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What began as a community service of Riverside Church of New York City in 1961,
WRVR changed gears in the 70s to become an internationally-recognized jazz
station. This page is dedicated to the station that launched a renaissance in jazz
music, put many of its air personalities in very high profile work later on, and
provided the relaxing sounds of New York to hundreds of thousands of listeners.
The numbers tell the tale of WRVR, though, as the business side of WRVR dictated
its fate, and in 1980, WRVR became a commercial country station.
My experience with WRVR began in 1977, the day that Elvis Presley died. On the
air that day was Herschel, Les Davis, G. Keith Alexander, Doug Harris and Rob Crocker.Also on this page, the sound of WRVR, an On-Air schedule, artifacts, links and remembrances.
Your webmaster premiered a 24-hour recreated broadcast of WRVR,WRVRecreated: A WRVR broadcast day on the Internet!
Another aircheck from the same date:
Aircheck 03 |
WRVR placed 25th in the ratings that summer, with a 1.1 share.
WRVR "Metropolitan Report"
from March, 1977. Click it
to enlarge.
Courtesy Donna Halper
Robert
Seigel of NPR, former WRVR Newsman
Rob Crocker - former
WRVR personality
John Platt - former Programmer for WRVR
Donna Halper - Air
personality, Music Director, Consultant to WRVR beginning in 1977
Batt Johnson
- former WRVR Personality
Tom Roberts reports that Les Davis is now on Sirius satellite radio.
A grass-roots effort, unsuccessful in its application to the FCC, tried to
save the WRVR
format for New York City. When the music changed, WRVR became a
memory.
Add to this list: do you have web links, pictures,
ephemera from WRVR in the 70s?
How about your memories of WRVR? Email please and contribute to
this web site.
Here are some of those remembrances:
WRVR-FM,
New York - This was my main jazz radio station from the time I became obsessed
by
jazz music (1976) until the walls came tumbling down in late 1980 when, without
warning, the announcer
played a jazz piece just before midnight, and then followed with a country song
just after midnight,
with the station now called WKHK. WRVR's call letters apparently started in 1961
as Riverside Radio,
with ownership by Riverside Church, whose religious services were covered on
Sunday mornings.
When I started listening, the announcer lineup was powerful, including Max Cole
in the early afternoon,
Les Davis, Knicks basketball player Spencer Haywood during the weekend, and
Zulema (sp?) on the
weekend. The station moved from playing plenty of hard-hitting jazz, to losing
its edge more and more
as it approached its own death in late 1980.
Jon Katz, Maryland criminal defense lawyer (www.markskatz.com/crimdefense.htm)
Hello:
I was having a bit of remembrance the other night and I thought about
all the wonderful big band jazz thatRichard, Napa, CA fogsf @ sbcglobal .net
Ed. note: If you can help Richard out, email him directly. Be sure to copy his email address and remove all spaces before sending.
It's nice to see folks remember this great Jazz radio station.
I first started listening to WRVR around 1974.
It was my musical mainstay. The station provided you with new and old. You could
here Duke and Louis on
some shows, and Chick and Herbie on others. Jazz-rock fusion wouldn't have got
the boost in 1970's without
stations like WRVR. I still somewhat recall when it when off the air. It was
1980, right after Labor Day. It
was either a Saturday or Sunday morning in early September when I heard Les
Davis say "here's one from
Johnny Cash." I thought I was still drunk from the night before, but I
wasn't. In a week or so all of the
station jocks were replaced, but who cared. I wasn't listening anyway. It was so
sudden, a real ambush
job, and a dark day for jazz fans in New York.
Smitty
My memories of WRVR are of being in my high school jazz band
(Trumpet) Connetquot High School
(Bohemia, Long Island) and listening to the station from about 11:00pm till
about 1 or 2:00am while I mentally
wrestled with the choice of whether to pursue Graphic Arts or Music Education.
Luckily the day I interviewed
for F.I.T. (Fashion Institute of Technology) the two representatives from the
school were complete losers. I
subsequently chose to attend Berklee College of Music and graduated in 1983. I
am currently Teaching music
in Westborough, MA since 1989. I still play trumpet. mostly Trumpet and Organ
(weddings) and also in a Motown,
R&B band which includes two teachers a police officer an EMT a nutritionist
and a HVAC specialist. We all still
love Jazz, but play classic rock R&B at our twice monthly gigs. I love that
I found this Website! I remember
Hershel's voice vividly.... This station was my musical savior at a time when
disco and all other rock stations
were playing down to the "ignorance" of musical consumers. I was
introduced to the late Trumpeter Woody
Shaw on WRVR and have been a Jazz follower ever since!
Paul Tomashefsky - Massachusetts
What a great site! What a great idea. You can't imagine how
alive that radio station IS. I went to get some
photographs reproduced about a year ago. The guy behind the counter looked at my
name and said, "Batt Johnson?
From RVR?" That is some twenty-three years later.
I have one correction for now with more to follow. Batt
Johnson was the first speaking voice on the country station
(WKHK) that replaced WRVR. John Brejot, the new music director from Texas was on
the air just playing music
without talk. The last jazz song to air was Charles Mingus' "Good-bye Pork
Pie Hat." The first country song was
Waylon Jennings "Are You Ready For The Country." This happened about
10AM September 8th, 1980. As we filed out
|of a large staff meeting next door at the auditorium of the elementry school
with all of the people of WWRL-AM
and WRVR-FM, there was a large light blue moving van parked outside. They were
loading all of the jazz records
(LPs) into it. Jaws were dropping onto the sidewalk, hearts were breaking and
tears were flowing. I entered the
studio and saw ALL of the phone lights flashing as John continued to play songs
without saying a word. He handed
the studio over to me. I took the microphone and did a back-announce of the
previous country songs heard as if
nothing had happened. I didn't DARE answer ANY of those calls coming in. What
was I going to say anyway? I know
that EVERY SINGLE PERSON on those lines had the same question..."What
the____happened?" The rest as they say...
Thanks for listening then, thanks for reading now.
Batt Johnson 06-16-04
I wrote an article about the old RVR -- and specifically about
the great Ed Beach -- in RADIO and RECORDS
a year or so ago. Ed lives in Eugene, OR, and thousands of hours of his JUST
JAZZ shows are now owned by
and available from the Library of Congress in DC.
See my web site, http://home.comcast.net/~willlayman/wsb/html/view.cgi-html2.html--SiteID-1258407.html, to read about Ed.
Will Layman 07-2004
Hello and thanks for the wonderful page devoted to WRVR. I
have a lot of memories of WRVR, mainly from 1979-80
when my family moved to Long Island. I even have some recordings of a few songs
that I will try to convert to mp3.
I was a big fan of Steely Dan, who were recording in NYC during this time, and I
was always calling 'RVR to request
one of their songs to be squeezed in. The dj's, especially Les Davis, always
managed to play the song. 'RVR was very
experimental towards the end, I remember hearing Hendrix mixed in, also Stevie
Wonder. It was a great time for jazz
crossover music and that niche really died when 'RVR went off the air. They
actually left the air at 12 noon, because
I listened to Les Davis that morning (Sept 8, 1980) before heading off to
school. When I got home I remember
thinking....whoa...bad reception, all I am getting is some country station! All
of the dj's at 'RVR were great and
friendly...I remember Batt Johnson alright, great voice, anyone remember the
beautiful Pat Prescott!
Stephen Vincent O`Rourke 07-2004
ALL HAIL WRVR. I was 19 when I was introduced to jazz by WRVR. I, too,
remember the day it "went off the air." Over the years, I keep up with my
favorite spinners -- Pat Prescott and Les Davis specifically. I've lost track of
Les, though. Do you know anything about his whereabouts? If he's still in radio
-- jazz or otherwise? Is he still alive? I know at one point, he was doing a
"Live At/From Greenstreet" long ago. Done an internet search and only get old
news. Pat does a show with Dave Koz at 94.7FM. If you know anything about Les,
please let me know at e-mail.
By the way, nice site.
T.R. Clark 10-2004
I grew up in the South. White boy from Chattanooga, Tennessee. In 1972 at age
14 we moved to Long Island when my dad, a sportswriter, took a job at the New
York Times. Went to Uniondale HS and played clawhammer banjo (was a hick from
Tennessee thing).
Jazz became my passion and RVR was the main reason. I really miss Van J (I think
the J stood for jaw). Sure wish I could find the recording of Hallelujah Time
the guys used as an intro for one of the shows.
Mike Searcy (Dandridge, Tennessee) 11-2004
During the seventies & early eighties while living in Manhattan I couldn't
begin a day without the wit of
Les Davis & Roberta Altman on current events.
I have yet to hear radio that comes close to the play list RVR, topshelf.
How I mourned after the shock that morning to hear...country music. As a
young budding Art Director I'd been
asked to design a logo for a new "jazz" station a few years later.
Though the station is still alive and quite well I would probably respond in the
same fashion...
"I can't design anything that isn't what it is and cd101.9 is NOT jazz.
WBGO was always there, or beginning to be but in New Jersey. WKCR there also
though I hadn't wanted earn
a degree while listening.
WRVR was the best and only representation of what a New York jazz station should
be. A finger on the pulse
of a true, progressive jazz aficionado.
Much love,
Joanne Jubert 01-2005
GOD BLESS YOU !!!! 'RVR was my most important music teacher.
And just in the last couple of days I have had conversations with fellow
musicians about that great station
and how much we miss it and the impact it had on us. Thank you for putting this
together. I was brought
to tears listening to the MP3 aircheck you have posted. If you have more of
these, please tell me how I
could possibly get them from you.
Peace and blessings, Zo-
Alonzo Wright 02-2005
I have fond memories of WRVR, not just as a listener but as a musician who
got musical support from this
station. I remember calling up Les Davis and asking him to play a tune and he's
play it within 10 minutes.
I also remember working at the now defunct Green Street restaurant. Les
did a remote show from the
restaurant. With a moments notice of walking up those steps just to say hello, I
was on the air doing an
interview. WRVR was about exploring different facets of this music called
jazz, not just playing the
same stuff over and over again, from straight ahead to contemporary to
Brazilian, from Chick Corea
to Chuck Mangione, Herbie Hancock to Dave Grusin, Miles Davis to Ronnie Laws.
The first years of
CD101.9 attempted to carry on a tradition set forth by WRVR. Unfortunately
it lasted for a brief
while. Right now it isn't even a shadow of what it was like then. When a
station that use to be so
vibrant, loses that, there is no where to go, nothing to say. I miss WRVR and
the air personalities
that brought life and spontaneity to the table. I am forever thankful to have
been a part of that history.
Onaje Allan Gumbs/ pianist,composer,arranger,producer 02-2005
"The Sunday Salsa Show" con Roger "Rogelio" Dawson was like going to church.
I lived in NYC on 45th St.
in Manhattan and would walk to Central Park with my radio and listen to the
unbelievable sounds.
At midnight I would listen to new releases "uninterrupted" from an eclectic mix
of artists and genres
like Angie Bofill, Passport, Dave Valentin.....it was great!
The music was fresh, electronics were evolving and the sounds, although heard
before, sounded new
and different. Very gratifying and diverse musical points of view.
WRVR, by way of it's Sunday Salsa Show, introduced me to a world of music which
I began to understand,
and actively pursue because of the way the DJ's presented the music, the
artists, and the genres. The
introductions and studio interviews, the "on location" shows, the venues, these
were all a new world of
enlightenment to which this native born Puerto Rican was now hooked.
There was a very personal aspect to the way WRVR engaged their audience and
challenged them to prove
their knowledge of music with contests. I remember winning a pair of tickets to
see the Jeff Lorber Fusion
with a member named Kenny Gorelick, now known as Kenny G, in New Jersey.
I guess longevity is the ultimate test of quality, and the fact this site exists
is a testament to the positive
impact that WRVR made with it's listeners, as well as the people involved with
it's development and
success. It sure was a great time in music for me and I'm grateful for the
education WRVR provided.
Hopefully, all of the alumni on both the giving and receiving sides are doing
well and able to see that
their sentiments are shared by many others who grew up in the NYC area.
Keep the music playing and make sure it's got plenty of SALSA!
Angel Matos 02-2005
Someone on your site mentions wondering what became of Les Davis. I assume
"everyone" now knows he
has a daily show on Sirius satellite radio. Before that, a Google search reveals
he had a show on Japanese
(!) radio (I would assume done remotely).
Charles 04-2005
The Sea Ranch, CA
WRVR was one of a kind and I enjoyed listening in the mid 70's. I'm wondering
if anyone knows who did the ID
jingles that ran on 'RVR circa 1974? Better yet... does anyone have a dub of the
cuts in the clear?
Don 05-2005
Lakewood, OH
I remember WRVR 106.7 like it was yesterday. No station in the Greater New
York City metropolitan area
was playing anything remotely comparable in the late 1970s. Although I was
very young, still in high school
as a matter of fact, WRVR was my first commercial exposure to cutting edge Jazz.
I had heard Jazz
practically all of my life, and was in the high school Jazz band. So, I had more
than a passing conversance
with the music. No commercial radio stations were playing Jazz fusion in the
late 1970s, though, which
probably accounts for its critical acclaim but commercial failure. Nevertheless,
Chick Corea,
Return To Forever, Jon Luc Ponty, Noel Pointer, The Jeff Lorber Fusion, Pat
Methany, The Jazz Crusaders,
and a veritable slew of lesser known musicians either got their start or had
their music exposed to a
broader audience by WRVR 106.7. The music is so intellectual, though, it will
probably never garner the
commercial sucess as genres such as Hip Hop, R & B, Rock, and even Contemporary
Gospel. I sure do
miss the music, and the progressive programming made famous by WRVR 106.7. CD
101.9 is but a poor
facsimile. . .
Dennis 05-2005
Great web site. I was an avid listener to WNEW-FM almost from the beginning
in October, 1967 with Rosko and Jonathan Schwartz. After nearly falling
off my chair after listening to John McLaughlin in early 1973,
I switched to jazz fusion and turned on to WRVR and Les Davis. It was a sad day
when they switched to country music. After that I soured on the whole
commercial radio experience and now all I listen to AM talk radio.
CD-101 plays the worst elevator music there is. No creativity or guts to play
some hard driving jazz fusion. What a sad commentary.
Keith Lazan 06-2005
Hey there, great to see a site dedicated to WRVR. It was my brother who
turned me on to the station in
1979. I was only 13 years old but loved progressive jazz and fusion at the
time. I have a cassette tape
from 1980 of WRVR. If you want I can transfer it to a CDR and send it to you.
Let me know.
Thanks!
David 08-2005
Ed. note: We've asked David for his aircheck, and when we receive it, we'll post it!
So Great that you have an article about WRVR and especially Les
Davis on your site.
I have such great memories of Les' shows. When I was in 3rd grade I got
hooked on Les' show on WRVR. His program introduced me to Bird and inspired me
to take up playing the saxophone. I have
recordings of Dizzy live and a band called Flying Island that I got
with my boom box back in 1978
from his show. Flying Island used to camp out at our house and played in the
room above our garage.
Les was ssooooo large.
Robert 09-2005
Grand Haven, MI
I moved to New York from the Caribbean in 1982 and got to know Les
Davis through Radio. Les helped
shape my understanding of Jazz. I now teach music in Florida and I often think
of Les, the magic and
wealth of knowledge he brought to this music. Question: Where is Les Davis
is he still in radio?
Jazz needs him!
Anthony 11-2005
I was introduced to WRVR in 1977. I always loved jazz but it took the RVR commercial format to get me to really become a customer of the music. I don't know if it makes any sense but when I'd listen to some of the other stations that played jazz, I'd listen but it didn't prompt me to go to clubs or buy records. It was as though the music was presented in an "academic" or some sort of "objective" studied format. I'd guess offhand that of the several hundred jazz LP's I have the vast majority of those purchases was because I heard a song from the record on WRVR. I really miss the station. Even now, 26 years later I still wish I could find a station that plays Jazz in the artful, enjoyable and yet commercial style that WRVR did. I really miss WRVR.
Brendan 2-2006
Hello.
I just thought it important to tell you that at 5:30am, Sunday July 16, 2006;
Max Cole died of complications from
lung cancer. He was 90 years old. Memorial service to be announced.
Many thanks. Kevin S. 7-2006
Ed note: Max was the Voice of Riverside Church and voiced the Sunday
Worship services as well as being the
"jazz impresario" for "Just Jazz" and "More Jazz" on WRVR's earlier incarnation.
A tribute to the service Max
gave to the church is at
http://www.theriversidechurchny.org/news/article.php?id=83
Thanks, Kevin. -LL
As far as I am concerned...jazz died when WRVR went off the air. I program my own format of jazz after the format of WRVR. I now live in Tampa, Fl. and I am trying to open a jazz restaurant in the downtown area of Tampa.
Smooth jazz just does not play the variety of songs that WRVR used to play. I am tired of hearing the same songs on all the smooth jazz formats. I now give away my sampler cd and people love the selections I have chose.
WRVR lives forever in my heart. it was good that after the station went off of the air, Les Davis still provided the same format from the Green St Cafe. if you would like a cd....let me know.
my format is simple.
old jazz, new jazz, Latin jazz, jazzy love songs, and something jazzy you can dance too. i.e.: Grover Washington Jr's track.....Check Out Grover.
The music I play is in tribute to WRVR-FM, New York. What ever happened to Les Davis?
Ric L. 7-2006
A great site for WRVR! I was a huge fan of WRVR in 1977-1980, and that is how
I discovered jazz music at the age of 13! I also remember that sad
day when I turned on my stereo and heard country on 106.7.
I was wondering if you or anyone had any interesting ephemera from WRVR for sale. I recall years ago they sold T-shirts when the station still had it's jazz format. However, it would be neat to have a poster or something, or even a repro of a poster would be interesting. Couldn't find anything on ebay, however.
Let me know if you know of anything, I would be very interested.
Cheers, Patrick Jeffery 10-2006
Ed. note: if you can help out Patrick in his search for WRVR-related material, let me know and I'll pass it along!
I was a freshman at college. My mom had sent me a letter with the newspaper clipping that said RVR had switched formats. I cried.
I now listen to pandora.com on the internet. I have tried to create a station
with many of the artists that used to play on WRVR.
You can also listen to this new, online version of WRVR
http://www.pandora.com/?sc=sh99114792788516495
Enjoy!
Don't cry!
Jeff in Connecticut 10-2006
Ed. note: Pandora is a great experiment and Jeff's station deserves a listen!
What's the liquidation process when a jazz radio station goes off the air
(what happens to the music collections? who can purchase? how to
best handle the details, etc)?
My interest in going forward with locating jazz station collections is
strictly from a commercial standpoint and therefore beyond the jazz fan
level. It may involve rewriting the posting along the lines of a newspaper want
ad: Buyer seeking to liquidate jazz station music libraries.
Please send details to jking101 @ cox.net for consideration.
Thanks for your input/suggestions.
Jon King 2-2007
Ed. note: Can someone help Jon, if so, contact Jon directly; copy and paste his email and remove any spaces.
I remember WRVR when it was a non-commercial radio station located at the
Riverside Church in the city of New York. The
non-commercial status would last through the '1960s.
In the early '70s, it was believed that WRVR would become the National Public
Radio (NPR) station in New York but WNYC,
a station which at the time was owned by the city, became the affiliate of the
network.
WRVR became a commercial station. The transmitter was moved from the church
to the Empire State Building and they
began broadcasting a format of talk part time and jazz throughout the night and
a good deal of the weekend. Max Cole,
Ed Beach and I believe Les Davis were all on the station at that time.
In 1974, WRVR went jazz 22 hours a day. RVR Evening, the station's news program was retained for a while.
It was a true shock in September of 1980 when the format changed to country
and the call letters became WKHK. I was
dialing around that afternoon and when I heard country music on 106.7 FM, I got
lost as to where I was on the dial.
It was amazing.
I want to thank you for this tribute site and everyone who ever worked at RVR
for giving us years of wonderful radio
and turning so many on to great music. We will never forget this radio station
and what it meant to so many people.
Larry Stoler 2-2007
My fondest memory was entering WRVR's Big Man Contest in 1976. It was in
commemoration of the great Cannonball
Adderley. As the youngest recipient in the group of winners (19 years of age), I
felt so sophisticated to be among the
ranks of jazz aficionados. Much of what I learned about this music was gained
from hours of pleasurable listening,
particularly to Les Davis. I almost passed out after meeting and witnessing him
read something I wrote on the air.
The whole event was a an intense thrill-fest. There was a photograph taken of
the winners inside The Village Gate.
I would be so grateful to get a copy of that picture or knowledge about how to
search for it. Also, how can Les
Davis be reached?
Barbara L. Gardner 2-2007
New Jersey
Ed. note: Les Davis is one of the hosts on the Sirus
satellite network on channel 72, Pure Jazz. Check out
his bio at
www.sirius.com and you'll find his email
address there too. If anyone has the picture Barbara is
talking about, contact me and I'll put you in touch
with her!
Thank you for your site. I found it doing a Yahoo! search. I live in Delaware
now but I'm born and raised in Brooklyn NY.
I grew up on WRVR since December 1978. I used to listen to WRVR 24/7. When I
joined the Army in 81 and got my 1st
stereo, I wrote on the front of all my albums WRVR 106.7 fm NYC. That was to
keep their memory alive. I still have
those albums and no working turntables, lol, 3 are sitting and I keep saying one
day lol. I use to record my cassette
tapes to sound like WRVR and even dj'ed on a radio station when I was stationed
in Turkey and played what I used
to hear on WRVR. Now all I have to do is learn from my teenage daughters how to
download on a iPod . God bless.
Raymond Shellow 6-2007
Delaware
I was continuity director from 1977 through 1979. Carol Goldfarb hired
me...she was the General Manager's Gal Friday
(now there's a term I bet you haven't heard in awhile...) The program director
at that time was Dennis Waters. I
worked closely with the copywriter, Robert Kraft. He is now the President of
FoxMusic in CA.
This was a perfect environment...was sorry to see it fold and become country and
western. We worked with a
great group of talented people. Great to hear Les is still on the air...wonder
what happened to his A.M. drive
side-kick Roberta?
Adrienne Wilkins (aka Jones) 6-2007
