Christian Christmas Songs on Radio: An Insider’s Perspective

In response to a post of ours about the lack of religious Christmas songs on WMYX-FM and (especially) WRIT-FM in Milwaukee, we got the following e-mail from a well-known area broadcast professional, used here with permission:

Mr. McAdams,

I agree. It is rather disheartening to hear that all of the Christmas songs on WRIT are void of any religious meaning.

My first reaction was going to be that sometimes stations play the fun, secular music to break into the season - gently adding songs with meaning as the season rolls on. After all, we haven’t even hit Thanksgiving yet. Upon looking at WRIT’s website, however, I see that they are playing ALL Christmas music. I find that to be very odd and rather disturbing.

I can guarantee you that when we start adding Christmas music to the rotation at WBWI (Thursday), the selection will definitely include songs with religious meaning. We, of course, don’t exploit the season by playing all Christmas music to get a ratings spike, though. Our Christmas music will be gradually mixed in until Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Feel free to tune us in.

Fuzz Martin
Program Director
92.5 WBWI

Charlie Sykes, on his show, is quoting an e-mail from a Clear Channel representative who claims they are going to “ease into” religious music as Christmas day grows closer. We don’t really follow the logic of this, but we’ll see whether it happens.

[Update]

As of this moment, 1:34 p.m. on November 23^rd, WRIT-FM shows two religious songs among the “Last 10 Played” on their web site. They are “Oh Holy Night” and “What Child is This?”

This is dandy, but if they intended to work religious music into the mix from the very beginning, why weren’t they willing to say so?