CHUM-FM

CHUM-FM

City of license	Toronto, Ontario
Branding	104.5 CHUM FM
Slogan	Today's Best Music
Frequency	104.5 MHz (FM)
First air date	1963
Format	Rhythmic AC-leaning Hot AC
Power	40 KW
Callsign meaning	taken from its sister radio station
Owner	Bell Media (Bell Media Radio)
Sister stations	Radio: CHUM (AM), CFXJ-FM TV: CP24, CFTO-TV (CTV Toronto), CKVR-TV (CTV2 Barrie)
Webcast	Listen Live
Website	104.5 CHUM-FM

CHUM-FM is a Canadian radio station licensed to Toronto, Ontario and operated by Bell Media. It broadcasts at 104.5 MHz with a hot adult contemporary format that leans towards rhythmic adult contemporary. Like most Toronto TV and radio stations, CHUM's transmitter is located on the CN Tower and the station can be heard down south to the New York and Pennsylvania border, and up north to Orillia, and also has a large following of American listeners.

CHUM-FM is consistently one of Toronto's most popular stations in the Bureau of Broadcast Measurement radio ratings, and is currently the #2 FM radio station in its market (and occasionally shares the top spot with Rogers Media-owned Adult Contemporary station CHFI).

History

CHUM-FM started broadcasting on September 1, 1963 with an ERP of 18,000 watts and a transmitter at 1331 Yonge Street. It aired a classical music format, the first station in Canada to do so. On March 21, 1966, their ERP was increased to 54,000 watts. In 1968, CHUM-FM received approval for a change in its transmitter location and increase in power to 100,000 watts. The transmitter was to be moved to the top of the Manufacturer's Life Building at 250 Bloor Street East.

On July 2 of the same year (1968), CHUM-FM changed formats to progressive rock, a forerunner to today's adult album alternative format, by playing a wide range of music ranging from world music and jazz to classical and folk. The station also aired public affairs programming, such as In Toronto. The station featured many famous Canadian radio personalities such as Larry Green, Walter Michaels, Steve Harris, Pete and Geets, Larry Wilson, David Marsden, David Pritchard and actor Rick Moranis.

On December 14, 1973, the station was authorized, along with other Toronto radio and TV stations, to move their transmitter to the top of the CN Tower. The new transmitter was turned on on May 31, 1976 with a reduced ERP of 40,000 watts.

In 1978, CHUM-FM created a Top 30 Album Chart to complement sister station CHUM-AM's Singles Chart. A television version of the countdown was later broadcast on Citytv, featuring music videos for most of the songs in the countdown; the TV version was discontinued in January 2008, following Rogers Communications' acquisition of Citytv.

In September 1984, the station started evolving towards adult contemporary. Current morning show host Roger Ashby would join the station from CHUM's AM sister station on September 2, 1985. Marilyn Denis and Rick Hodge would join the show a year later, and the show became an instant success, making them some of the best known broadcasters in Toronto radio.

The station evolved towards its current Hot Adult Contemporary format in 1990.

On May 26, 1998, CHUM-FM was granted a license to broadcast in Digital audio broadcasting using the Eureka-147 system. The transmitter was installed on the CN Tower and broadcast at 1456.304 MHz with an ERP of 5,084 watts.

Starting in the mid-2000s, CHUM-FM's playlist has been noticeably more open to periodic, carefully selected rhythmic contemporary crossover songs, including rhythm and blues, reggae, hip hop music, and dance music, while keeping some 1980s, 1990s and 2000s songs, as well as standard pop/rock material that forms the Hot AC format. The reason for this was to balance younger and older audiences. Many hot adult contemporary stations in Canada have followed this pattern and resulted in audience growth nationwide, making Hot AC the country's most listened-to format. The closest local competition musically within the format came from CKFM-FM (99.9 Mix FM), which leaned mostly younger.

CHUM-FM also carried American Top 40 with Ryan Seacrest from 2004 to 2006. CIDC and CKFM have been the Toronto affiliates for the show since then.

At the 25th Anniversary Canadian Music Industry Awards, held March 8, 2007, CHUM-FM was honoured as Station of the Year, Program Director of the year for CHUM-FM PD Rob Farina, and air talent of the year for Roger, Rick & Marilyn. Former CHUM President Jim Waters was inducted into the Music Industry Hall of Fame that same evening.

On February 5, 2007, CHUM-FM became the flagship station to a syndicated interactive evening show titled, The Sound Lounge. The show handed over control of the content to the user's hands by an all listener chosen playlist, listener generated remixes and mash ups, and the opportunity to interact with listeners coast to coast via email, SMS, and voice. The show was originally hosted by Cory Kimm. Kimm then moved to Winnipeg and became part of the morning show on CHIQ-FM. Chris Biggs became the new host on September 11, 2007. Biggs moved to CKFM-FM and Richie Favalaro became the new host in early 2008. The show aired on CHUM Radio-O&O Hot AC affiliates in Halifax (CIOO-FM), Brockville (CFJR-FM), Peterborough (CKPT-FM), Kingston (CFLY-FM), Winnipeg (CHIQ-FM), Calgary (CKCE-FM) and Victoria (CHBE-FM). On June 16, 2008, the show was cancelled.

PD Rob Farina moved to CJEZ-FM in early 2007. David Corey, ex-APD at KISS Boston (Kiss 108) took over as program director that same year.

On June 22, 2007, CTVglobemedia purchased CHUM-FM and most of the other assets of CHUM Limited, the station's owners since their sign-on in 1963, following approval by the CRTC, while the Citytv stations were sold to Rogers Communications.

On June 23, 2008, Rick Hodge resigned from both CHUM-FM and 1050 CHUM to pursue other opportunities. Roger Ashby and Marilyn Denis continue to host mornings, which are now called The Roger, Darren & Marilyn Morning Show (when Darren B. Lamb joined the show after a stint of afternoon drive host). Hodge currently works at NewsTalk 1010.

Until late 2009, CHUM-FM continued to be the most listened to and most influential radio station in Canada with over 1,166,000 weekly listeners according to the BBM data released on December 3, 2007. But in December 2009, when CJEZ-FM flipped from adult contemporary to adult hits, adult contemporary rival CHFI-FM became the most-listened-to radio station in Canada. During the 2005-2009 season, CHFI continued to usually beat CHUM as the top-rated radio station in Canada, although CHUM had unseated CHFI on some books. Also in 2009, CHUM-FM had been phasing out most modern adult contemporary artists and heavy amounts of older material from the playlist and began leaning towards a rhythmic adult contemporary direction due to no rhythmic AC or urban AC stations in Canada.

Today, CHUM-FM competes with AC station CHFI-FM, and Top 40 stations CKFM-FM, CIDC-FM and CKIS-FM, as well as, to a lesser extent, Hamilton-based AC-formatted station CKLH-FM.

Trivia

According to his biography Private Parts, infamous shock jock Howard Stern was offered a job at CHUM-FM in 1981 while he was working at WWWW-FM in Detroit, Michigan. According to a February 2006 broadcast of his Sirius Satellite Radio show, he turned the job down because he would have been paid in Canadian dollars.

The CHUM Chart Top 30

The CHUM Chart Top 30 is a weekly countdown of the 30 biggest songs of the week voted by listeners and requests. The CHUM Chart Top 30, which began airing in 2000, is a successor to the original CHUM Top 30 Chart that was aired originally on CHUM-AM and hosted by now-morning show host Roger Ashby. The CHUM Top 30 Chart updates every Saturday and is on air on Saturdays at 9am and Sundays at 7pm by Richie Favalaro.

Contests

CHUM-FM airs numerous contests and some of the popular ones are Beat the Bank and Breakfast in Barbados.^[1] In Beat the Bank, the station lets the 25th caller play and the objective of the game is to win as much money as possible with some risks of losing all of it. The player has to decide whether to move on to another "vault" or to stop and take the amount inside the vault. The more vaults opened, the risks of losing all of the money is higher, but the money inside the vault increases. Vault 1 usually starts around $200 to $1000 and depending on how much vaults are opened, the value usually increases by $300 to $10,000 from each vault. CHUM-FM is known to give the most money, ($500,000 as the jackpot), compared to other CTVglobemedia radio stations, like Kool 101.5, who gives a maximum of $50,000 dollars CND. Rival station CHFI has a contest similar to Beat the Bank known as "The Big Bag of Cash."

In Breakfast in Barbados, the station will take callers from caller 25 to caller 30 to qualify for the draw to go on the trip. Winners will get an all-inclusive trip to Barbados and it is usually joined by popular artists like Michael Bublé in 2007, Kelly Clarkson in 2009, and the Barenaked Ladies in 2010.^[2]

See also

• List of radio stations in Ontario
• 250 Richmond Street West
• CHUM (AM)
• CHUM Chart

References

1. ^ Totally Barbados: Breakfast in Barbados 2010
2. ^ "B'dos continues to gain celebrity exposure with CHUM FM". Barbados Advocate. 12 March 2010. http://www.barbadosadvocate.com/newsitem.asp?more=lifestyle&NewsID=9408. Retrieved 12 March 2010. "This year’s concert, which will take place on Thursday April 22, 2010 at Holders House, will showcase the record-breaking group, New Kids on the Block (NKOTB) and the highly popular Canadian band, Barenaked Ladies. These acts will be added to the concert’s already impressive entertainment résumé, which included, to name a few, Nelly Furtado, American Idol alumnus Kelly Clarkson and, Katy Perry, also of Capitol Records." 

External links

• 104.5 CHUM-FM
• CHUM-FM history at Canadian Communications Foundation

Coordinates: 43°38′59″N 79°23′26″W / 43.64975°N 79.39067°W / 43.64975; -79.39067