Latest news about Smooth Radio

Heart 90s to launch on national DAB digital radio

Global is transforming its Heart 90s playlist service into a full national radio station on DAB, with Kevin Hughes hosting breakfast. It’s the first of five new services all going national on DAB in the next week – as teased by Global over the last few days. Heart 90s will officially launch tomorrow at 6am – Thursday 29th August – with non-stop music from the 90s and joins Heart, Heart Dance and Heart 80s which all have live national breakfast shows from Leicester Square. Kevin Hughes currently hosts Saturday afternoons on Heart, and previously presented Drive on Heart South Wales...

RAJAR Q2 2019: London and national brands round-up

Zoe Ball has lost more than three quarters of a million listeners to her BBC Radio 2 breakfast show, according to the latest audience research from RAJAR. The show’s reach is down 781,000 quarter-on-quarter to 8.266m for the three months survey period up to the 23rd June 2019. In Q1/19 she had 9.047m listeners; in Q2/2018 Chris Evans reached 9.038m. Radio 2’s audience at breakfast is now the lowest its been since Q3/2010, when Evans was fairly new in the job.

Gold returns to AM in Peterborough and Northampton

Gold is returning to AM in Peterborough and Northampton using the frequencies currently used by Smooth Radio. Ofcom has approved two format change requests, to change the Character of Services from an easy listening featuring lifestyle oriented speech, targeting an audience aged 50-plus to classic pop hits targeted primarily at 35-54 year-olds. The move means all programming on 1332AM in Peterborough and 1557AM in Northampton will be shared with all other AM stations in the Gold network in England, rather than the Smooth network.

Smooth Radio poaches Angie Greaves for national Drive

Smooth Radio is changing tactics and keeping its regional breakfast shows, as Magic’s Angie Greaves joins Global to present a national drivetime show. The UK’s biggest radio group had planned to network everything except the 4-7pm slot on Smooth as it has done with Capital – and is about to with Heart, which launches its national breakfast show next week. But now Global says breakfast shows on Smooth will be locally-produced as the drive show goes national instead.

Tina Hobley leaves Smooth Radio’s London drive show

Smooth Radio’s drivetime presenter in London, Tina Hobley, is leaving the show after two and a half years but will keep her weekend slot. The former Coronation Street and Holby City actor joined the station in 2013, and added the weekday 4-7pm programme in the capital in January 2017 when she replaced Anthony Davis. Global has told RadioToday she’s leaving the daily show in mid-July to spend more time with her children, but will remain on the Sunday 10am-2pm slot across the Smooth network.

RAJAR Q1 2019: Regional and local radio facts and figures

Whilst the national news is all about new radio stations and breakfast shows, the main headlines in the regions are about one of Bauer’s latest brands. The first results for Greatest Hits Radio in England show a mainly downward trend following the rebrand from City 2 stations last quarter.

RAJAR Q1 2019 – Zoe & Chris plus national and London radio round-up

Chris Evans and Virgin Radio both reached over a million listeners in the first quarter of 2019. The digital station’s audience has almost trebled compared with the last period of 2018 thanks to the arrival of Evans from Radio 2. In Q1/2019 it posts a weekly reach of 1.3m and total hours of 7.765m. A year ago those figures were 427,000 and 1.632m. Last quarter they were 447,000 and 1.686m.

Global just launched a country music station from Smooth Radio

Smooth Country has just appeared on the Global Player app, and online via the Smooth Radio website. The new service plays “the most relaxing country songs” and is part of the “playlists” section in the Global Player. It features the same jingles and voice-overs as the main service. Global says: “Smooth Country celebrates the very best of relaxing country music, to make you feel as if you’re chilling with the top down of a Chevy on a long drive across the heart of Nashville.

Global to network Capital, Heart and Smooth breakfast shows

Global will broadcast national breakfast shows on the Capital, Heart and Smooth networks by the end of this year, RadioToday can reveal. Capital will go first with the London output replacing 14 breakfast programmes on the Capital network in England, Scotland and Wales on April 8th. Due to deregulation and larger ‘approved areas’, only nine drivetime shows will be provided instead of the current 14.

Opinion: UK commercial radio presenter numbers could drop by more than 250

With news that Global is to introduce networked breakfast shows and have just a handful of local drive shows across Capital, Heart and Smooth, RadioToday’s Stuart Clarkson has done the maths on what it means for presenter roles across commercial radio. Our exclusive figures show that presenter numbers could drop by more than 250 if both Global and Bauer take full advantage of the recent changes in localness guidelines from Ofcom.