KQNM

For the Milan, New Mexico radio station that held the call sign KQNM at 1090 AM from 2005 to 2008 and from 2009 to 2015, see KRKE.
KQNM
City Albuquerque, New Mexico
Broadcast area Albuquerque metropolitan area
Branding Immaculate Heart Radio
Frequency 1550 kHz
Translator(s) 98.9 K255AU (Corrales)
First air date March 29, 1972 (as KAMX)
Format Catholic
Power 10,000 watts (day)
27 watts (night)
Class D
Facility ID 4705
Transmitter coordinates 35°06′02″N 106°40′34″W / 35.10056°N 106.67611°W / 35.10056; -106.67611Coordinates: 35°06′02″N 106°40′34″W / 35.10056°N 106.67611°W / 35.10056; -106.67611
Former callsigns KAMX (1971-1994)
KDZZ (1994-1996)
KHTZ (1996-1999)
KSYU (1999)
KQEO (1999-2000)
KYJY (2000)
KKJY (2000-2008)
KQNM (2008-2009)
KIVA (2009-2012)
KRKE (2012-2015)
Owner IHR Educational Broadcasting
Website ihradio.com

KQNM (1550 AM) is an American radio station based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The transmitter tower is in the city's Old Town district northwest of downtown. KQNM is owned by IHR Educational Broadcasting and airs a Catholic radio ministry featuring mostly talk programs.

History

This station originally broadcast on 1520 AM as KAMX in 1972. It had aired Spanish language programming throughout the 1970s.[1] Later it mostly carried programming that was broadcast on the 107.9 FM frequency. However, the station could only be heard during daytime hours due to night time interference from KOMA (now KOKC) out of Oklahoma City. In 1995, it broke off from 107.9 simulcasting and began to run children's programming from Radio AAHS as KDZZ, but it would return to simulcasting 107.9 in late 1996 under callsign KHTZ moved from 100.3 FM until 1999.

"Joy" logo

In 2000, the station was sold to Vanguard Media and moved to the 1550 frequency under the call letters KKJY, which allowed for the station to increase its daytime power and initiate nighttime operation. It began broadcasting an adult standards format to fill a void left after KIVA 1310 AM had dropped the format for talk. It picked up the KKJY call sign that had once belonged locally to 100.3 FM, which had a long running easy listening format from 1979 to 1994. It was branded as "Joy AM".

In 2006, the station's format shifted to soft AC. On July 25, 2008, it again changed its call sign to KQNM and called itself "Soft Favorites 1550". On May 18, 2009, it changed to KIVA[2] while moving the KQNM call sign to 1100 kHz in Milan, New Mexico. The KIVA format was changed to talk radio on June 15, 2009. On August 28, 2012, the station swapped dial positions with KIVA moving the talk format and KIVA callsign to 1600 and KRKE moving from 1600 to 1550.

On September 22, 2015, the call letters were changed back to KQNM, with KRKE moving to 1090 in Milan. Soon after Vanguard had taken the station off the air and had put the station up for sale. In 2014 Vanguard had divested KIVA (AM) to Rock of Talk LLC. IHR Educational Broadcasting had purchased the station and began to air it's Catholic radio format beginning in late September 2016.

FM broadcast

107.5 (2011-2013)

In early May 2011, KRKE (then on 1600 AM) began using an FM translator K298BK Sandia to rebroadcast the format at 99 watts in stereo on 107.5 FM and rebranding as "Cool 107.5". The station had previously been called "Real Oldies 1600". They had also changed their website to cool1075.com. The translator was owned by the Educational Media Foundation.

This change brought the station to better compete with KABG 98.5 which serves as an Oldies/Classic Hits format, mainly playing music from the 60s, 70s and 80s. For the first year or so, the station continued to focus on the traditional 1960s based oldies format it had aired since 2005 as an AM-only station but since mid-2012, it began to shift more to classic hits like KABG and most other FM oldies stations.

94.5 (2013-2015)

A construction permit was granted to this station on April 18, 2012 to move to the 94.5 frequency and increase power to the class maximum of 250 watts. On February 14, 2013 the station moved to the new frequency as K233CG while re-branding as "The Greatest Hits KOOL 94.5" as well as completing a shift in the format to playing music from the 1970s and '80s competing directly with KABG. KOOL 94.5 was promoted as "Clutter-Free", featuring a music-intensive presentation without programming elements such as personality announcers, news, weather and traffic reports. KRKE however generated low ratings and since July 2013 faced additional competition from KABQ-FM 104.7 which featured a 1970s-centric version of the format. In early 2014, the format had been shifting to focus more on music from the 1980s. On May 12 of that year, at 12:00 p.m., 1550 and 94.5 re-branded as "94-5 The 80's Channel" with an all-80s pop/new wave format making it the first time this format has aired in the Albuquerque market since KKOB-FM dropped the format in late 2002. The last song on "Kool 94.5" was Hold On by Wilson Phillips, while the first song on "94.5 The 80's Channel" was Video Killed the Radio Star by The Buggles. Originally, the new format had a large emphasis on music from the New Wave genre from artists like Duran Duran, The Police, and Blondie as well as early alternative rock acts such as The Cure, R.E.M., and The Psychedelic Furs. However, with ratings very low, the station adjusted its playlist to include more pop and hard rock acts from the 1980s in late July 2015. The station's website krke.fm had also been taken down along with its live stream and Facebook page.

At 10:38 p.m. (MT) on September 27, 2015, an announcement began playing on a repeating loop saying that the format was leaving the air and would return after the first of the year on a different frequency. It also identified the station as "KQNM Albuquerque" and suggested that listeners tune into KDSK on 93.7, which airs an oldies format. The last song played was "Take Me Home Tonight" by Eddie Money. The format had not reappeared at the stated time; however, on May 2, 2016 iHeartMedia shifted KABQ-FM to an 80s hits format.

At around 2 p.m. on September 30, this station began airing long DJ sets of mostly trance music both instrumental and with vocals with no sweepers or commercials but only identifying itself once an hour as "EDM 94-5" followed by the legal identification around 10 minutes from the top of the hour. This went on for about six days.

As of October 6, 2015, the station was in a dead air status, with neither static nor audio broadcast. Since October 9, both KQNM and K233CG were off the air. On October 19, KQNM filed a silent notification with the FCC citing that programming had been discontinued in preparation for a sale of the station.[3]

Additionally, Educational Media Foundation filed a silent notification for K233CG on November 5, 2015 stating that the translator would be off the air until a new feed station could be found.[4] The request was granted on December 4, however 94.5 returned to the air on December 1 rebroadcasting the Air 1 format from KQRI 105.5. KQNM 1550 remains off the air. K233CG was sold to Martha Whitman, owner of KOAZ (1510) and K279BP (103.7), in late June 2016 for $61,431.66.[5] Martha Whitman had then reached a deal to sale the translator to Cumulus Media for $425,000.[6] On September 1, 2016, it began to rebroadcast 770 KKOB (AM).

98.9 (2016–present)

On February 5, 2016, a construction permit was granted by the FCC to upgrade translator K255AU 98.9 Corrales from 10 watts to 70 watts with KQNM as the feed station.[7] K255AU is owned by Immaculate Heart Radio, a Catholic radio ministry which currently relays KXXQ out of Milan. In early July 2016, Immaculate Heart Radio purchased KQNM for $250,000.[8] The sale was approved by the FCC on September 15, 2016 and the Catholic format began airing on KQNM in late September.

References

  1. ↑ https://repository.unm.edu/bitstream/handle/1928/18614/Volume%2080%20No%208%208-31-1976.pdf?sequence=1 Page 7
  2. ↑ "Call Sign History". FCC Media Bureau CDBS Public Access Database. Retrieved August 4, 2009.
  3. ↑ https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws.exe/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/cdbsmenu.hts?context=25&appn=101693268&formid=910&fac_num=4705
  4. ↑ https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws.exe/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/cdbsmenu.hts?context=25&appn=101697763&formid=910&fac_num=88468
  5. ↑ https://radioinsight.com/blog/headlines/106955/station-sales-week-of-624-mount-wilson-continues-monterey-sell-off/
  6. ↑ https://radioinsight.com/blog/headlines/108008/kkob-albuquerque-adds-425000-fm-signal/
  7. ↑ https://licensing.fcc.gov/cgi-bin/ws.exe/prod/cdbs/forms/prod/cdbsmenu.hts?context=25&appn=101711785&formid=349&fac_num=138678
  8. ↑ https://radioinsight.com/blog/headlines/107181/station-sales-week-of-78/

External links

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