Time For Chinese Hit Music At Top 40?
Written Jul. 11, 2008 by Sean Ross in Content with 1 Comment
So if you're a 40-year-radio veteran with a background in AC and Country ...
And if the name of your company is MOR Media ....
And you syndicate "The Country Oldies Show" and "Country Oldies Flashback" ...
What's the logical next syndicated offering?
An English-language show spotlighting hit music in Cantonese and Mandarin and targeting "teens and young-adults"?
Okay, so it may be a little surprising that the pending new show "Chinamerica Hit Radio" is coming from veteran programmer Steve Warren, but it's an idea that has been a long time in the offing:
Warren's demo -- a 30 minute (or five-minute scoped) prototype of what will be an hour show -- bounces from AC-flavored music to music that sounds surprisingly like early '90s rhythmic product to an '80s flashback (that actually sounds like a Country oldie). A few songs are in English; some will definitely sound very different to somebody with Western pop sensibilities.
But the need for a show like this makes immediate sense. Another veteran programmer, Warren Cosford, tried to find a Vancouver home for Chinese pop music nearly 20 years ago. Arbitron did its first study of Chinese-language listeners in New York and Los Angeles and 2005, and while the majority of listening was to Chinese-language radio, the top English-language formats included AC and CHR.
Reader Comments
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Thanks Sean. Although I failed to get licensed in Vancouver, a pal of the late Julian Breen's launched in Hong Kong and was almost instantly went #1. I understand it was later shut down when China took over from The Brits. The Chinese Rock and Roll Trail begins here http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/red/sonic/
WC