MusicMaster Blog

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FashionTV – Tel Aviv, Israel; Radio Arabella – Vienna, Austria; WINC-FM – Winchester, VA; Christian FM – Vero Beach, FL; KCWU – Ellensburg, WA; KSFI – Salt Lake City, UT; KRSP – Salt Lake City, UT; KPRI – San Diego, CA

Welcome to Scott Shannon and True Oldies

MusicMaster is thrilled and honored to welcome the legendary Scott Shannon to the MusicMaster family. In July, Scott launched his popular True Oldies Channel format online and it is powered by MusicMaster! Hear Scott at TrueOldiesChannel.com every day and hear our very own Drew Bennett from 7pm-12am on the TOC as well! Watch for more news coming from the TOC camp in the future! Welcome, Scott! We are so proud to have you on board with us!

MusicMaster’s Expansion Continues

Software Giant Enhances Information Technology, Support, and Accounting Departments

MusicMaster announced recently the addition of three new team members, including an award-winning Florida radio program director, a longtime Las Vegas corporate director of digital technology, and a senior accountant.

Joining the company as a Music Scheduling Consultant is former JVC PD Dave Tyler, an entertaining voice on Florida radio for over 25 years. Tyler says, “I have been with WTRS alone for 16 years and there are few gigs that could entice me away from my JVC Broadcasting family, but this is one that checked every box on my wish list, the most important of which is the chance to work with Joe Knapp, whom I’ve known and admired for a long time.”

Longtime digital technology expert, Jeff Schroeder joins the MusicMaster team as Senior Technical Consultant for onsite installation, technical documentation, and automation interface expertise. Jeff shared, “I’ve known Joe Knapp and CTO Scott Wirt for almost 20 years, and I’ve been a fan of MusicMaster since then. I couldn’t be more thrilled at the opportunity to work with them and the amazing team they’ve put together.”

Additionally, Lorie Robers joins the corporate office as Senior Accountant. Lorie brings years of accounting experience to the international business offices of MusicMaster. Robers says, “I’m happy to be working with VP/Finance, Susan Averbeck. Joining an exciting, growing company like MusicMaster will allow me to utilize my talents and expertise.”

President and founder Joe Knapp, adds, “The exponential growth of this company has filled me with overwhelming pride and joy. It still blows my mind that the simple music scheduling program I created over thirty years ago evolved into this huge global company with thousands of MusicMaster users in every variety of entertainment platforms across dozens of countries around the world.”

Knapp founded MusicMaster in 1983 and it continues to be the world’s largest Windows-based music scheduling software for media outlets including radio and television stations.

Sponsor of the 7th Annual Monitor Latino Convention

MusicMaster patrocinará la 7ª Convención Anual del Monitor Latino el 24 agosto – día 26 la reunión más grande de las emisoras latinas de los Estados Unidos, México y toda América Latina. La convención se llevará a cabo en el Pacific Palms Resort en Los Ángeles, California. Si usted va a ir a este gran evento, nos gustaría invitarlo a visitar nuestro Consultores de MusicMaster Aaron Taylor y Jesús Rodríguez para consultaciones si eres un usuario o interesado en la posibilidad de incorporarse a nuestra familia de MusicMaster.

El equipo de Consultores de MusicMaster también tendran un taller Bilingüe el martes 26 de agosto a las 10:30 am en el salon “Cherry Hill”. Esto es muy útil para todos aquellos interesados en los productos de MusicMaster, así como algunos trucos de programación para los usuarios actuales. El propósito y el contenido de este taller consiste en demostrar las ventajas de las nuevas herramientas que MusicMaster PE, LT, y PRO tienen para ofrecer a los canals de musica de radio y televisión. Únase a nosotros y formar parte de este taller para todos los ejecutivos de la radio, programadores, locutores, estaciones de Internet, y para cualquier amante de la música y el radio.

MusicMaster will be sponsoring the 7th Annual Monitor Latino Convention on August 24th – 26th the largest gathering of Latino broadcasters from the United States, Mexico, and all Latin America. The convention will be hosted at the Pacific Palms Resort in Los Angles, California. If you will be going to this great event, we would like to invite you to visit our booth to meet MusicMaster Scheduling Consultants Aaron Taylor and Jesus Rodriguez for some one-on-one consulting whether you are a current user or considering joining our MusicMaster family.

The MusicMaster Scheduling Consultant team will also be hosting a Bilingual workshop on Tuesday August 26th at 10:30 am in the “Cherry Hill” ballroom. This is great for all those interested in MusicMaster products as well as some programming tricks for current users. The purpose and content of this workshop is to demonstrate the advantages of the new tools that MusicMaster PE, LT, and PRO have to offer radio and television music channels. Join us and become a part of this content-filled workshop for all radio executives, programmers, announcers, Internet broadcasters, DJ’s, radio hobbyists, and any radio or music lover.

A Fresh Coat of Paint on This Ol’ Town

MusicMaster Sheriff, Joe Knapp welcomes fellow Texans attending the 61st Annual Convention and Trade Show August 6-7 at the Renaissance Austin Hotel. Over a thousand will join Knapp at the largest state broadcast association convention in the nation.

Look for MusicMaster as we team up with automation partners, ENCO and Wide Orbit in the exhibit hall, and mark your agenda for Joe’s big presentation, “The Artistry and Science of Music Scheduling” Thursday, August 7 at 2:15pm.

Not registered for the full convention? Joe has a hat-full of free trade show guest passes. E-mail MusicMaster’s man from Austin, Drew Bennett, to reserve your guest pass.

The Broken Spoke may never be the same.

MusicMaster in Vancouver

Joe Knapp and Aaron Taylor, along with Jason Singleterry from Wide Orbit joined forces with the 103.5 QMFM, Bell Media-Vancouver, B.C. Programming, Engineering and IT teams this month to help launch CHQM-FM and CFBT-FM on MusicMaster and Wide Orbit in their beautiful new facility. What a great experience we had together, and are proud to welcome another Bell Media station cluster to the MusicMaster/A-Ware Software family!

From left to right: Aaron Taylor, Music Scheduling Consultant, A-Ware Software; Troy Wylie, Regional IT Manager, Bell Media; Leah Koepenick, Engineering/I.T. Technician, Bell Media/Vancouver; Joe Knapp, CEO/President, A-Ware Software; Brad Challoner, Music Director, CHQM-FM; Curtis Strange, Program Director, CFBT-FM/CHQM-FM; Jason Singleterry, Project Manager Radio Automation, Wide Orbit; Jasmina Koga, Music Director, CFBT-FM; Chris Larke, Chief Engineer Radio, Bell Media/Vancouver; and John Bolwitt, Engineering/I.T. Technician, Bell Media/Vancouver

Hong Kong Likes MusicMaster

On his last tour through Asia, Rainer Eichhorn had great meetings with existing and new clients.

Gregory Wong, of our Hong Kong-based partner company BTL, was putting together a string of very good meetings and some cool Dim Sum lunches.

We are looking forward to the next projects in this wonderful City.

MusicMaster Stations in Germany Celebrating the Soccer World Cup 2014

Check out the happy faces! GM’s, PD’s, MD’s and listeners of Bayern 3, FFH, Radio Paradiso, WDR 2, Hitradio Niedersachsen and Antenne Bayern went crazy during the World Cup earlier in July. Soccer was everywhere and everyday, in the studio, on the street or at parties at night. Many stations, like Antenne Bayern, took their listeners to party and meet the World Cup team in Berlin.

Summer Greetings from ON AIR

The team from ON AIR wishes all MusicMaster users around the globe a great summer! At least to those who are in summer now (the northern hemisphere). And to those who are in winter now (southern hemisphere), a great next summer!

This picture was taken during a ON AIR company meeting in Berlin. From the left, Justus, Thomas, Andreas, Ellen, Gabriele, Max and Kevin. Two members of the team were missing, Matthias was in Iran and Rainer was in Manila, obviously working.

Congrats to TKRN

MusicMaster congratulates Tom Kent and his TKRN team for hitting the 450 station mark!

TKRN CEO Tom Kent: “It’s all about the FUN and oh what fun it is to be adding yet even more great stations. Mucho Gracias to Midwest Family and Radio
Jones for taking us to this incredible 450 station milestone!”

TKRN is comprised of over 450 great radio stations in the United States, Canada
and Mexico.

Winner of “Give a Shout out to your Station”

The winner of the contest “Give a Shout Out to your Station” is Corey Tremere, Program Director at Ocean 100, NewCap Radio.

Thank you Corey for being a passionate user of MusicMaster.

Corey will be receiving his awesome MusicMaster gym bag soon.

Music Master of the Month

Dave-o Thompson
Founder and Programmer
Ariel Stream
Harrisburg, PA

If you had your own radio station, whose favorite music would you play? Rockers? Country purists? Northern Soul fanatics?

When major market radio veteran Dave-o Thompson started Ariel Stream, he went with…nobody’s favorite music. What started as an idea for brand-extension on HD2 signals for AC stations, has morphed into an online identity of its own, uniquely speaking to audiences who are used to getting family-friendly selections from other formats’ music, playlists copied from market-to-market, and no-brainer familiarity.

“I’m trying to present fresher music mixing the ‘WTF’ flow of a Jack, with the earnestness and breadth of a Triple-A”, says Thompson. “The presentation is more low-key, without dialing-back to the energy level heard on ‘Lite’ formats. I even adopted a new name – Peter Aurielle – so I wouldn’t be tempted to lapse back into the caffeinated snark and left-brain thinking more suited to what I do as Dave-o.”

In addition to the Aurielle voice tracks, Dic Ervasti serves as voiceover guy, and plans are in the works to produce jingles, and add a female station voice as well, and add more of an internet presence.

Musically, Ariel Stream isn’t looking for trends, but simply that “ear-candy” quality of unique songs and production that fit well together, but still gives listeners fresher musical discovery within their own comfort zone. If you like pure Bluegrass, the full spectrum of Electronica or the artists that define Chill…don’t expect that here. But, you’ll get enough of a taste of these, and several other niche genres, to know that there’s plenty out there to discover that’s compatible with your tastes, then you probably missed out on.

A singular playlist benefits from uncommon scheduling strategies. “The barrage of unfamiliar music can still get fatiguing to some, particularly for ’passive’ audiences. So I actually have categories for a sparse collection of more familiar songs, as well as recognizable artists and covers, to give the brain a ‘musical lily pad’ now and then. There are also night-centric categories that beef-up the basic playlist for listeners putting far more time-spent than typical commuter, and office-workday listening.”

“MusicMaster is particularly suited for seasonal songs that can automatically come back into play, or just move to a higher rotation automatically, then drop back away from prominence when seasons change. And then there’s the Christmas rotation, shuffling December, holiday, relationship-vs.-spiritual songs, even Wintertime titles that stick around into January: moving titles, clocks and rule tree modifications automatically gives you more control with less effort.”

“Ariel uses lots of different ways to categorize songs beyond standard artist codes and tempos. Moods, cultural or international origin, instrumentation (synth vs. acoustic, for instance) and the intensity of the song, be it angels awash in echo, or starting and ending low-key but with a pounding middle section; these are all things I keep watch of. It‘s important because most of the music is unfamiliar to this audience, so I want to give them the best chance to keep the music from all running together in their heads.”

Musicmaster’s Joe Knapp and Drew Bennett bring considerable technical knowledge to Ariel Stream; (“Un”)consultant Keith Hill helps Dave-o with any MusicMaster for Windows issues. In fact, Keith, Joe, and MusicMaster’s Shane Finch were all present at the inception, and encouraged Dave-o to develop his “Anti-AC for AC listeners” concept, despite their bewilderment. He has also consulted with OM Bill Shannon of the Tom Kent Radio Network, musicologist and host of Echoes John Diliberto, and print magazine publisher Harris Toser.

Ariel Stream is online at arielstream.com, or Live365, and for devices through any app that streams Live365 internet radio stations.

Favorite positioning statements:

It’s not a radio station; it’s more like…a message in a bottle.

We don’t “Soft Rock”; we don’t “Lite Rock”; we don’t “alt Rock”, or “Pop Rock”, or even “Sweater Rock”. Fact is, we don’t rock at all. We just…don’t.

Cutting-edge music…without the “cutting edge”!

A whole new world of music to discover…in YOUR comfort zone!

Let Ariel Stream take you down the road not taken; up the scenic route; through the secret passageway…ANY way, but the mainstream…!

Quick Tip: LogNote Purge

LogNotes can pile up in a hurry.  There is no harm in leaving LogNotes in the program, but you may wish to purge these from time-to-time to make search lists more streamlined.  When you open the LogNote Editor you will see a Purge option at the top.  When you open this you’ll have two options.  You can either use the automatic settings or manually set a cutoff date.  We recommend the default option because it only removes LogNotes that are not in any clocks or logs.  If you choose the manual option, you’ll pick a date and time for the purging.  Any LogNotes prior to that date and time will be removed, even if they are in the active history.  Either way, LogNote Purge is a great way to keep your LogNote list neat and tidy.

Recent Feature Articles From the MusicMaster Blog

Fail Alerts!
By Drew Bennett

MusicMaster continues to listen to our users and add new features to our products. With the release of MusicMaster Pro 5.0sr13, you will now find a new feature called Fail Alerts. Fail Alerts let you know when a song fails a rule in the Schedule Editor. To turn on Fail Alerts, head to Tools, Options Additional Properties. Look for a field called FailAlert in the Scheduler section. Turn on Fail Alerts using one of three methods. (Read more.)

MusicMaster Rules: What’s behind your Exclusion Mask?
By Marianne Burkett

There are all types of rules available to you in the MusicMaster Rule Tree to keep songs from playing in or around the same hour they last played. In working with so many clients, I’ve come to find many who are daring enough to use the Day or Play Exclusion Mask rules, but have them set up strangely. So, I will explain to the best of my ability how to set them up properly. Let me start with the Day Exclusion Mask. What does it do and what rules can it replace? (Read more.)

Industry Event Calendar

There are industry events and conventions every month around the world. We always appreciate meeting our customers and finding out how MusicMaster is working for them. If you’re planning on attending any of these events, let us know. We’d love to meet with you if possible.

• August 6-7: Texas Association of Broadcasters Convention & Tradeshow – Austin, TX
• August 24-27: Monitor Latino – Los Angeles, CA
• August 25-28: SET – Sao Paulo, Brazil
• September 3-6: Christian Music Broadcasters “Momentum” – Orlando, FL
• September 9: RAIN Summit – Indianapolis, IN
• September 9-11: PRPD Public Radio Programming 2014 Conference – Portland, OR
• September 10-12: 2014 Radio Show – Indianapolis, IN
• September 11-16: IBC2014 – Amsterdam, Netherlands
• September 25-28: Central Canada Broadcast Engineers Conference – Barrie, Ontario
• October 15-17: Broadcast India Show 2014 – Mumbai, India
• October 16-17: Alaska Broadcasters Association – Anchorage, AK
• October 21-23: Wisconsin Broadcasters Clinic – Madison, WI
• October 26-28: WABE Convention – Edmonton, Alberta