WEMC (91.7 FM) is a classical music formatted broadcast

radio station Radio broadcasting is transmission of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based radi ...

licensed to Harrisonburg, Virginia, serving Harrisonburg and

Rockingham County, Virginia Rockingham County is a county located in the U.S. state of Virginia. As of the 2020 census, the population was 83,757. Its county seat is the independent city of Harrisonburg. Along with Harrisonburg, Rockingham County forms the Harrisonbur ...

. WEMC is owned by

Eastern Mennonite University Eastern Mennonite University (EMU) is a private Mennonite university in Harrisonburg, Virginia. The university also operates a satellite campus in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, which primarily caters to working adults. EMU's bachelor-degree holde ...

. Due to declining listenership and low student involvement,

James Madison University James Madison University (JMU, Madison, or James Madison) is a public research university in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Founded in 1908 as the State Normal and Industrial School for Women at Harrisonburg, the institution was renamed Madison Coll ...

WMRA WMRA is a public-radio formatted broadcast radio station licensed to Harrisonburg, Virginia. It is the NPR member station for the central Shenandoah Valley. Combined with its full-power repeaters and low-power translators, it serves much of wes ...

(90.7 FM) took over operation of WEMC on January 14, 2008. WMRA moved its morning, midday, and late-night classical music blocks to WEMC in exchange for NPR's ''

Talk of the Nation ''Talk of the Nation'' (''TOTN'') is an American talk radio program based in Washington D.C., produced by National Public Radio ( NPR) that was broadcast nationally from 2 to 4 p.m. Eastern Time. It focused on current events and controversial i ...

'' and ''

Fresh Air ''Fresh Air'' is an American radio talk show broadcast on National Public Radio stations across the United States since 1985. It is produced by WHYY-FM in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The show's host is Terry Gross. , the show was syndicated to ...

'', which had been heard on WEMC as WMRA was unable to fit them into its schedule. Both stations preserved their evening schedules, as WMRA was hesitant to eliminate its evening music programming due to WEMC's inferior signal. WEMC dropped its last remaining information programs, ''

Democracy Now! ''Democracy Now!'' is an hour-long American TV, radio, and Internet news program hosted by journalists Amy Goodman (who also acts as the show's executive producer), Juan González, and Nermeen Shaikh. The show, which airs live each weekday at ...

'' and rebroadcasts of the BBC World Service, on August 11, 2014. The station now broadcasts classical music throughout the week. There are local hosts only on Monday and Tuesday evening ("Bob's Record Shelf" and "Air Play", the latter featuring regional orchestras), with the rest of the music largely coming from the syndicated

Classical 24 Classical 24 is a syndicated, satellite-delivered public radio service providing classical music to its carrying stations. It generally airs overnights on many non-commercial and a handful of commercial classical music stations. However, the se ...

. The only exceptions to the format are the local

Mennonite Mennonites are groups of Anabaptist Christian church communities of denominations. The name is derived from the founder of the movement, Menno Simons (1496–1561) of Friesland. Through his writings about Reformed Christianity during the Radi ...

music show "Mostly Mennonite, Mostly Acapella", and the service from Park View Mennonite Church in Harrisonburg live on Sunday morning.

References

External links

WEMC 91.7 Online
* 1955 establishments in Virginia Classical music radio stations in the United States Public radio stations in the United States NPR member stations Radio stations established in 1955 EMC EMC Eastern Mennonite University {{Virginia-radio-station-stub