CD. Links are provided to a site of your choice such as Amazon or CD Baby where listeners can purchase the CD. The web presentation also includes background on the band and repertoire, musician bio's, photographs, some info on the venue where the recording took place and the circumstances surrounding the recording, playlist, credits, and links to the band's own website, the venue's website and any other links you would like to include. The audio will stream in 28.8kbps and 56kbps in Windows Media format. www.ozzyjazz.com is completely free to both listeners and musicians whose work appears on the site. THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO CHARGE FOR THIS SERVICE - in fact, they pay APRA/AMCOS a webcasting licence fee and submit quarterly returns. APRA in turn distribute this fee to the owners of copyright on the music and recordings, as they do with radio stations although by the time APRA take their fee these amounts are pretty small. APRA is the Australian equivalent of ASCAP in the States or PRS in the UK.

[Phil Meloy]

In case anyone hasn't noticed the AAJ radio station directory is available again.

[victor]

want to know what really upsets me...we have a radio station that is run by the university of utah KUER 90.1 FM that plays the good stuff from 8 pm to 4 am and the rest of the time they have NPR news information and local programming
we need a jazz station here that plays jazz 24/7....the only time i can listen to jazz all day is when i am at work and listen on the internet....this station is the one that helps promote the "jazz at the sheraton" series and the "snowbird jazz festival" i think we have a large enough following that would support a 24/7 all jazz station:mad2:

[Noah Peterson]

Hi Phil,

I'd love to take you up of your offer of station listings.

I'm plannign a fall tour from Portland, OR to Michigan to St. Louis and back to Portland, OR and I'd liek to send copies of my new Cd around as well.

How can I get the list?

Yours,

Noah
www.noahpeterson.com

[Phil Meloy]

Hi Noah - no problem, I'll email you the list as a Rich Text File attachment. Also let me know what states you're touring through as I can search for them by individual state at this end. You should also contact Lazaro Vega who has posted on this thread. He does the jazz programme on Blue Lake Public Radio in Twin Lake, MI. It'll be on the list. You can go to the Media section of the Links section of the Jazz Services web site at www.jazzservices.org.uk and hit on the links to the stations' own web site in order to research certain ones further. Let me know if you find any that you think need updating.

[Noah Peterson]

Thank you!

Hi Phil,

I got my first confirmation email for airplay which made me realize I needed to say thank you for that information. That message came from a station in Texarkana whose information I probably would never have come across on my own.

I've add some of my own research to your list and put them into excel so the mailing addresse s& contacts can be extracted into labels for mailing, making it easier for us new guys to get our stuff out. I'm happy to give it to you to share with others if you'd like.

Yours,

Noah

[Phil Meloy]

Hi Noah - glad to hear the info has been of some help. Sorry if I had known I could have also sent you the list in Excel form which may have saved you a bit of work. It it be great if you could contribute some new contacts to the list and please feel free to share the info with any other musicians you know - the more new jazz musicians who can get air play to promote themselves the better - also hopefully this also will contribute to the jazz music library resources of smaller independent broadcasters across the States who are actively supporting jazz in their broadcast schedules.

BTW good to see that you've got your CD on CD Baby - another good resource for independent musicians.

[xricci]

There are currently 250+ radio stations listed in the AAJ database.

http://www.allaboutjazz.com/newsletter/guides2004.jpg

To view them all, go here...
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/entity_archive.php?t=4

To search for a radio station, go here...
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/entity_search.php?t=4

If your radio station is not listed, please add it here...
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/entity_edit.php?t=4

[Phil Meloy]

Noah - here's another station I've just added to the list in Wisconsin www.wobj.org They have a good four hour jazz programme on Sunday evenings. The station is owned and licensed to the local native American community.

[Richard Nelson]

Is your list still available? I'm trying to promote a new CD--on the, shall we say, progressive side of things--I could definitely use help identifying radio stations that might be interested in playing it.

CD can be viewed at:

http://www.invisiblemusicrecords.com/Resources/OriginStory.html

[Phil Meloy]

I've now listed all the radio stations in the United States that are programming jazz that I know of in the Media section of the Database on this site www.jazzservices.org.uk. The vast majority of them will be listed under K or W but you need to trawl through the whole alphabet to find all of them. You will also find a few Canadian ones listed under C. The listings are dated as to the the time of their last update.