From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
CKUA is a Canadian radio station. Originally located at
the University of Alberta in Edmonton (hence the UA of the call
letters), it now broadcasts from studios in downtown Edmonton and
south Calgary. CKUA was created in 1927 through a
provincial grant which allowed the University of Alberta's
Extension Department to purchase the licence of CFCK. CKUA was the
first public broadcaster in Canada and also the first to offer
educational radio programming, including music concerts, poetry
readings, and university lectures. From 1930 to 1931 the station
was an affiliate of the CNR
Radio network.[1]
CKUA was operated from 1945 until 1974 by Alberta Government
Telephones.[2] A crown corporation, the Alberta
Educational Communications Corporation (later known as Access)
assumed ownership of the station in 1974.[1] In
1994, Access sold the CKUA network to the non-profit CKUA Radio
Foundation for $10.[3]
In 1997 the station was nearly shut down due to political
squabbles, poor management, and attempts at privatization. The
station was saved from demise when control was handed over to the
public from directors appointed by the provincial government. As of
2005, more than two-thirds of the station's funding came from its
listeners in the form of donations.
Culture
The CKUA building in downtown Edmonton.
CKUA is considered a cultural icon by many musicians throughout
Canada. The station's practice of supporting local, independent,
and non-commercial artists has helped launch the careers of such
renowned musicians as k.d.
lang, Jann Arden,
and Bruce
Cockburn. In addition, the employ of CKUA has contributed to
the careers of Arthur Hiller, Robert Goulet, and Tommy Banks, among others. Throughout the
1930s an early radio
drama series, CKUA Players, was produced out of the
station and broadcast throughout Western Canada by a network of
stations.[4]
CKUA schedules different programs throughout the week and thus
can offer many different genres. These include, but are not limited
to: blues, bluegrass, R & B, Celtic, country, classical, jazz,
reggae, house, hip hop, dance, funk, rock, and world music. CKUA's
music library boasts one of the largest and most diverse music
collections in Canada, with over 70 000 CDs, 50 000 LPs, and 10 000 78 rpm
records, as well as a few aluminium transcription discs, 45s, and other various media formats. CKUA
also continues its history of educational programming with its
broadcast of telecourses offered by the music and history
departments of Athabasca University on
weeknights. A highlight of weekday programming is the daily Call of
the Land, a farm and agribusiness news program rumoured to be the
basis of the SCTV parody, "Farm Film
Blow-Up".
Broadcast
technics
The station broadcasts its signal across the Province of Alberta
at 580 kHz on
the AM
band through one Edmonton-based
transmitter. The signal is also carried province-wide on FM through a
network of 16 transmitters. CKUA also broadcasts in western Canada
on select satellite providers. As of February 29, 1996, CKUA became
the first radio station in Canada to stream their broadcast online, and now
has upgraded the service to carry in excess of five hundred
streams. The station currently has over 160 000 weekly
listeners.
Because of CKUA's extensive coverage, the station is one of only
a handful of broadcasters (another being Access)
to carry the Alberta Emergency Public Warning
System. The provincial government-funded programme provides the
station with 12% of its annual income. CKUA is especially suited as
the primary originator of this service as (unlike many commercial
stations) its studios are staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days a
week.
Notable
hosts
Current
Previous
Transmitters
References
External links and
references
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