Smooth AC in NY?

[Bill Harmonic]

Saw that a translator that has been shuffling across the New York area in recent months has finally gained approval to reach its intended final destination. 106.5 W293BU Union City, NJ has gained a Construction Permit to relocate to 106.3 and broadcast from 4 Times Square with 99 watts covering much of Manhattan as well as portions of Brooklyn, Queens, and New Jersey.

The translator has been rebroadcasting Country programming from the HD2 subchannel of Clear Channel’s 106.7 WLTW in recent weeks, something that will continue once the station moves to 106.3 and increases power. It does appear a new format is in line for the move and that's based on the registrations of 1063NewYork.com and CD1063NewYork.com. Could the return of Smooth AC could be in the offing?

The CD moniker was used on Emmis’ Smooth Jazz/AC “CD 101.9” WQCD from 1988 until 2008 when it switched to Rock WRXP. With this new signal covering much of New York’s commercial district, the format could help flank top ranked “106.7 Lite-FM” from a potential full-powered competitor.


Questions and Thoughts (1) Just because you register CD106.3NewYork.com does not mean Smooth AC is in the big apple. (2) If it is a return for Smooth AC, is Captain Kepler and his motley crew involved? (3) Could it work there as an Urban AC which is what it really is. (4) Talk among yourselves!

[AnotherCat]

If it is smooth A/C it's probably not going to work out well because there are some strong A/C and Urban A/C stations in the market that have the franchise on the core Smooth A/C library. The real fans would want more instrumentals, especially original instrumentals, and smooth A/C doesn't give them that. Only niche I can think of for this is 45+ Urban A/C listeners who don't like the fact that Urban A/C is starting to play some hip hop.

[Interstate 78]

About 6 months ago, a strange message was posted on a chill/electronic twitter feed that I happened to stumble upon. It said that smooth jazz was returning to NYC terrestrial radio sometime in the future. No other information was given. And this wasn't one of those feeds that looked like a prank. It looked pretty reputable. Maybe you're onto something here. Detroit just got smooth jazz back on a translator. Now New York next. I'm still not excited though. If the best thing this smooth jazz network can do is dig up translators and tiny little stations like this and also an AM in Reno, Nevada, I'm not impressed.

[AnotherCat]

Translators and tiny stations playing Kenny G and Sade once an hour. SJN killed the genre, what is it doing now, coming back to stomp on the ashes to make sure something better doesn't rise up?

[Jazz_Kat]

Looks like BA and company will try to find anywhere and I mean anywhere to play/air their "programming".

Meanwhile, seems like they are having a bit of trouble with the 106.3 translator. You can read more about that in the New York forum.

[producer57]

I can tell them where they should start-by flushing it down the toilet bowl-
These people really don't have a clue-But they are doing whatever they can to be able to pay the bills-no matter how lame

[Bill Harmonic]

 9 minute demo for Chilljazz.com with call letters WRIZ New York, etc.

http://soundcloud.com/media-5/chill-jazz-com-preview?utm_source=soundcloud&utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=facebook&utm_content=http%3A%2F%2Fsoundcloud.com%2Fmedia-5%2Fchill-jazz-com-preview

[AC Tones]

Like we talked about offline, Bill...not impressed with the product.  I wish them well, but I am not seeing anything groundbreaking or throwback here, IMO.