10 Questions with ... Chris Reynolds

1. What do you think are the key elements to programming?

There are three that I like to use: and they are: 1) Imaging, 2) Usage, 3) Promotion

The first is Imaging, which is very vital and by far the most important category of any radio station because it is one of the ways the listener bonds with the product. The station must align itself with the people, the pulse, and needs of the community to promote its own initiatives as well as theirs. A station well-positioned with a dominant community involvement is crucial to the success of the station. Win in the community and you’ll win overall without a doubt. This key explains who and what you are through your packaged branding messages.

Usage encompasses what it is that the station does and how the listener can use the station to their advantage. It describes the Core Artist, Music Quantity Statements and the Digital Platform that clearly define the direction and focus of programming. The key is to create innovative methods to reach listeners and involve them in the process of listening. Weave them into the fabric of the station so that they feel as though they are a part of the process.

Promotion is a very important key element because listeners do not just passively absorb messages that they hear, they react. What counts here is how the station attempts to promote itself to make the listeners think and feel a certain way about the station. I always like for my station to always be the topic of discussion among listeners; usually this is the station that is hard to beat! The topic of discussion can be just that; maybe on "Hot Topic Tuesday," there was this gigantic story that listeners were calling in and talking about days after the original discussion.

2) How do you get the music right?

The first and most important thing to do is identify the listener for whom you will be playing the music for on your station. Build a profile of this person so that everyone who works on the station understands who they are talking to on air. The Sales team can also benefit from this profile as well because as they go out to get clients to advertise on the station they know exactly who will be buying their product.

Take Lisa, for instance … she is a 35-year-old black single mother with two young children. She's professional, drives a Toyota Camry, educated and is in touch with today's trends. She enjoys working out when she can, getting pampered at the local spa, and loves her Mary J. Blige, Maxwell, and a ‘90s Throwback or two from time to time.

So, now that we know what Lisa likes, we cater directly to her musical taste. Today's Smooth R&B seems to be the right fit, especially when Lisa is in the car with the kids in the morning. It also helps in brightening up her day, because they're some of today's most popular songs, as well as those tunes that take her back to a time when she was a teenager. Now when Lisa wants to get turned-up she listens after 3PM when her station plays that Hip Hop and R&B. She knows when to listen for the right mix of music to match her mood. 

3) You mentioned working with the community … could you elaborate?

This is so important because it goes beyond just entertaining and shucking and jiving. Let's just breakdown the word “community!” The first four letters are in “command” the last four letters are “unity.” Let's discuss how I attempted to communicate unity at my previous radio station.

Which brings me back to 2009 when I launched a campaign on my former radio station called "Know Thyself.” Targeted to impact the teen-through-young adult audience, it was, of sorts, a life raft of truth: amazing and rarely shared African historical facts and positive thoughts and images that were constantly being pumped over the airwaves between rap and rhythm & blues.

It was like interrupting the listeners every day; unconscious life flow to drop some profound truth. "Just like the multi-genius Imhotep built the first step Pyramids in Ancient Kemet (Egypt), we're building another 40-minute commercial-free music guarantee," the voiceover talent would say.

We were taught that the father of medicine is/was Hippocrates. The TRUE father of medicine is the great physician and multi-genius from Ancient Kemet Imhotep. Sweepers were designed to transmit this message to the listener, hopefully sparking within them curiosity to try and find out who Imhotep is and their connection to him.

There were other subtle messages targeting the community in sweepers and promos with substance that were designed to energize young listeners to begin to THINK! Words that promote self-love, respect for women, and love for one another and family. Messages that speak to our collective conscientiousness about the beauty and genius of us as a people. Verbal images that seek to promote peace in our community.

I remember someone asking me the question, "How do these positive messages fit into programming that still plays songs that some may find negative or offensive?" My answer was this: There remains a demand for the music that we play and just like other forms of entertainment, one chooses how they would like to be entertained. So again, there were messages in sweepers that transmitted that message. For example, 'THE MUSIC WE PLAY IS FOR YOUR ENTERTAINMENT ONLY! TAKE THE CHAINS OFF THE BRAIN! THE PEOPLE'S STATION 93.7 WBLK! This would play following a song that glorified materialism into a very conscious hip-hop song for instance.

The "Know Thyself" campaign also featured symposiums out in the community once a quarter where the station would fly-in speakers and lectures that would cover a wide range of topics from history, health and wellness to education.

4) What got you started in radio?

Having relatives that were in the entertainment field as well as on local television piqued my interest in our business. Growing up in Tulsa, OK and having a brother who was about 6' 4" and a lean 300 pounds who made a living protecting The GAP Band (Charlie Wilson and his brothers Ronnie and Robert) as a bodyguard, would take me to their soundchecks whenever they were at home to do a concert. He even let me on the tour bus a couple of times as well.

Having a group like the Gap Band from Tulsa brought pride to our city and young boys like myself back then had our own bands complete with instruments, singers and dancers; we wanted to be just like them. But of course, as time went on, that desire began to fade for most of us as we got older. But the one thing it did not do was crush our love for music … that continued!

Another brother of mine became a sportscaster on the local television station in Tulsa. In fact, he was so good that he left home two years later for Houston to do the same thing at KPRC Channel 2 there, followed by WLS Chicago and then on to WXYZ Detroit to anchor sports there, where he has since retired.

What I did was take a little something from both of my brothers and combined it into this radio thing after being challenged by a young man back in the day.

In the ‘70s we had a station in Tulsa, KKUL, the only station that played that pure soul from the Stylistics, Blue Magic, Dramatics, etc. One of the main jocks at the time was Doc Soul; I mean, Doc Soul was the man! Everybody wanted to talk and sound the way he did on the radio. So anyway, me and some friends were hanging out and playing in the park one day, listening to the radio. Suddenly, Doc Soul did one of them real serious killer breaks (of course I did not know any of the radio terminology at the time) and we all look at each other with the WOW face! One of them said “Chris, I bet you can't sound like that.” I gave it a shot ... and they said, “Man, you sound just like him” (of course I had one finger in my ear with my chin on my chest) and being the naive young boy I was, I believed him and of course the rest is history.

5) Do you remember the first time you were on the air?

Are you ready for this one? It was the summer of 1981. By this time, of course, KKUL had changed formats. The station was KXOJ. Now KXOJ was on AM as well as FM simulcast. But to get it on FM, you had to subscribe to the local cable channel and what they would do is run a splitter from your cable box into your stereo (back then we called them record players). The signal was very flat, no compression and it almost sounded mono.

So, my first time on the air was a Saturday afternoon, I'll never forget it. I was so afraid to open up the microphone, but when I did the urinal was too far away (true story) that was the impact that it had on me because I felt like everyone I knew was listening.

6) Did you play college football?

Yes, defensive end at the University of Tulsa. Football is more than what it seems once you really get into it because it takes the effort of everyone to achieve a team goal. It teaches you to be disciplined, to carry out an assignment so that a play is run properly whether you are on offense or defense. There are also life lessons that can be stressed upon you in understanding the brotherhood of the game and what it means to be a team and working together.

Take the position of the defensive end, for instance. The defensive end's position is to always contain the outside, let no man with the football get to the edge, always turn him back inside so that your team mates can make the tackle -- that's teamwork.

The team makes the fewest mistakes and does their work correctly, more than the other team, without any unforeseen natural interference, usually always wins. The same is true for radio. On an equal playing field from programming, promotions,and sales, if everybody on the team are doing their job, and doing their job correctly, then the TEAM should always win. 

7) Who were your mentors in and outside radio?

In radio, I'd have to say Cliff Winston from KJLH. Cliff taught me what persistence really is. Back in the mid-‘80s when I arrived in Los Angeles, I wanted so bad to be on the air at the Stevie Wonder station. I got in touch with Lee Bailey's production man for his Radioscope show to direct me on putting together a mock aircheck. Once I had it done, I was ready to present it to Cliff. So I began calling him to set up an appointment to get him to listen to my tape and get his thoughts. Well after about close to nine months or so of calling him every other day, only to have the receptionist always tell me that he was unavailable, literally every time that I called, one Saturday afternoon Cliff was working on the air … this is it, I am going to talk to him and nothing was going to stop me! Cliff had a prize to giveaway that afternoon. Once he said be the tenth caller, that was my chance to finally talk to this man. I began dialing (I was caller number three), I hung up and tried again (it was busy), the third time I dialed it rang again, I was saying to myself (heart beating fast, very fast) I am going to finally talk to this man. When he answered, and said I was caller 10, I was so happy. Off-air as he was getting my information, I told him that I had been trying to set up an appointment with him so that he could listen to my demo. He then said why don't you come up early next week? So, he transferred me to his assistant and she set up the appointment. When I went to see him and he played the tape the next thing out of his mouth was, "I should have hired you a long time ago.” At that very moment I realized that being persistent for something that you really want always pays off in the end. We had a great working relationship and he gave me an opportunity to experience this craft in a major market coming from a small town like Tulsa, OK. Not too long ago, Cliff sent me a message commenting on a term that I coined, "Brand Communicator," for job posting that I had put up last year.

Another mentor in the business is Ron Atkins. Ron took a chance and gave me my first opportunity as a MD at KMJQ. He used to always say: "Make sure you listen to every piece of music that comes through the station because you never know if a song may be a hit or not." He liked his Buffalo Bills back then, so he and I had a lot in common as it related to football and those lessons I mentioned about teamwork and what it takes to win.

My brother Richard who instilled in me the true knowledge of self. He had such an authentic approach to life! Always reminding me of how we are made up of everything around us, from the air we breathe, to the plant, animal, and minerals that sustain life. Energy can never be destroyed and even though he is no longer here physically, his spirit is with me and lives on forever. 

8) Were there any difficulties being an on-air PD?

I would never use the word “difficult.” Maybe “challenging?” Early on in my career as a PD, I had to program multiple stations (WDZZ and WTLZ) while doing a midday air shift. Both similar but different formats. I had to drive from Flint to Saginaw at least twice a week to make sure that the staff remained focused, understood the direction of the station and was having fun while doing so.

One thing I can say about being an on-air PD is that it allows me the opportunity to reach out and touch the listeners. It gives me a chance to talk and bond with them at the same time. I can really get a feel for what they like and most importantly, do not like about the station whether it’s the music, a promotion, a contest, something on the website … it is almost like having an open-door policy where they can talk to me about anything that is on their mind.

9) Do you believe in dayparting music?

Most definitely. Based on the fact that listening and behavioral habits change throughout the day is paramount and should always be considered. Let's take a station in a mid-sized market with about 12% African-Americans. One station is a 50,000-watt flame thrower that's been around for more than 50 years. There's an AM station with an alright signal playing solid gold soul, and there's a heritage station that's an AM day-timer that airs Tom Joyner in morning drive, plays gospel music sporadically mixed in with blocks of talk show programming.

There's a demand for day-parting in this market because the older listeners are underserved even though the two AM stations are targeted to an older audience, they have weaker signals and are hard to pick-up unlike the BIG station on FM.

Now the 50,000-watt flamethrower has Steve Harvey in the morning and is programmed toward an adult audience and plays smooth R&B until 3p. Then from 3p to 10p its nothing but Hip-Hop music. Once the youth are in school there is no need to bombard adults with Hip-Hop music that is intrusive to their daily habits and lifestyle and what's interesting is that overtime they become programmed to know when to turn on and turn off a station that is or is not playing the music that is tailored towards them. This formula works on weekends too because the youngsters usually are in bed asleep until late in the morning Saturday and Sunday. So, playing the adult music up until about noon will not hurt the station now that the listeners know what to expect at certain times of the day during the week and weekends.

It is similar for Hip-Hop stations as it relates to dayparting of certain rap songs during the week as well. Songs that are very hardcore should not be played until later in the afternoon. Working females in offices, hospitals, and other business that employ a high number of ladies may get turned off by certain songs they may find degrading, misogynistic, and just downright inappropriate during a certain time of the day.

Throwbacks on either an adult or hip-hop station should also be dayparted as well! Musical formative years of the core listener to the radio station should always be considered. Each person carries a musical imprint of a certain time in their lives when songs impacted them -- songs they remember growing up. Once this has been identified, the program director isolates those songs to play throughout the day to attract these listeners. On the 50,000 watt-flame thrower, the throwbacks played between 10a-3p will not play after 3p and vice versa. The same is true on the Hip-Hop station as well. The throwbacks played between 10a-3p (which would be more mid to early ‘90s) would not play after 3p. After 3p on this station, the throwbacks would consist of late ‘90s to 2010 -- 2015. Different dayparts, different audience.

10) What do you think is the most important thing around a radio station?

One word, “morale,” and it is such a cliché' but it is so true. We are all mirrors of one another. Our vibrations and energy dictates the outcome of how we behave and interact with one another. Think of inside a radio station as one big organism, which we will call the macrocosm and all the people who work at the radio station is an extension of it and they are the microcosm. So, you have all these individuals bouncing around like cells inside this enormous structure. Now in order for this macrocosm to function properly it needs the positive energy feed to it from the microcosm. If morale is low, more so than high, then it affects to macrocosm adversely causing the environment to become insulated with negative energy -- causing slow or low productivity.