Previous Format: AC “Buzz 105.7” WBZZ (Stunting as “Santa 105.7″)
New Format: 90s Hits “105.7 Crush-FM” WQSH
Date & Time Of Change: January 3, 2011 at 12:00am
More Info: RadioInsight, Wikipedia

WPTR, one of the most known calls in Albany radio history. In 1960′s and 70′s, it was one of Albany’s two major Top 40 stations (along with 980 WTRY), when Top 40 became an FM format WPTR went to country and was dominant in that field. In 1995, Albany Broadcasting sold the station to Crawford Broadcasting, which flipped it to religious WDCD. By 1999, Crawford Broadcasting began dabbling in secular broadcasting with the “Legends” standards format on their AM stations, and with Albany lacking a Standards station (after 94.5 WABY-FM became Soft AC WKLI), the space there was to launch. Going on heritage, 1540 returned to its original calls and after a week off the air for maintenance and upgrades launched standards “Legends 1540″ on January 10, 2000 (the first 30 seconds of this switch are bits of signals of stations at/around 1540).

WHRL had a long heritage as a station playing instrumental music in Albany, first as Beautiful Music, then as one of the first Smooth Jazz stations. In early 1999, Clear Channel purchased WHRL in their acquisition of Dame Media with no major on-air change. However, when modern rock WQBK-FM “The Edge” flipped suddenly to Active Rock in late September, a hole existed for modern rock. With Clear Channel flipping Smooth Jazz stations in smaller markets, WHRL was fair game for a change, and on October 2, 1999 became Modern Rock “Channel 103-1″ quietly (with an outcry from the Smooth Jazz listeners). Those listeners would not have to worry, as Modern AC WZMR flipped to Smooth Jazz 16 days later

WZMR was a fairly new station in the Albany market, having moved in from Johnstown (oldies WSRD) in March 1999 after a purchase by Albany Broadcasting. The station began as Modern AC “The Point”, but was forced to change the name to “Z104.9″ on the request of Infinity Broadcasting (representing rival owner Tele-Media, which had the right to use the name in Albany; launching Modern AC WCPT that May). After WCPT’s launch, “Z104.9″ failed part due to a poorer signal than WCPT, part due to a contract to carry New York Yankees baseball placed there prior to the format launch. Having never broken the 2 share barrier, WZMR decided to fill the Smooth Jazz hole left by WHRL’s flip two weeks earlier (see above). The below switch is the end of Modern AC (with the last song, New Radicals “You Get What You Give”–the first song of the Modern AC format) followed by the liner starting the Smooth Jazz format

Previous Format: AC
New Format: Adult CHR
Date & Time Of Change: March 18, 1996 at 3:00pm
More Info: Wikipedia