INTERNET—Jazz Site Aims At Abandoned Radio Listeners

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With FM programming in Los Angeles and elsewhere focused increasingly on pop music, jazz lovers are generally left to listen to their own CDs or nothing at all.

To fill that void, Beverly Hills-based Halycon Entertainment Inc. is gearing up to launch a jazz radio station through the Internet. Expected to debut before summer, Neontonic.com will offer seven themed channels from its Web site, allowing listeners to stream music 24 hours a day in a variety of genres.

Halcyon COO Ethan Crimmins said the company, which is backed by television producer Norman Lear, among others, believes online broadcasting represents the future for jazz and other musical styles that attract dedicated fans but can’t draw the wide audience that would make such enterprises viable in traditional radio.

“For a couple of million dollars you can start an online station,” Crimmins said. “It’s much more expensive to start a (traditional) radio station.”

Indeed, purchasing an FM frequency in a major market such as Los Angeles would cost tens of millions of dollars, at least.

“There are very few barriers to entry, so you see a lot of people getting in (to online broadcasting),” said Berry Meyerowitz, vice president of marketing for Chicago-based RadioWave.com, one of the largest online broadcasters. “But more fail than succeed because it’s hard for them to get their name out.”

But Crimmins said the demographic that his station will attract on the Web mostly professionals with annual incomes above $100,000 is a good match for Internet radio.

“Our mantra is ’35-plus,’ because they are the disenfranchised listeners. There’s nothing out there for them,” he said.

Instead of cross marketing with an existing radio station, Neontonic will rely on partnerships with its sister company, Concord Records, and businesses such as Playboy and Caesar’s Palace which have extensive live-recording catalogs.

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