Capital East Midlands was a regional

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting 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 rad ...

owned and operated by

Global Radio Global Media & Entertainment Limited, trading as Global, is a British media company formed in 2007. It is the owner of the largest commercial radio company in Europe having expanded through a number of historical acquisitions, including Chrysal ...

as part of the

Capital Capital and its variations may refer to: Common uses * Capital city, a municipality of primary status ** Capital region, a metropolitan region containing the capital ** List of national capitals * Capital letter, an upper-case letter Econom ...

radio network, broadcasting to the

East Midlands The East Midlands is one of nine official regions of England. It comprises the eastern half of the area traditionally known as the Midlands. It consists of Derbyshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire (except for North Lincolnshire and North East ...

from studios in

Nottingham Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located south-east of Sheffield and nor ...

. It launched on 3 January 2011 following the merger of Trent FM,

Leicester Sound Leicester Sound was an Independent Local Radio station which broadcast to Leicestershire. The station merged with two other East Midlands stations, Trent FM and Ram FM to form Capital FM East Midlands (part of Global's The Capital FM Network, C ...

and

Ram FM Ram FM was an Independent Local Radio station, which broadcast to central and southern parts of Derbyshire on 102.8 FM. The station merged with two other East Midlands stations, Trent FM and Leicester Sound to form Capital FM East Midlands (p ...

. In April 2019, the station was merged with a sister Capital station in

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands, within the wider West Midlands (region), West Midlands region, in England. It is the Lis ...

to form Capital Midlands.

History

The regional station originally broadcast as three stations – Radio Trent began broadcasting to

Nottinghamshire Nottinghamshire (; abbreviated ''Notts.'') is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. The county is bordered by South Yorkshire to the north-west, Lincolnshire to the east, Leicestershire to the south, and Derbyshire to the west. Th ...

in July 1975, later expanding its coverage area to central and southern Derbyshire in March 1987 with split local programming introduced for the area. The Derbyshire station was relaunched in 1994 as Ram FM. Leicester Sound was launched in Leicestershire in September 1984, just over 11 months after the county's first ILR station, Centre Radio, went into receivership. Both Trent FM and Leicester Sound were owned by

Midlands Radio Midlands Radio plc was an independent radio operator, which operated seven radio licences in Birmingham, Coventry, Leicester, Nottingham and surrounding areas in the United Kingdom. Stations owned FM *BRMB *Leicester Sound *Radio Trent *Mercia ...

until a takeover by

Capital Radio plc GCap Media was a British commercial radio company formed from the merger of the Capital Radio Group and GWR Group. The merger was completed on 9 May 2005. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index ...

led to the stations being sold off to the GWR Group in 1993. In 2005, the owners merged with Capital to form

GCap Media GCap Media was a British commercial radio company formed from the merger of the Capital Radio Group and GWR Group. The merger was completed on 9 May 2005. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index ...

, which was later taken over by Global Radio. In June 2008, Global launched

The Hit Music Network Capital is a network of twelve independent contemporary hit radio stations in the United Kingdom, broadcasting a mix of local and networked programming. Ten of the stations are owned and operated by Global, while the other two are owned and ope ...

on Trent, Leicester Sound and Ram FM alongside Ten 17 in Essex, Hertfordshire's Mercury 96.6 and

Mercury FM Mercury FM was an Independent Local Radio station in the Surrey and Sussex area of the United Kingdom that was founded on 20 October 1984 and closed on 25 July 2010. The station broadcast on FM 97.5 MHz in Horsham and 102.7 MHz in ...

in Sussex and Surrey (also Mercia FM and Beacon Black Country until their sale to Orion Media). Local programming was restricted to daily breakfast and weekday afternoon & drive time slots with networked output originating from Nottingham. Two other Hit Music stations – London's 95.8 Capital FM and

Red Dragon FM Capital South Wales is a regional radio station owned by Communicorp UK and operated by Global Media & Entertainment, Global as part of the Capital (radio network), Capital network. It broadcasts to Cardiff and Newport, Wales, Newport and the ...

in south east Wales retained local output. On 13 September 2010, Global Radio announced it would merge Trent FM, Leicester Sound and Ram FM to form a sole regional station as part of a merger between its Hit Music and

Galaxy A galaxy is a Physical system, system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar medium, interstellar gas, cosmic dust, dust, and dark matter bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek ' (), literally 'milky', ...

network stations to form the nine-station Capital radio network. The merger led to the closure of studios in Leicester and advertising offices in Derby. On 26 February 2019, Global confirmed the station would be merged with Capital Birmingham. From Monday 8 April 2019, regional output will consist of a three-hour Drivetime show from Birmingham on weekdays, alongside news bulletins, traffic updates and advertising.Global to network Capital, Heart and Smooth breakfast shows
RadioToday, 26 February 2019 Local breakfast and weekend shows were replaced with network programming from London. The last local programming from Capital East Midlands aired on Friday 5 April 2019. Local news, traffic and advertising for the region continues to air as opt-outs - the station also retains offices in Nottingham.

Notable former presenters

* Sacha Brooks (now at Capital XTRA Reloaded) *Emma Caldwell Presenters announced for new regional radio station
Nottingham Post, 18 November 2010Show swap at Capital FM East Midlands
RadioToday, 16 March 2012 * Rich Clarke (now at Heart South) * Andi Durrant (now at

Kisstory Kisstory is a British digital radio station owned and operated by Bauer Media Audio UK as part of the Kiss Network. Playing "old skool and anthems", it is a sister station to Kiss. As of March 2025, the station has a weekly audience of 2 mill ...

) *Dave Kelly * Margherita Taylor (now at Smooth Radio and Classic FM) *Andy Twigge 96–106 Capital jock in tandem skydive
Radio Today, 15 September 2011 (now at

BBC Radio Derby BBC Radio Derby is the Local BBC Radio, BBC's local radio station serving Derbyshire and East Staffordshire. It broadcasts on frequency modulation, FM, AM broadcasting, AM, Digital Audio Broadcasting, DAB, digital TV and via BBC Sounds from s ...

)

References

External links

Capital East Midlands
{{DEFAULTSORT:Capital East Midlands

Defunct radio stations in the United Kingdom Radio stations in Derbyshire Radio stations in Leicestershire Radio stations in Nottinghamshire Radio stations established in 2011 Radio stations disestablished in 2019

Media Media may refer to: Communication * Means of communication, tools and channels used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Interactive media, media that is inter ...

Mass media in Nottinghamshire