WVNJ (1160
AM) is a
religious
Religion is a range of social- cultural systems, including designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relate humanity to supernatural ...
formatted
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 ...
licensed to
Oakland, New Jersey and serving
Bergen County, New Jersey
Bergen County is the List of counties in New Jersey, most populous County (United States), county in the U.S. state of New Jersey.[New York City
New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...]
area. The station is
owned-and-operated by
Relevant Radio
Relevant Radio (corporate name Relevant Radio, Inc.) is a radio network in the United States, mainly broadcasting talk radio and religious programming involving the Catholic Church. Relevant Radio broadcasts "talk radio for Catholic life" over a ...
, Inc. and broadcasts
Catholic
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
programing.
History
WVNJ began operation on AM 1160 as a CP in 1987 and signed on in 1992. The station initially offered an oldies format featuring mostly
R&B music from 1955 to 1974. The format did not do well and in January 1996 WVNJ flipped to an adult standards format known as "The Station Of The Stars" featuring the music of
Frank Sinatra
Francis Albert Sinatra (; December 12, 1915 – May 14, 1998) was an American singer and actor. Honorific nicknames in popular music, Nicknamed the "Chairman of the Board" and "Ol' Blue Eyes", he is regarded as one of the Time 100: The Most I ...
,
Dean Martin
Dean Martin (born Dino Paul Crocetti; June 7, 1917 – December 25, 1995) was an American singer, actor, and comedian. Nicknamed the "Honorific nicknames in popular music, King of Cool", he is regarded as one of the most popular entertainers of ...
,
The Mills Brothers,
Peggy Lee
Norma Deloris Egstrom (May 26, 1920 – January 21, 2002), known professionally as Peggy Lee, was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, and actress whose career spanned seven decades. From her beginning as a vocalist on local r ...
,
Tommy Dorsey
Thomas Francis Dorsey Jr. (November 19, 1905 – November 26, 1956) was an American jazz trombone, trombonist, composer, conductor and bandleader of the big band era. He was known as the "Sentimental Gentleman of Swing" because of his smooth-to ...
,
Ray Charles
Ray Charles Robinson (September 23, 1930 – June 10, 2004) was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. He is regarded as one of the most iconic and influential musicians in history, and was often referred to by contemporaries as "The Gen ...
,
Nat King Cole
Nathaniel Adams Coles (March 17, 1919 – February 15, 1965), known professionally as Nat King Cole, alternatively billed as Nat "King" Cole, was an American singer, jazz pianist, and actor. Cole's career as a jazz and Traditional pop, pop ...
,
Johnny Mathis
John Royce Mathis (born September 30, 1935) is an American singer. Starting his 69-year career with singles of standard (music), standard music, Mathis is one of the best-selling recording artists of the 20th century and became highly popular as ...
,
Bing Crosby
Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby Jr. (May 3, 1903 – October 14, 1977) was an American singer, comedian, entertainer and actor. The first multimedia star, he was one of the most popular and influential musical artists of the 20th century worldwi ...
,
McGuire Sisters,
Bobby Darin
Bobby Darin (born Walden Robert Cassotto; May 14, 1936 – December 20, 1973) was an American singer, songwriter, and actor who performed Pop music, pop, Swing music, swing, Folk music, folk, rock and roll, and country music.
Darin started ...
,
Perry Como
Pierino Ronald "Perry" Como (; May 18, 1912 – May 12, 2001) was an American singer, actor, and television personality. During a career spanning more than half a century, he recorded exclusively for RCA Victor for 44 years, from 1943 until 1987 ...
,
Glenn Miller
Alton Glen "Glenn" Miller (March 1, 1904 – December 15, 1944) was an American big band conductor, arranger, composer, trombonist, and recording artist before and during World War II, when he was an officer in the United States Army Air Forces ...
,
Sammy Davis Jr., and many others. The station stayed away from baby boomer pop with the exception of quazi-rock and roll artists like Ray Charles.
The station also added former 1130
WNEW air personalities such as
Ted Brown,
Jim Lowe, Jim Harlan, Mike Prelee, Mike Myers, and Bobby Ryan. Bill Gaghan was the
program director during Ted Brown's tenure. Throughout 1996, 1997, and 1998 the station was somewhat profitable but ratings were modest at best. Advertising on the station gradually faded in 1998. With
WQEW leaving the format after Christmas 1998, it was hoped that WVNJ would pick up some of their advertisers and ratings. However, by 1999 Adult Standards had become a tough format to sell and WVNJ was losing sponsors. As a result, the station began automating evenings and overnights.
In 2002, WVNJ began selling blocks of evening time as well as blocks of weekend time to specialty programmers as well as for infomercials. By 2003, WVNJ added more infomercials to middays during the week as well in order to turn a profit. By 2006, WVNJ was down to only a few hours of music per week.
WVNJ "The Voice"
Starting in late 2006, WVNJ became " The Voice". When the format first began, the station remained playing music, more talk shows and infomercials were added as 2007 rolled in. WVNJ began to lose the standards music and added more talk and infomercials. Later on in 2007 WVNJ added its first morning talk show called "The Voice In The Morning" with Gary O'Neill and Kathleen Maloney. The show was canceled in early November 2007 and replaced in January 2008 by another local morning show. The replacement was a talk show hosted by Sam Greenfield (formerly of
WEVD and
WWRL) and long time WVNJ announcer Pete Buckey.
On September 13, 2018, it was announced that Universal Broadcasting of New York was selling WVNJ to Immaculate Heart Media. The sale was consummated on November 26, 2018.
References
External links
relevantradio.com
{{Relevant Radio
Oakland, New Jersey
Radio stations established in 1987
VNJ
1987 establishments in New Jersey
Relevant Radio stations