The joint starts jumping with KKJZ

Radio • Sam Fields, a KKJZ disc jockey since 1989, broadcasts his show weekdays from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. on the CSULB campus.

 

By Rachael Furlong
Contributing Writer
Online Forty-Niner

It's been 23 years since Cal State Long Beach became the home of KKJZ, which was known as KLON when it came to CSULB in 1981. KKJZ is the No. 1 rated jazz station in the country, and the only full-time station in the Los Angeles area broadcasting mainstream acoustic jazz.

When KLON first arrived on campus, the station was not welcomed with open arms by CSULB's journalism students. In the late 1950s, around the time of the birth of the Daily Forty-Niner, journalism students had started a student-run radio station KSUL. KSUL was supported by the university, the Associated Students and the Cal State Long Beach Foundation.

The station was run entirely by students and started to increase student listeners and interest in broadcast journalism. KSUL was a class D, 10-watt radio station. Many of the journalism students who worked there went on to work in all aspects of radio.

The only problem that KSUL faced was finding the funds needed to maintain the station, and it was this lack of funds that led to the end of student run radio at CSULB. The FCC asked KSUL to sign-off because the station did not have the funds to increase its power, and 10-watt stations were being abolished in order to curb interference with larger, more powerful commercial FM stations.

When KLON was founded in 1951 it was licensed to the Long Beach Unified School District. In 1981, during what KKJZ-FM General Manager Judy Jankowski suspects were tough financial times for the city, the state offered to buy the radio station from the school district, and the license was transferred to CSULB. When it first came to CSULB, the station had an eclectic format.

"We were like old public radio, every hour we did something new, something for everyone," Jankowski said.

At the time, Los Angeles based radio station KKGO played strictly jazz, and in 1990, when it changed its format to classical music and its call letters to KMZT, they donated its jazz and blues music library to KLON and as Jankowski puts it, "That's when we went straight jazz."

In 2002, in order to clearly reflect the content of the radio station, KLON changed its call letters to KKJZ, and became KJAZZ.

"Why did we do it? We made it idiot proof; no one knew that KLON stood for Long Beach," Jankowski said. "Because Los Angeles is such a transient city we wanted the station to be more accessible. If you want to hear jazz, listen to KJAZZ."

When it inherited KKGO's music library, KLON also added to its staff two of Los Angeles' most well known jazz program hosts, Sam Fields and the late jazz legend Chuck Niles, both from KKGO.

Sam Fields has been working in jazz radio since 1972, first at jazz station KBCA in Los Angeles, and then several other well-known Los Angeles radio stations such as KROQ, KLAC and KMET before coming to KKJZ. Fields used to be the evening host at the station until he replaced Chuck Niles as the weekday afternoon host, broadcasting from 1-4 p.m., Monday through Friday.

Chuck Niles had been the weekday afternoon host at KKJZ for 14 years, but had been working in jazz radio for decades. Niles had several jazz songs written about him, such as "Bebop Charlie," by Bob Florence, and "The Hippest Cat in Hollywood," by Horace Silver, and he is the only radio announcer to have earned a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. His death in March of this year was devastating to the radio station and the jazz community.

Not only has KKJZ played an important role in the jazz community, but it also has a significant impact at CSULB.

"We put on the Long Beach Blues Festival, and it's the biggest blues festival west of the Mississippi," Fields said.

The Long Beach Blues Festival, which is held on the athletic field, brings 20,000 to 30,000 people to the CSULB campus every year.

Also, CSULB is mentioned on the air at least twice an hour, meaning that at any time of the day, one of KKJZ's 400,000 listeners hears the complimentary CSULB identification.

"I think it's a real feather in the cap of CSULB to have been mentioned on a premier radio station," said KKJZ Station Manager Sean Heitkemper. "If you were to pay for that kind of publicity it would be a lot of money."

KKJZ is also affiliated with KUOR-FM, which is based at the University of Redlands, expanding CSULB's publicity to Riverside and San Bernardino, also an important source of independent local news.

"At any time, that station can go independent; if there's a local emergency out there they can broadcast directly here," Jankowski said.

KKJZ is one of the top five radio stations in Internet listening, as well as being one of only five U.S. radio stations broadcast in Japan, and is also broadcast to 3 million military personnel on Armed Forces Radio.

In addition to the publicity that KKJZ brings CSULB, the radio station provides an opportunity to students to get involved with the radio station.

"Quite a few students have come through the ranks to go on to lucrative careers in broadcasting, advertising, and marketing," Heitkemper said.

Heitkemper actually started at KKJZ as a student assistant in 1993. He was initially hired to work for the annual fund because he had experience with fundraising.

"I came to KKJZ because I really like the blues," Heitkemper said. The same year he started he approached one of his supervisors about donating some time to the blues show, and began volunteering, answering phones and doing other odd jobs. Since then, Heitkemper has worked his way up to be the station manager and also hosts the weekend program, "The Atomic Lounge."