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Radio station in Omaha, Nebraska, United States

KSRZ

  • 2 min read
KSRZ

Key facts

instance ofradio station
countryUnited States
located in the administrative territorial entityNebraska
All data from the card 18
Broadcast area
Omaha-Lincoln-Council Bluffs
Frequency
104.5 MHz (HD Radio)
Branding
Star 104.5
Format
Adult contemporary
Owner
SummitMedia(SM-KSRZ-FM, LLC)
Sister stations
KEZO-FMKKCDKQCHKXSP
First air date
May 12, 1972
Former call signs
KOOO-FM (1972–1979)KESY-FM (1979–1997)
Call sign meaning
Star
Licensing authority
FCC
Facility ID
50308
Class
C0
ERP
100,000 watts
HAAT
331.7 meters (1,088 ft)
Transmitter coordinates
41°18′16″N 96°1′42.1″W / 41.30444°N 96.028361°W
Public license information
Public fileLMS
Webcast
Listen live
Website
www.104star.com

KSRZ (104.5 FM, "Star 104.5") is a commercial radio station licensed to Omaha, Nebraska, United States. Owned by SummitMedia, it airs an adult contemporary format, with studios located on Mercy Road in Omaha's Aksarben Village.

KSRZ's transmitter is sited at the Omaha master antenna farm on North 72nd Street and Crown Point.

History

The station signed on the air in May 12, 1972, as KOOO-FM, the sister station to KOOO (1420 AM, now KXCB). The two stations broadcast a country music format and were owned by Pier San of Nebraska, Inc. KOOO-FM's power was only 31,000 watts, a fraction of its current output.

In 1979, the station changed its call letters to KESY, and flipped to a largely automated beautiful music format. It played quarter-hour sweeps of soft instrumental music, mostly cover versions of popular adult songs with Broadway and Hollywood show tunes. Throughout the early 1980s, KESY was used as the audio on a local Limelight Movie Channel when it signed off the air for the night.

By the late 1980s, the audience for easy listening music was aging, so KESY added more vocals to its playlist to entice younger listeners. In 1989, KESY evolved to soft adult contemporary music, adopted the moniker "Y 104", and used live DJs.

On January 9, 1998, KESY moved to the 97.7 FM frequency. After a few days of simulcasting, 104.5 FM flipped to modern adult contemporary (which emphasizes on more modern rock hits targeting a female audience) as "Star 104.5", with new call letters KSRZ. The format later evolved to a more broad-based hot adult contemporary format.

By 2008, KSRZ repositioned to a mainstream adult contemporary format, with a heavy reliance on songs from the 1980s.

Journal Communications and the E. W. Scripps Company announced on July 30, 2014, that the two companies would merge to create a new broadcast company under the E. W. Scripps Company name that owned the two companies' broadcast properties, including KSRZ. The transaction was completed in 2015. Scripps exited radio in 2018; the Omaha stations went to SummitMedia in a four-market, $47 million deal completed on November 1, 2018.

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Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source article