Radio October 28, 2022
Longtime
KNX (1070 AM, 97.1 FM) anchor Dick Helton recently left the station to start
his official retirement after 24 years at the all-news station. His last
broadcast was October 14th, wrapping up a career that spanned over a half
century — 53 years, to be exact — including many 29 years at sister all news
station WBBM/Chicago, where he reported news and was found just prior to
joining KNX in 1998. He worked for one company, or at least one company and the
remnants of the company that took it over, his entire career. First known as
CBS, it is now Audacy, which bought CBS Radio a few years ago.
In
case that didn’t sink in, Helton’s 53 year career was spent at just two
stations … that is impressive, to say the least . Almost unheard of. You can
hear his last 15 minutes on the air (or so … commercials take up a substantial
portion of the quarter hour … it IS Audacy, you know) — including a few
tributes — at https://bit.ly/3Ddxu7Z.
His
most memorable moment? Hard to say. But he did mention on the air that one of
his highlights included reading over the wire services in 1970 that The Beatles
were breaking up. Helton called Apple Records in London, and was able to get
through to George Harrison, who gave him details.
He
met his wife (Carol Ramos) at WBBM, got married in 1995, and moved out to Los
Angeles when she landed at former Los Angeles talk radio leader KABC (790 AM)
in 1997. Helton, on the air at KNX, competed against Ramos for a time.
In
signing off, he said “I can’t imagine having done anything else in my life.
Every day, behind the microphone, well it’s felt like the right place to be.
One of my colleagues at WBBM ended his broadcasts by saying ‘may all the news
in your life be good!’ … I wish that for each and every one of you. Thanks for
listening.”
Helton’s
replacement is afternoon drive reporter Mike Simpson, who joins Helton’s former
morning team-mates Jennifer York and Vicki Moore. Moore has worked morning
drive on KNX since 2004 and had been paired with Helton since 2008
You
Better You Bet
KGO/San
Francisco — sister station to KABC — recently dropped its formerly respected
and longtime — 80 years — talk format in favor of … sports betting.
Really.
Sports betting. Yeah, there’s a winner. Sure.
Let’s
see what it brings to the table. Money, maybe, from online betting companies.,
assuming California ever legalizes gambling for the masses. Cheap syndicated
programming, to keep costs down as owner Cumulus Media likes to do. And no
waste of actual listener time, as no one actually cares about betting
information on the radio and it is pretty much a guarantee that few, if any,
listeners will ever tune in.
Online
entertainment and podcast services gave Cumulus Media executives awards of
Employee of the Month for helping push listeners away from radio and toward
their own pay services.
Will
the format fail? You can bet on it. Sports radio itself rarely succeeds in the
ratings; sports betting has an even lower appeal. When your “best” and most
appealing program is the awful syndicated Jim Rome Show, and your filler is the
even worse CBS SportsRadio, there is no way up.
Will
it come to KABC? The odds are that it will. Executives at Cumulus are that
stupid.
New
Programs
K-Mozart
(1260 AM, 105.1 HD2) has added some new programs to the lineup, including Broadway
to Hollywood and The New Opera House. Both programs are hosted by
opera performer Audrey Yoder.
Broadway
to Hollywood debuted with a presentation of Fiddler on the Roof —
including a portion in Yiddish — on October 15th; the program airs every
Saturday at 9 a.m. with repeats Sunday nights at 6 p.m. The primary emphasis is
musicals from, well, anywhere from Broadway to Hollywood and all places in
between … hence the name.
The
New Opera House launched October 16th at airs every
Sunday night at 8:00. The first program featured an airing of West Side Story
including the original cast. Future programs will run the gamut from “old
school” to modern progressive; the intention is to expose music that is rarely
heard on the radio in Los Angeles.
Yoder
is a local opera performer featured in performances in Santa Barbara and San
Luis Obispo. K-Mozart owner Saul Levine is extremely proud of the new programs,
as well as the ability to add Yoder to the station roster. “At a time when the
big shots are degrading radio, I am proud that a little family owned station is
still creating interesting programming to serve the public and not Wall
Street,” Levine said.
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