In the retail environment, it’s been Christmas at some stores for months. In radio, the season usually begins around the second week of November when KOST (103.5 FM) starts playing all holiday tunes. Occasionally, others will join in the fun.

This year, it’s happening already. K-Mozart (105.1 HD2, 98.3 FM in the San Fernando Valley, online at kmozart.com and via apps) beat all others to the punch as of Friday, Oct. 25th with 24/7 holiday music.

Yes, before Halloween.

The mix includes both modern and traditional favorites; while I wrote this, I heard “Carol of the Bells” performed by David Foster followed by Burl Ives’s version of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.”

You may be asking, why so early? Owner Saul Levine explained it this way: “We want to get a jump on the competition.” Unstated, but also probably true – it will bring some attention to his station streams. The fact that holiday music seems to get people feeling in a good mood no matter when it is played also helps. I keep wondering when a station will play the format all year long.

Levine told me that his format will run through December 31st.

Station Birthday

As one of the oldest FM stations in town, KUSC (91.5 FM) has quite a history, and it celebrated a birthday just a few weeks ago.

The idea to feature it came from an email I received from reader Michael Morse, who wrote, “I enjoy your column very much. For part of the time that I was a telecommunication major at USC (1958-1962), I was the news director of KUSC and actually was paid a small amount. The station was student-run, on the air four hours a day, using a 3900-watt transmitter built for the 1939 Worlds Fair. The tower was atop the John Hancock building on campus so the range wasn’t far but we had listeners.

“Sadly, as good a station as it is today, it has lost its way, no longer serving its original purpose as being part of the educational experience of the University. Any thoughts?”

Yes. But first a little history.

The license was approved and the first transmitter was purchased by the University of Southern California for the station in 1941. But World War II got in the way … the government wanted the transmitter and requisitioned it away from the station. So oil magnate, USC trustee, and university alumnus Captain George Allan Hancock — who also happened to be a cello player with the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra — purchased another.

A 250-foot tower was built on top of the Hancock Foundation building on campus, and the station started broadcasting on October 24, 1946. To highlight the new band and recognize the potential sound quality, the station identified itself as “frequency-modulated KUSC radio.”

The transmitter was mono — stereo was still years off — with clear reception available within a roughly 10-mile radius of the campus, according to station archives. I do not know the original format, but it can be assumed that it played popular music of the day along with university-specific information and entertainment. Stan Chambers, later moving to KTLA Channel 5, was an early announcer with KUSC.

In early 1972, graduate student Wally Smith became the station’s general manager. He convinced the powers that be to switch to a classical music format, which debuted on April 2. The move was somewhat controversial internally, with many students opposing the change. Note the word “students” … in 1972, KUSC was still a student-run radio station. Of note: the station’s power was 30,000 watts by this time, vastly increasing its reach.

Depending on your perspective, 1976 was a turning point year. According to the station website at KUSC.org, “The Corporation for Public Broadcasting awarded KUSC a five-year, $750,000 major market expansion grant — the first such grant in the nation. The funds helped attract major audiences to public radio and established a downtown L.A. space for full-time professional announcers, producers and engineers.

“KUSC also signed on in stereo from its new transmitter on Lookout Mountain above Hollywood, expanding its audience potential to 12 million people.”

Did you catch that? “… for full-time professional announcers, producers and engineers.” This was the end of student involvement in the station, and in my opinion, should have caused the loss of the educational license. They are a professional station. In my opinion, no college or university should be able to hold an educational radio broadcast license when they are not operating it for the benefit of students. But I digress.

By 1978, KUSC was the most popular classical music station in the country. Since that time, it has improved technically using satellite transmission and distribution. It broadcast the Olympic Art Festival to the nation in 1984, for example, and started linking stations in order to simulcast its format in 1985, first in Santa Barbara and later in such areas as Palm Springs, Morrow Bay, and San Francisco … a ten-station classical music network.

Today, the station isn’t even on the USC campus, broadcasting instead from a 32-story high-rise in downtown Los Angeles. There is on-campus a student-run station, though, KXSC, broadcasting using a low-power AM transmitter as well as at KXSC.org. I will cover that in a  future column.

Richard Wagoner is a San Pedro freelance columnist covering radio in Southern California. Email [email protected]

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