WVEZ (106.9 FM) is a

commercial Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...

hot adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quiet ...

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 radio ...

licensed A license (or licence) is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own something (as well as the document of that permission or permit). A license is granted by a party (licensor) to another party (licensee) as an element of an agreeme ...

to serve

St. Matthews, Kentucky St. Matthews is a city in Jefferson County, Kentucky, United States. It forms part of the Louisville Metro government but is separately incorporated as a home rule-class city. The population was 17,472 at the 2010 census, up from 15,852 at th ...

. Owned by SummitMedia, the station covers much of the

Louisville metropolitan area The Louisville metropolitan area is the 43rd largest metropolitan statistical area (MSA) in the United States. It had a population of 1,395,855 in 2020 according to the latest official census, and its principal city is Louisville, Kentucky. Th ...

. The WVEZ studios are located in

Downtown Louisville Downtown Louisville is the largest central business district in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the urban hub of the Louisville, Kentucky Metropolitan Area. Its boundaries are the Ohio River to the north, Hancock Street to the east, York and Jaco ...

, while the station

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna. The transmitter itself generates a radio frequency alternating current, which i ...

resides in nearby New Albany. Besides a standard

analog transmission Analog transmission is a transmission method of conveying information using a continuous signal which varies in amplitude, phase, or some other property in proportion to that information. It could be the transfer of an analog signal, using an ana ...

, WVEZ broadcasts over a single

HD Radio HD Radio (HDR) is a trademark for an in-band on-channel (IBOC) digital radio broadcast technology. It generally simulcasts an existing analog radio station in digital format with less noise and with additional text information. HD Radio is used ...

channel, and is available online.

History

The station signed on the air in April 1967 as WKRX in Louisville, airing the

automated Automation describes a wide range of technologies that reduce human intervention in processes, namely by predetermining decision criteria, subprocess relationships, and related actions, as well as embodying those predeterminations in machines ...

"Young Sound" format, a blend of

soft adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quiet sto ...

and

easy listening Easy listening (including mood music) is a popular music genre and radio format that was most popular during the 1950s to 1970s. It is related to middle-of-the-road (MOR) music and encompasses instrumental recordings of standards, hit songs, n ...

music from

CBS Radio CBS Radio was a radio broadcasting company and radio network operator owned by CBS Corporation and founded in 1928, with consolidated radio station groups owned by CBS and Westinghouse Broadcasting/Group W since the 1920s, and Infinity Broadc ...

. It switched to a Schulke-produced

Beautiful Music Beautiful music (sometimes abbreviated as BM, B/EZ or BM/EZ for "beautiful music/easy listening") is a mostly instrumental music format that was prominent in North American radio from the late 1950s through the 1980s. Easy listening, elevator musi ...

format in 1970. In 1974, it was acquired by Stoner Broadcasting and its

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigne ...

changed from WKRX to WVEZ. The EZ in the call letters represented the easy listening format. The station continued to play the Schulke format until 1984, but remained Beautiful Music until 1986. In April 1986, the station switched to a satellite-delivered

Soft Adult Contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quiet sto ...

format, before going with live

disc jockey A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include Radio personality, radio DJs (who host programs on music radio stations), club DJs (who work at a nightclub or music f ...

s and local programming in 1989. The station rebranded from "EZ107" to "Lite 106.9" in 1993. In 1999, the station was acquired by the

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Georgia. It is the seat of Fulton County, the most populous county in Georgia, but its territory falls in both Fulton and DeKalb counties. With a population of 498,715 ...

-based

Cox Radio CMG Media Corporation (doing business as Cox Media Group) is an American media conglomerate principally owned by Apollo Global Management in conjunction with Cox Enterprises, which maintains a 29% minority stake in the company. The company pri ...

, Inc. WVEZ's call letters were changed to WVEZ-FM in 1988. Its AM

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

at 790 kHz, now WKRD, changed its call sign to WVEZ. 106.9 remained WVEZ-FM until December 7, 1999. WVEZ began a tradition in 1999 in which it flipped to exclusively Christmas music during the holiday season. The tradition continues to this day. On July 20, 2012, Cox Radio, Inc. announced the sale of WVEZ and 22 other stations to SummitMedia LLC for $66.25 million. The sale was consummated on May 3, 2013. SummitMedia moved WVEZ's

city of license In American, Canadian, and Mexican broadcasting, a city of license or community of license is the community that a radio station or television station is officially licensed to serve by that country's broadcast regulator. In North American broa ...

from Louisville to

, although the studios and transmitter remained in place. On January 4, 2016, WVEZ rebranded from "Lite 106.9" to "106.9 Play." On October 5, 2020, WVEZ flipped to Christmas music. While WVEZ has typically been one of the nation's earliest flippers (occasionally flipping in late October), the unusually early change to Christmas music is in part to provide a diversion during the

COVID-19 pandemic in the United States The COVID-19 pandemic in the United States is a part of the COVID-19 pandemic, worldwide pandemic of COVID-19, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by SARS-CoV-2, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). In the Uni ...

. WVEZ was the third station to change that year, with two other early changing stations also citing COVID-19 for the exceptionally early holiday music. At midnight on March 8, 2021, WVEZ shifted to

Hot AC Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul, R&B, quiet s ...

under the name “Mix 106.9”. The shift eliminated all music from before 2000 in their playlist.

Previous logo

References

External links

* * * {{Adult Contemporary Radio Stations in Kentucky VEZ Radio stations established in 1966 1966 establishments in Kentucky Hot adult contemporary radio stations in the United States