Radio. That word to describe the invisible transmission of radio frequencies through the air, from a transmitting device to a receiving device. That word was once very new on the lips of people around the world, most notably in the second half of the 19th century. In America, new companies sprang up and used the word ‘radio’ often, in a way to inform the public that they were part of the new emerging trend sweeping the nation and to attract new customers to their businesses. Back around the turn of the 19th century to the 20th century when radio was new to the general public, there were no morning drive DJs, no overnight soft music shows or anything of the sort.
In fact, back during those times Morse Code was often used to communicate with listeners. During the run up to World War I, the US government was fearful of many things, so one of the things that they did was to shut down many foreign owned radio stations that were transmitting in Morse Code in foreign languages. It showed the power of the new nascent radio medium, and it was a sign of things to come for societies not only in the US, but worldwide.
Fast forward several decades and soon millions of people were enjoying the radio medium. Radio used to be one of the most important ways to get news or sports, to hear new music or to hear plays or shows when they were first aired. It remained a first alert system for emergencies of all kinds to warn people to get out of harm’s way of impending threatening situations. Radio was a masterstroke of an invention, and it stirred people in ways that were not imagined before its invention.
When I came into this world and learned as a very young child what radio was, I was absolutely fascinated with it. Being so young, it was like magic to have someone turn a radio on, start listening to music, and not see anything entering or exiting the device at all. It just floored me at how something like that could actually work. When I got a little older, in my early teens, I knew and felt the feeling of celebrity associated with the people well known in radio; certainly, the musicians who I heard play and sing all of this great music, but also the DJs that I heard who announced and described the music in many different emotional tones, tones that often matched the style of music that they played.
As a teenager I had begun to associate getting one’s music played on a radio station as being something very special. And I still do today. For me, to have any of my works played by a radio station programmer or DJ evokes a warm, special feeling that runs very deep within me. But back when I was younger, I celebrated the local or regional musicians and singers who received radio airplay as it was quite a powerful thing to happen to one’s career.
Growing up, so many of my family and friends listened to the radio, and I did too. There was plenty of music to listen to, and often times the message in the music coming from the radio reflected the times that we were living in. There were many who sang out about injustice in society, and those songs were hit songs to the people and were not about what the chart position said, or even if the song was on a chart at all. Music on the radio gave many people the feeling of being “up with the times”, it was what was talked about at get-togethers, parties, and most places where folks would gather.
As I grew into my late teens and my early 20’s, I began to feel like I had put in enough time with my chosen instrument, the bass, to play on a recording that would be suitable for radio airplay. When I lived in Japan, I was told that some of the performances that I had taken part in with music bands were broadcast on some of the local stations near the area of the shows that we did. I wished that I had heard any of those broadcasts, and while I didn’t, I was very glad to know that the music I was a part of had been broadcast out to the public. Knowing that this radio airplay had taken place for me in a foreign country made me absolutely tingle inside. A great feeling indeed.
Later on in my later 20’s and my early 30’s during my days of living in Los Angeles found me playing with some really good original bands. I loved being a part of an original band’s sound, it is very difficult to describe how that feels, how coming up with such a singular sound is achieved. The effort to make that happen did pay off for those bands as they did garner airplay in the Los Angeles area. To hear the music I’d helped make being played over the air on some of the big market radio stations in Los Angeles during the late 1980’s was a marvel to me. I felt so great when I heard the music from those bands I was in being played on the radio. It was at that point in my life that I began to want to create my own music with the hopes of having it air on the radio. A feeling inside me wanted me to continue the journey of creating the best music that I could and have it suitable for radio airplay.
My interest in radio had also become very strong on a personal level, and I wanted to use my own voice to announce and describe to the music listeners what they were about to hear. So, I answered an ad to work as a DJ at KCLA FM in Los Angeles in 1993, auditioned, was selected, and began to air my own half hour radio show titled “Jerome Lee’s Tuneful Mix”. I aired that show for about a year, and it was one of the best things that I could have done with my life. The need for music is great when you are an on-air DJ, so it taught me how important having a large selection of music was to maintain a radio show of any size, and my show aired just once a week. Having this experience allowed me to understand better what the people who were running a radio station were thinking.
After I had made my move to Europe, and settled in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, I met and worked with more bands that also garnered radio airplay as a reward for their musical efforts. And my own personal intentions of creating the best music that I could was very intense inside me. When the situation lined itself up for me to have the opportunity to record my own music, I jumped at that chance and took it. The time and effort that I put in to make my first solo artist recording was worth it, as it led to me having my first on air artist interview with a terrestrial radio station DJ in Amsterdam in 2003, something I will never forget. Again, a major first in my musical life happens in a foreign country, and once again through the medium of radio.
Returning to the US to live saw me in my mid 40’s, and I had a new CD in tow that I was happy with. And by the early to mid 2000’s, the internet had begun to make its way into people’s lives and change how they communicated with the world. Radio was right there when this enormous change in society began to take place. Now, not only could a person listen to local or regional radio on the internet, but one could listen to internet radio stations on several continents around the planet. This thought struck a nerve in me with the possibilities that it presented. It meant that my emerging radio marketing plan could be centered around using the internet as a platform to have my music heard on internet radio stations not only on a local or regional level, but on a truly worldwide scale.
Once I embarked upon my internet radio marketing campaign in 2005, it set off a motion that still carries forward to this day. My marketing efforts have garnered airplay on internet radio stations from Adelaide to the Azores and more. I have worked with many internet radio station programmers that were once a part of the giant Live365 network of internet radio station operators who aired my music, they were truly wonderful people to associate with.
Fast forward to the year 2017, and the efforts of my internet radio campaign have garnered my first on air artist spotlight interview ever in the US! This happened because of the great internet radio station programmers and DJs who cater to independent musicians and artists like me. I have been thankful to see this paradigm shift grow on the internet, to see so many internet radio stations who cater to independent artists. This has been a very fortunate change for musicians and artists; it increases the chances of their works being heard by many more new listeners.
While terrestrial radio is ever changing (and even disappearing) in countries around the world, it appears that internet radio has found a home and looks to be with us all for the long run. I am thankful to be a part of it, and I will continue to release the best music that I can and continue to offer it for internet radio airplay. And if you are an artist/musician, I hope you do too.
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