Out of Hospital: Hermitage FM

Oftentimes a radio station's "back story" strikes me as much as its programming. Such is the case with Hermitage FM, a community station in Leicestershire in the U.K. (Web site - Listen)

Not to say their programming isn't good. In fact, I like it well enough to include in my current "#1 Faves" list that I have set up on my Aluratek wi-fi Internet radio. That puts it in rarefied company.*

The back story for Hermitage FM is that it started out as a hospital radio station in 1976. At that time and for years afterward it could be heard only over the hospital's internal speaker system.

In 1999 it became the smallest hospital radio station in the country to be granted a broadcast license (hospital radio stations must be a U.K. phenomenon; I'm not aware of them in the U.S.). In late 2000, under the name Carillon Radio, it began broadcasting to its local community on an AM channel. Its studios then were still situated above a hospital X-Ray department.

Just last year, the Carillon folks went on the air with Hermitage Radio at 99.2 FM, becoming "the first hospital broadcaster in the country to become a Community radio station." The FM station broadcasts to North West Leicestershire while continuing to serve its original local area via its old AM outlet. It also has its Internet stream, of course.

The station (or stations) has come a long way since its hospital days, evidently. It now boasts three studios ... and even a coffee lounge ("located below our Coalville studios on Hotel Street"), complete with a book room. Radio, coffee and books -- sounds like something I might have designed as my ideal retreat.

Why do I like this station?

First, there's the local aspect. Some people are drawn to Internet radio because it offers a wealth of uninterrupted music streams. I, on the other hand, enjoy getting a taste of local color (or in this case "colour") from distant places. Hermitage FM provides that in the form of news and announcements for the several Midlands towns it covers. Besides, I have to know where Hermi the Hedgehog, the station's mascot, is going to show up next! (That's him at a St. Georges Day event. We don't have St. Georges Day here ... or hedgehogs.)

The station's music is a mix. It tends toward top-40 and oldies, "oldies" being the '70s, '80s and '90s. Nevertheless, it surprises me with songs I have never heard before, possibly because the top 40 in the U.K. at any given time was never exactly the same as here in the U.S. For instance, last night I was listening to a great old song I had never heard and wondering who the singer was, and it turned out to be Bonnie Tyler, who had hits in the U.S. but not with this particular one.

I especially like the station's playing of what I think would fall under the heading of Northern Soul. This was a phenomenon from the 1970s when clubs in the north of England played obscure mid-1960s Motown-esque soul records, songs that got little or no airplay when they were released in the U.S. Yet it's a wonderfully fresh sound to my ears -- from 45 years ago.

* The others currently are WFMU (free-form station from New Jersey), WHAY (Americana from Kentucky), WPAQ (Old Time and bluegrass from here in North Carolina), KMRC (swamp pop from Louisiana), Radio Caroline (its oldies stream), and Big Blue Swing (Internet-only blues/swing station).