Sock Hop Radio

I spent over fifty years on Saskatoon radio. I went from on-air to programming to general manager and vice president, took shifts in BC and Alberta along the way, and kept coming back to the booth because that's where it always felt right. The last few years, my Sunday show was The Sock Hop — four hours of the music I grew up with — and when it signed off, the notes started coming in: where do we go for this now? Sock Hop Radio is my answer. Same records, same era, no last show.

I love the music from the late fifties through the mid sixties because it never stopped sounding like itself. A 45 from 1959 still hits the room the same way it did when it was new. These are the records I pulled out of cardboard sleeves on tight overnights, the ones I've been programming and talking about my whole working life, and the ones that, when I'm honest about it, I just like better than most of what came after. If it sounds good, it goes on the air. That's been my rule since I started, and I'm not changing it now.

So this station is mine, on my terms — every song chosen, every break voiced, every hour built the way I'd build any good radio show. The studio's smaller than it used to be and the request line's an email these days, but the job hasn't changed: pick the right song, say the right thing, get out of the way. Pull up a chair. The records are cued and we've got nothing but time.

"If you remember when this music came out the first time, welcome back. If you don't, you're going to recognize more of it than you think — welcome in."