WOVV Update; and the Debut of Sanity Theory

I continue to be impressed with the responsive of the folks at vTuner to user requests for the addition of new audio streams to their database.

I blogged recently about WOVV, the new radio station in Ocracoke, North Carolina -- the village's as well as the island's first ever. Although WOVV will go on the air later this year as a regular broadcast station, for now it exists as an Internet stream. Today I discovered that that stream is now available for me to listen to on my wi-fi Internet radio device, which uses the vTuner database.

When I wrote about WOVV, this was not the case. So, I emailed vTuner via its contact page and requested that the station be added -- and now, there it is. Thanks again, vTuner (they also added WPAQ, the old-timey station in Mt. Airy, following an earlier request). You do customer service right.

Now, a point of blogmaster privilege ...

Can't really relate this to Internet radio, but I want to congratulate my daughter and her friends on the upcoming debut, this Friday, of their band, Sanity Theory.

These young ladies have been practicing hard and I'm looking forward to seeing and hearing them when they perform at an event at their school. They'll be playing a Green Day song this first time out of the gate, but they say they intend to start writing and performing songs of their own as soon as they can. They are even planning the art for their first album already!

Having always been a frustrated rock 'n' roll performer myself, I am excited for them. I wish Sanity Theory all the best this Friday and beyond.

Their blog is at sanity-theory.blogspot.com, and here's their Facebook page.

WOVV, Ocracoke: Radio Comes to the Island

One of my fantasies has been to run a radio station in some isolated town, perhaps on an island, where I would, in effect, be the Voice of God.

I don't know if the people behind WOVV harbor such a grandiose vision of themselves, but their location would fit my fantasy perfectly: Ocracoke, North Carolina.

Ocracoke is a real village on an island out in the Atlantic, reachable by ferry, small boat or airplane. By "real village," I mean it's not a beach town, per se, unlike many other places in the Outer Banks. In fact, you have to drive a ways outside of town to get to the beach. It has a long history, most of it tied to the sea, and in particular, fishing;  residents with roots going back many generations; and sandy, tree-shaded streets where tourists and locals alike leisurely ride balloon-tired bicycles to the store.

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One thing Ocracoke has never had is its own radio station, even with the critical need for good communications in such a hurricane-prone location. That is changing.

A group of enthusiastic Ocracokers are nearing the go-live date for the town's and the island's first broadast station, WOVV. Also known as Ocracoke Community Radio, the station will be heard at 90.1 FM. Besides playing music, WOVV will broadcast local news, community announcements and tourist information, and will be supported by listener contributions and underwriting (the NPR model, in other words). In a nice touch, Ocracoke youth will be recruited to do most of the voice-overs for the underwriting spots.

For those of us who've vacationed in Ocracoke
but don't have the opportunity of living there, the good news is that WOVV already streams itself on the Internet (wovv.org/listen.htm -- or try the Flash player embedded here, if you see it). It's a great means of enjoying the local Ocracoke flavor from anywhere in the world.

Unfortunately (for me anyway), WOVV's stream is not available in the vTuner database, which means my vTuner-based wi-fi radio cannot currently play it.

The stream is available through other sources, though, including Shoutcast; so, for instance, you can hear it with the embedded Shoutcast player that you should see on this page. Just search in the player for "WOVV" or "Ocracoke" and you'll have it.

(Well, maybe. It was in Shoutcast earlier today when I tried it, but now I can't find it there. Oh wait, now it's back. In any case, you can always listen directly from the station's own site.)

UPDATE: Disregard my references to Shoutcast. I'm planning to remove the Shoutcast player from this site due to its slow loading time. It seems to slow down the page more than any other element on the page.

WOVV's local flavor extends to its music programming. For a town of fewer than a thousand permanent residents, Ocracoke is home to some impressive talent, including local bands Molasses Creek, Baby Dee and the Free Mustache Rides Again, Coyote and Mya Rose. The radio station gives precedence to such local artists, including devoting several hours each day to "Locals Only Beach" music blocks (see schedule).

To be clear: WOVV is (will be) a legally licensed broadcast station, with call letters assigned by the FCC, FCC construction permit, and everything. Yet somehow this crew looks like they could have stepped out of the cast of that "Pirate Radio" movie, which means they're probably having a ball with this whole broadcasting endeavor, on top of and aside from the community service thing.

CNN story about WOVV

WPAQ, Voice of the Blue Ridge

Mount Airy, North Carolina is known as the boyhood home of Andy Griffith and also (quite naturally) the real town upon which the fictional TV town of Mayberry was modeled. For old-time music fans, it is also known as the home of WPAQ radio.

WPAQ first went on the air in 1948, the embodiment of a vision held by a young Ralph Epperson. Epperson was dedicated to promoting, encouraging and preserving the authentic music of the Blue Ridge mountain region. To that end he invited local musicians to come to the studio, where they would play live on the air -- while Epperson, often, was recording them for posterity.

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Ralph Epperson passed away a few years ago, but his heirs at WPAQ have hewed true to his original vision. This is an authentic country station, through and through. In addition to the bluegrass, old-time and gospel music, the announcers give the news, do charmingly less-than-slick commercials for local businesses, and even read out the obituaries.

The crown of the WPAQ lineup is undoubtedly "The Merry-Go-Round," a show of live music held each Saturday on the stage of a local theater. If you're ever in Mt. Airy on a Saturday, you can drop in and enjoy it in person, for free.

Although I currently live in North Carolina, I'm a little too far outside of WPAQ's broadcasting footprint to pick it up on a regular radio at its dial position of 740 AM. But thanks to Internet radio I can now listen to a WPAQ stream whenever I want.

By the way, if you have a standalone Internet radio device that uses the vTuner station database, you have me to thank for WPAQ's availability to you. Well, I can't really swear to that, but it's possible.

You see, I was disappointed to find, at the time I acquired my vTuner-based Internet radio (an Aluratek), that WPAQ was not in vTuner. Although Aluratk's version of vTuner does have a facility for adding your own streams to the radio, it's a little confusing and doesn't always work. Mainly this has to do with the variety of formats used for streaming radio -- some simply won't work in vTuner.

Long story short is that I finally gave up on adding the WPAQ stream to my radio. Instead I settled for requesting that the vTuner folks add it to their database for me, and of course for others who would enjoy this type of station. I didn't really expect that much would come of this request, but lo and behold, a couple of weeks later I was checking vTuner and there in its list of "new stations" was WPAQ!

Thank you, vTuner and Aluratek. And thank you, WPAQ, for keeping a great radio tradition alive.