Adult Standards vs Oldies

[airforcetwo]

The Oldies format is fading from the radio dial all across the country while many markets still have/or is getting an Adult Standards station. It seems like the Adult Standards listener would be older than the Oldies listener.

A few markets with an Adult Standards station:
Charlotte, NC: lost Oldies MAGIC 96.1, but still has an FM Standards MIX106.1
Los Angeles: 540/1260 is moving from Oldies to Standards
Fort Wayne, IN: Standards move from FM to WGL 1250
Memphis, TN: WMPS-AM 1210 drops AAA for Standards

Can anyone help me figure out why Oldies is getting unplugged and Standards is still on the air?

<P ID="signature">______________
John Sells
Concord, NC</P>

 

[BlueHen]

> Can anyone help me figure out why Oldies is getting
> unplugged and Standards is still on the air?

A couple theories of mine...
First, if we're talking about the "Real Oldies" era (1956-64), I think the target age group is identical to that for standards, and that format is also disappearing. That said, standards might have a better survival rate because the texture of the music itself has a greater appeal to the audience today. As a comparison, I may have grown up during the disco era of the 70's, but that type of music has completely no appeal to me today. In fact, it gets on my nerves. The Carpenters, Anne Murray, John Denver, Neil Diamond, Manilow, Olivia, 5th Dimension, & the Capt & Tennille may have been considered square back then, but nowadays I'd take listening to them far and above over "Boogie Oogie Oogie."

Secondly, stations playing the normal incarnation of oldies from 1964 into the 70's might be suffering from audience burnout with their limited 300-song playlists. I can take "Respect" just so many times before wanting to throw the radio out the window.

 

[gr8oldies]

I can look at almost every large market around me and with a couple of exceptions, the Adult Standards format has gone away. Dayton-gone. Cincinnati-gone. Columbus, WMNI is still there. Not sure about Cleveland. Indianapolis-gone. There are a handful of small stations carrying Adult Standards around here (namely Washington Court House and Hillsboro, OH).


> > Can anyone help me figure out why Oldies is getting
> > unplugged and Standards is still on the air?
>
> A couple theories of mine...
> First, if we're talking about the "Real Oldies" era
> (1956-64), I think the target age group is identical to that
> for standards, and that format is also disappearing. That
> said, standards might have a better survival rate because
> the texture of the music itself has a greater appeal to the
> audience today. As a comparison, I may have grown up during
> the disco era of the 70's, but that type of music has
> completely no appeal to me today. In fact, it gets on my
> nerves. The Carpenters, Anne Murray, John Denver, Neil
> Diamond, Manilow, Olivia, 5th Dimension, & the Capt &
> Tennille may have been considered square back then, but
> nowadays I'd take listening to them far and above over
> "Boogie Oogie Oogie."
>
> Secondly, stations playing the normal incarnation of oldies
> from 1964 into the 70's might be suffering from audience
> burnout with their limited 300-song playlists. I can take
> "Respect" just so many times before wanting to throw the
> radio out the window.
>
<P ID="signature">______________
"There ain't no reason to fight over a woman. There's two more down the street!".."Senisble Don", 700 WLW</P>

 

[Chuck]

> I can look at almost every large market around me and with a
> couple of exceptions, the Adult Standards format has gone
> away. Dayton-gone. Cincinnati-gone. Columbus, WMNI is still
> there. Not sure about Cleveland. Indianapolis-gone. There
> are a handful of small stations carrying Adult Standards
> around here (namely Washington Court House and Hillsboro,
> OH).

Neither format is exactly flourishing, but Oldies has simply burned itself out. As a previous poster mentions, most Oldies stations have shot themselves in the foot by having such limited play lists. You can only listen to the same old stuff for so long.

I operate a small Adult Standards station in East Texas. We're doing OK with it, mostly because we are playing a lot of the same songs that were also heard on many stations during the same era that most Oldies stations have focused on, 1950 to the late 1960's. For the most part, the artists we play were staples on TV shows like Ed Sullivan, and were quite popular in their time. We also intersperse a lot of modern artists like Michael Buble, Bette Midler, Rod Stewart, John Pizzarelli, etc, who perform in the style of this earlier era.

It turns out our listeners (age 45 to deceased) remember most these songs just as well as the rock and roll hits. Perry Como, Nat King Cole, Rosemary Clooney, Dinah Shore, Dean Martin, Ella Fitzgerald, etc. were also popular at the same time as Elvis, Chuck Berry, the Supremes, etc. It's just that lots of former Oldies listeners are discovering these songs again. They usually remember them quite well, but they haven't heard them on the radio in years. It seems, everything old is new again.

We also have a fairly large play list. That helps a lot. It's about 1200 songs in each week’s rotation. That's out of a library of about 8500 songs (and growing). It makes a lot less predictable than most other stations in the area. One listener summed it up, when he said, "I love to be surprised."

 

[Oldbones]

> It turns out our listeners (age 45 to deceased) remember
> most these songs just as well as the rock and roll hits.
> Perry Como, Nat King Cole, Rosemary Clooney, Dinah Shore,
> Dean Martin, Ella Fitzgerald, etc. were also popular at the
> same time as Elvis, Chuck Berry, the Supremes, etc. It's
> just that lots of former Oldies listeners are discovering
> these songs again. They usually remember them quite well,
> but they haven't heard them on the radio in years. It
> seems, everything old is new again.


Also, when you get to a certain point in life, you become less concerned with image...you'd never admit you liked a "square" artist like Dean Martin when you were 25, but at 45 who cares?

>
> We also have a fairly large play list. That helps a lot.
> It's about 1200 songs in each week’s rotation. That's out
> of a library of about 8500 songs (and growing). It makes a
> lot less predictable than most other stations in the area.
> One listener summed it up, when he said, "I love to be
> surprised."
>

Depends on the surprise. My guess is that as long as it's a familiar song that fits the texture it's OK, but I don't think Led Zep would be a pleasant "surprise".

 

[Chuck]

> Depends on the surprise. My guess is that as long as it's a
> familiar song that fits the texture it's OK, but I don't
> think Led Zep would be a pleasant "surprise".

Agreed. We did get one caller who thought we should play "Dark Side of The Moon" during our dinner music program which we call "The Supper Club" That would probably wake them up in the rest home.

 

[gr8oldies]

To answer all of the above. I disagree with the 300 song playlist, but at the same time I've never bought into the idea that oldies listeners don't want to hear the hits, and if we dropped the hits and started playing nothing but obscure stuff, the audeince would come back in droves. There are a lot of factors in play, but the biggest is the aging of the audience. The audience isn't going away, it's getting too old for advertisers to care.

A lot of the MOR type 60s songs are familiar to people above 45, but we remember them as our mom's music, not ours.



> > Depends on the surprise. My guess is that as long as it's
> a
> > familiar song that fits the texture it's OK, but I don't
> > think Led Zep would be a pleasant "surprise".
>
> Agreed. We did get one caller who thought we should play
> "Dark Side of The Moon" during our dinner music program
> which we call "The Supper Club" That would probably wake
> them up in the rest home.
>
<P ID="signature">______________
"There ain't no reason to fight over a woman. There's two more down the street!".."Senisble Don", 700 WLW</P>

 

[clichemoth]

> Can anyone help me figure out why Oldies is getting
> unplugged and Standards is still on the air?
>

The standards sound and the era it represents have more relevance. New artists are releasing new songs. People still go to the sort of classy drinking establishments where the music is played. The records sell.

In contrast, the very nature and branding of oldies prevent new songs, I haven't seen too many sock hops recently, and the records are strictly in the $4 bin at Wal-Mart.

What we think of as "oldies" was youth targeted music originally. Expecting it to be popular now is like expecting Hilary Duff, Lindsay Lohan, etc. to still be popular musical artists in 2035.

Standards has always been adult music. Once you've been through enough of life to get it, you get it. Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, etc. are timeless. Doo-wop isn't.

I like both (and would be considered way too young for the demo), but I understand the logic here.

 

[Oldbones]

> What we think of as "oldies" was youth targeted music
> originally. Expecting it to be popular now is like
> expecting Hilary Duff, Lindsay Lohan, etc. to still be
> popular musical artists in 2035.
>
> Standards has always been adult music. Once you've been
> through enough of life to get it, you get it. Sinatra, Ella
> Fitzgerald, etc. are timeless. Doo-wop isn't.


Sinatra was a teen idol in his day. He was able to re-invent himself, not many artists are able to.

I'll agree that doo wop isn't timeless, but except in NYC & Philadelphia it wasn't very popular even in the 50s. Even though they were considered teen acts in their day, wouldn't you consider the Beatles or Beachboys timeless as well?

 

[clichemoth]

>
> Sinatra was a teen idol in his day. He was able to
> re-invent himself, not many artists are able to.
>
> I'll agree that doo wop isn't timeless, but except in NYC &
> Philadelphia it wasn't very popular even in the 50s. Even
> though they were considered teen acts in their day, wouldn't
> you consider the Beatles or Beachboys timeless as well?

Yes, and some standards stations play them, or will at least play covers of their songs. They've stood the test of time, as I'd say Bobby Darin, Buddy Holly, and Otis Redding have as well.

Most lesser artists of the pre-1970 period really haven't been as lucky.





>

 

[Chad_Hauris]

> I can look at almost every large market around me and with a
> couple of exceptions, the Adult Standards format has gone
> away. Dayton-gone. Cincinnati-gone. Columbus, WMNI is still
> there. Not sure about Cleveland. Indianapolis-gone. There
> are a handful of small stations carrying Adult Standards
> around here (namely Washington Court House and Hillsboro,
> OH).
>

So far as I know Cleveland still has WKHR, 91.5 FM, a non-commercial station...
they play the jazz/big band type standards, not really the "MOR" stuff.
I remember when there were so many AM stations carrying the adult standards MOR-type format but I think it's mostly had it...when I tuned in to AM stations while traveling across the country, most of the AM music stations were classic country, country, oldies, oldies with some standards mixed in, and a few actual AC...heard very few of the "music of your life" type stations.

 

[wwes]

> So far as I know Cleveland still has WKHR, 91.5 FM, a
> non-commercial station...
> they play the jazz/big band type standards, not really the
> "MOR" stuff.

Yes...Cleveland's FM 91-5 is very alive and well....
and on the Internet now they are #1 in their "Live 365 " genre (Swing)...
logging over 20,000 hrs/mo...& climbing evey day.

With (commercial) WRMR (AM) now gone,
I'll guess they'll prob hit over 100,000 local listeners soon.

Their listeners actually support their one-week/yr Fund Drive very well.
It helps being the only FM station in NE Ohio that serves the 60-death demo...
and the 24/7 commercial-free concept seems to go over well too.
Bill
www.SundayOldiesJukebox.com
www.WeisingrEngineering.com