WYXB (105.7 FM), branded as "B105.7", is a

commercial Commercial may refer to: * (adjective for) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and services ** (adjective for) trade, the trading of something of economic value such as goods, services, information or money * a dose of advertising ...

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 by Urban One in

Indianapolis, Indiana Indianapolis ( ), colloquially known as Indy, is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Indiana, most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana, Marion ...

. The studios are on Monument Circle in downtown Indianapolis. WYXB is one of two

adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul ...

stations in Indianapolis; the other being WNTR, "107.9 The Mix". WYXB switches to

Christmas music Christmas music comprises a variety of Music genre, genres of music regularly performed or heard around the Christmas and holiday season, Christmas season. Music associated with Christmas may be purely instrumental, or in the case of Christmas ...

for part of November and December. WYXB is a Class B station. It has an

effective radiated power Effective radiated power (ERP), synonymous with equivalent radiated power, is an IEEE standardized definition of directional radio frequency (RF) power, such as that emitted by a radio transmitter. It is the total power in watts that would ha ...

(ERP) of 50,000

watt The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of Power (physics), power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantification (science), quantify the rate of Work ...

s, the maximum for most stations in Indiana. The

transmitter In electronics and telecommunications, a radio transmitter or just transmitter (often abbreviated as XMTR or TX in technical documents) is an electronic device which produces radio waves with an antenna (radio), antenna with the purpose of sig ...

is on Burk Road near South Post Road on the eastside of Indianapolis.

History

Classical WAIV

The station signed on the air on . Its original

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally as ...

was WAIV, a

classical music Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be #Relationship to other music traditions, distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical mu ...

station. It was owned by Calojay Enterprises and was a rare stand-alone FM station, not co-owned with an AM or TV station. The studios were at 3208 East Michigan Street. In 1964, the station relocated to the Dearborn Hotel on East Michigan Street. (The Dearborn is now home to the Wheeler Mission Community Center.) By 1967, WAIV ran out of advertising dollars. The founders formed "The Fine Arts Society of Indianapolis" in 1968 to keep classical music on the radio but no longer dependent on advertising dollars. The group put WICR 88.7 FM on the air as a listener-supported classical and jazz outlet.

Urban WTLC

The call letters on 105.7 FM changed to WTLC on January 22, 1968, and flipped to an

Urban Contemporary Urban contemporary music, also known as urban music, urban pop, or just simply urban, is a music radio format. The term was coined by New York radio DJ Frankie Crocker in the early to mid-1970s as a synonym for Black music. Urban contemporary r ...

format. Throughout the years, WTLC utilized several on-air brandings, including ''Soul Stereo FM 105 WTLC'', ''WTLC FM 105'', ''Fresh 105 WTLC'', ''Power 105 WTLC'', ''105.7 The People's Station'', ''105.7 The Power'', ''Power 105.7 FM'', and ''105.7 WTLC''. In 1997, Emmis Communications bought both WTLC-FM and its AM

sister station In broadcasting, sister stations or sister channels are radio or television stations operated by the same company, either by direct ownership or through a management agreement. Radio sister stations will often have different formats, and somet ...

, WTLC 1310 AM. In February 2001, Emmis sold the intellectual rights to the programming on WTLC-FM and AM, while the actual station license stayed in the Emmis fold. WTLC-FM and its urban format moved up the dial to 106.7 FM on February 15.

AC WYXB

Emmis changed the call letters of 105.7 FM to WYXB, rebranding it as "B 105.7". The station switched to

, playing the softer hits of the 1980s, 90s and current AC music. On June 13, 2022, Emmis announced it would sell its entire cluster of radio stations in Indianapolis to Urban One.Emmis Sells Indianapolis Stations To Urban One
/ref> The sale, at a price of $25 million, was consummated on August 31, 2022.

Programming

WYXB broadcasts a

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

-based

adult contemporary music Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, sou ...

format. WYXB’s

playlist A playlist is a list of video or audio files that can be played back on a media player, either sequentially or in a shuffled order. In its most general form, an audio playlist is simply a list of songs that can be played once or in a loop. ...

spans from the 1980s to the present. Its original positioning statement of "Soft Rock for a Busy World" was later shortened to just "Soft Rock." It has since changed its slogan to "The BEST variety of the 80s, 90s, & TODAY". WYXB switches its format to

during the holiday season between mid-November and

Christmas Day Christmas is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed primarily on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A liturgical feast central to Christianity, Chri ...

. B105.7 changes the station's moniker to "Indy's Christmas Station" during this time. WYXB DJs Bernie Eagan and Eric Garnes are Indy radio veterans. Studios for Urban One stations in Indianapolis, WLHK, WIBC,

WFNI WFNI (1070 AM broadcasting, AM) is a commercial radio, commercial Radio broadcasting, radio station licensed to Indianapolis, Indianapolis, Indiana. It is owned by the Emmis Corporation but is usually off the air. WFNI carried a sports radio ...

, WTLC, WTLC-FM and WYXB are on the southwest quadrant of Monument Circle.

References

External links

* {{Urban One YXB Urban One stations Mass media in Indianapolis Radio stations established in 1961