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There are seminal moments in everyone’s life when you remember where you were when something major happened.The tragedy on 9/11 is one of those moments!Do you remember where you were, what you did, who you called?9/11 was a day that changed all of our lives.
In honor of all those impacted by that tragic day, MEGA 104.3 remembers and stands united to pay tribute!
Please click on the link below or paste it in your browser to watch a wonderful tribute that our talented team put together.Please share this with your friends and family by forwarding this link and/or posting it on your Facebook and Twitter.
A bitter sweet day.. very sad to hear about Michael Jackson, yet very proud of our staff at MEGA 104.3 for the way they mobilized and reported on the tragedy. Beau Duran our PD articulated things well in a memo to the staff.
"As you know Michael Jackson died today in LA. We went into immediate tribute mode as soon as the news broke. I want to take a moment to thank Angie for staying on top of the story all day and hanging out late to stay on the air with me, J.B. for calling in with updates as the news broke and Alex for coming in this afternoon to share some memories and play some of MJ’s greatest songs.
Moving forward Friday and this weekend we are not going to stop paying tribute to Mega’s most well known artist. On Friday morning Alex will be doing his thing from 5-8. I will handle the 8AM hour and from that point until 5PM we will be spicing in a handful of MJ songs each hour along with our normal rotation. Perry is going to do a special all MJ Old School workout. At 5PM we’re going to start a “King of Pop” weekend where we will do basically the same thing. Play a few MJ records each hour amongst our normal scheduling thru Sunday afternoon.
Throughout the course of the next few days, I want to make sure we are talking to our listeners on the air plenty. Getting their thoughts on MJ and remembering the world’s most successful artist together. Michael Jackson is OUR artist. We play more of his music than any other station in town.
EVERY one of our listeners grew up with Michael. He was truly a member of the Mega family and we should act likewise on the air. For the next few days we are not a radio station. We are a vehicle to let our listeners have a voice. We need to turn off the “DJ” in us and just have a conversation with people. Open up and talk about how this affects you...let the listeners in and they will do the same".
At the radio station we are a family. Sometimes a dysfunctional family, but a family nonetheless.
This morning, my friend Alex Santa Maria who happens to be our Morning DJ and Music Director on MEGA stopped by my office to say hi. He was so excited to tell me about his daughter Sheila and her new adventure. Sheila is 17 and a high school student in Phoenix. She just left home to study, immerse herself in the language, customs and culture of Japan for six months as a foreign exchange student. The more Alex told me, the more excited I got hearing about it! I was wondering how at 48, I could take a sabbatical and be a foreign exchange student.
Alex also shared with me that he is going through a little separation anxiety as well. Although, before she left, taking advantage of technology, Sheila set Alex and Veronica up on Skype so they can video conference each other. It's just as simple as logging on to the internet and a couple of mouse clicks later.... wal la...they are communicating a world apart! This should help ease Alex's anxiety once he figures out the time zone issues.
Alex is definitely the proud father! He was glowing as he was telling me about Sheila. I love seeing Alex like this and hearing the stories!
As Alex and I were speaking, I was reminded of a story that Fran shared with me when she was studying for her International MBA at the Thuderbird School of Global Management. She had a professor who said that since we live in a Global Society, "the greatest gift you can give your children, is to expose them to a different country every year". Fran and I subscribe to that philosophy and have taken it to heart and have tried to do this with the girls. Although, being a foreign exchange student is the ultimate gift. I hope that our girls will have the opportunity to study abroad some day too.
Back to Sheila...... Sheila is an exceptional artist and a talented writer as well. Through the years, Alex has shown me Sheila's artwork and it is incredible. I have always been amazed by here drawings and sketches. To give you an idea of how talented Sheila is, the picture below is a sketch she did on the flight to Japan. It is a drawing of all of her new friends that she met on the way over.
Someday, I hope to have a Sheila Santa Maria original on our wall!
Sheila's has started a Blog where she is keeping a diary of her experience. Click Here:
I'll be anxious to check in on it over the next six months to hear about her adventure and see more of her artwork.
It has been an anxious couple of days at the radio station.
Our new KAJM transmitter site, high atop the Bradshaw Mountains, just north west of Phoenix in the Prescott National Forest is only a mile or two away from the Lane 2 forest fire. Our site is in a lush pine forest. It takes about three ours to get there from our studios in Scottsdale, this is due to the treacherous four wheel drive road that you have to traverse to get there.
The fire was started by a lost hiker who lit a signal fire. Unfortunately the fire got out of control. To date, seven buildings and 7,300 hundred acres have been destroyed. The entire town of Crown King (population 400) has been evacuated. Due to the many canyons and rugged mountains and monsoon weather conditions, this is a difficult fire to contain. After almost four days the fire is only 5% contained.
The forest service has done a tremendous job keeping the fire out of Crown King and away from the two communications sites that are above the town. Those sites are home to FM radio stations, two-way, pager, long distance and cell phone companies along with local, federal and municipal government communication installations, the FAA and more.
The forest service has also done a terrific job of keeping us informed of their progress in fighting the fire. They have mobilized their team and communicated to us personally over the phone and directly via email as well.
Even though forest service has evacuated the area and closed all roads except for fire, forest and emergency use, they have granted us access so we can get to our site for maintenance and ensure that we stay on the air (APS shut down the power grid up there).
I'm keeping my fingers crossed that they get a handle on the fire so it doesn't spread our way or towards Crown King and that there is no loss of life and property damage is kept to a minimum.
I know that there are a lot of anxious people out there like us. We are very grateful to the forest service and fire fighters that have come from all over to help fight this fire.
Thanks!!!
Here is a link to the Prescott National Forest Service where you can read their updates on the fire, http://www.fs.fed.us/r3/prescott/
We've had a lot of exciting changes at the radio station the past few months.
We increased the power of MEGA (KAJM) to a full class "C" FM station. We have a new transmitter site with a state of the art technical facility. And we now reach more than one-million more listeners than we did previous to our signal upgrade.
On the programming side, Beau Duran takes over as Program Director for both MEGA and ENERGY. Beau is a dedicated radio pro. His passion for radio is endless. He eats, drinks, sleeps and breaths the radio station. Beau Gets It!
Alex Santa Maria moved from afternoons to mornings and he is super-charged, playing more hits and interacting with the listeners!
Angie Gomez has moved from co-hosting duties in morning drive to holding down the fort on her own every mid-day from ten until two.
The newest addition to the on-air line-up is Raul Torres. I don't know where Raul gets his energy from, but he rocks in the afternoon. We keep it cold in the studio and Raul is sweating every time I stop in to say hello. Raul is on fire! Listen to his mix show at five, it's GREAT!
The "Night Princess" Nina Cruz continues to keep nights alive from six to eight with great music and a lot of listener interaction on the phones.
Wrapping it all up every night live from Hollywood is legendary DJ Art Laboe with his Killer Oldies, request and dedication show from eight to midnight. This is "Old School" radio at its best.
On the business side, Jeanette Scott joins us as our new Business Manager and Tarina Lovegrove joined us in sales. Ian Makar who started out as a rookie seller for us five years ago is our new sales manager. Ian has worked hard and deserves the promotion. He has a lot of great ideas and is a man on a mission.
As my friend Michael Crawford says..... "Get Excited!"
There are seminal moments in everyone’s life when you remember where you were when something major happened. The tragedy on 9/11 is one of those moments! Do you remember where you were, what you did, who you called? 9/11 was a day that changed all of our lives.
