QRD Music Director Interviews Part 3 - UMass Dartmouth's WUMD

This is the third installment of my series of excerpts from the QRD "Radio Special" issue full of interviews with college radio music directors. Thanks again to Silber Records head honcho and QRD founder Brian John Mitchell for allowing me to share his excellent interviews. My interview with Brian goes into detail about his process for selecting stations and about his connection with college radio.

This week, I'm presenting a bit of Brian's interview with the Music Director of WUMD-FM from University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth. According to WUMD's website:


"WUMD Radio is a public service of UMASS Dartmouth and has been bringing listeners a world of music and information for over 25 years. WUMD is a non-commercial student organization serving the campus and community with in-depth public affairs programming, and an endless variety of musical alternatives."


MD Geary Kaczorowski is a radio veteran, having been involved since the 1970s. He chats about the station format, digitization, vinyl, DJ automation, and specialty programming. According to the interview:


QRD – How much control do you let individual DJs have over what they play & how do they deal with requests?

Geary – Our DJs have complete control over their shows. We don’t tell them what to play at all.


QRD – What’s the importance of specialty shows at your station?

Geary – Very important. They bring in a huge audience.


QRD – With your experience in radio, are you jaded or hopeful for the music industry?

Geary – I have been in the music industry since the late 70’s so I’m completely jaded about it.


QRD – What are the best & worst parts of your job?

Geary – Worst part: dealing with the childish nature & irresponsibleness of the DJs. Best part: the music.


QRD – I imagine a lot of the younger generation of DJs pretty much exclusively use MP3s over CDs (much less vinyl). How do you feel about the situation?

Geary – I’m all for it. But I still love spinning vinyl. Our station has a very extensive vinyl & CD collection.


QRD – How do you feel about automation for overnight or unfilled DJ slots? What program do you use for automation & how does it decide what to play?

Geary – We use automation for all open slots. Our automation programmer has done a great job with placing very interesting songs into the rotation. It’s set at random with IDs, PSAs & promos slotted in at the appropriate moments. I think we’re using I-Tunes for our automation.


You can read the complete interview with Geary over on QRD. Next Tuesday, October 7th, 2008 I'll write about QRD's interview with the MD from University of Georgia station WUOG.

Previous QRD MD Interviews:

Interview with Brian of Silber Records about QRD Radio Music Director Issue

QRD Music Director Interviews Part 1 - Wesleyan's WESU

QRD Music Director Interviews Part 2 - McGill's CKUT