REVOLVING DOOR:
Anna Maria Tremonti, the award-winning host of CBC Radio One’s The Current, is stepping away from the show to host and produce for CBC Podcasts. CBC says the veteran broadcaster’s last day with The Current will be June 21 so Tremonti can focus on her podcasting ventures which will include an indepth, one-on-one interview series, starting this fall. Tremonti also has a second CBC Podcast project in development. She has helmed The Current since the weekday morning current affairs show was first introduced in Nov. 2002. Prior to The Current, she spent 19 years with CBC Television, including two years as a host of The Fifth Estate and nine years as a foreign correspondent for The National, based in Berlin, London, Jerusalem and Washington. She’s also worked on Parliament Hill and as a reporter in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Alberta. She began her career at CKEC New Glasgow, NS.
Sue Smith is stepping down as host of CBC Radio One’s Homerun in Montreal at the end of June. Smith started her broadcasting career at CFCF/CFQR Montreal, arriving at CBC in 1988 as the traffic reporter on Daybreak. After one season, she started working on television series Citybeat. After three years, she moved to London to work as a producer for Worldwide Television News, then Jamaica, earning her master’s degree in international relations and having three children along the way. Returning to Montreal after 10 years abroad, Smith hosted Good Morning Live at Global TV and then returned to CBC for Living Montreal. She’s been hosting Homerun since 2010.
Jamie ‘Coach’ Herbison is retiring after 39 years behind the mic. Long part of XL103 (CFXL-FM) Calgary morning show team Don, Joanne and The Coach, Herbison stayed on when Don Stevens and Joanne Johnson retired at the end of 2017. Friday, May 31st will be Herbison’s last day on the morning show, alongside Heather Prozak and Buzz Bishop.
Curtis Bray is joining Bell Media’s 105.7 EZ Rock (CHRE-FM) St. Catharines as host of their new morning show Lori and Curtis In The Morning. Starting Monday, June 3, Bray joins long-time morning show host Lori Love weekdays from 5:30 – 9 a.m. ET. Bray has been helming mornings at 102.3 Jack FM (CHST-FM) London for the last four years.
Steve Stax is returning to Jack 102.3 (CHST-FM) London, ON. Stax, Meghan and Loop launches June 3. Stax has been helming mornings at Blackburn Radio’s Classic Rock 98.1 (CKLO-FM) for the last four years. Prior to that he was with Rogers London for nearly 15 years.
Hilary Welch is moving over to Rogers’ Easy 101.3 (CKOT-FM) Tillsonburg, ON. She’ll join Mark Paine on the morning show, starting June 3. Welch had been co-hosting mornings with Curtis Bray on 102.3 JACK FM (CHST-FM) London for the last four years.
Brian Fraser, CFRA Ottawa technical producer and one of the voices on The Morning Rush with Bill Carroll, is off work while he fights leukemia. Fraser is a 2016 Algonquin College Radio Broadcasting grad.
Shane Woodford is leaving CHNL Kamloops to move to Denmark with his family. Woodford has been news director at NL since 2016 – his second stint with the station after a five-year departure to join CKNW Vancouver as a reporter/anchor and fill-in talk show host.
Spencer Van Dyk is moving into a new reporting role with CBC Quebec covering the Eastern Townships, based out of Sherbrooke. Van Dyk has been with CBC Quebec since May 2018.
Nathan Durec is joining News 1130 (CKWX-AM) Vancouver as a reporter. Durec is a freelance writer and recent Langara College Journalism grad.
Kailey Klempner is leaving Corus to join an unnamed tech company as content marketing manager. Klempner first joined Corus in 2014 and has been the content creator and social media manager for 18 Corus Radio FM brands, based in Toronto.
Mahnoor Yawar is leaving OMNI Television where she’s been covering Toronto City Hall for the network’s Punjabi broadcasts. She’ll be joining CityNews as a full-time producer.
Chris Bilton, editorial director, Digital at VICE Canada, is leaving to take on a new role with The Weather Network. Bilton first joined VICE in 2015 as a deputy editor.
Charelle Evelyn is taking over as managing editor of The Hill Times. Evelyn has been a deputy editor with the publication since 2017 and was previously associate editor of their sub publication The Wire Report. After 10 years, former managing editor Kristen Shane is moving on. Laura Ryckewaert will now serve as deputy editor of the Wednesday edition.
Olivia Blackmore has accepted a part-time position with the Halifax bureau of The Canadian Press. The Toronto-based freelancer, whose bylines span Canadaland to Canadian Living, recently completed a Masters of Data and Investigative Journalism at the University of King’s College. She‘ll join the bureau as a reporter-editor, starting in late June.
Fiona Odlum has left Global Saskatoon to join CBC Saskatchewan as a reporter for radio and television, based in Regina. Odlum had been a weather specialist with Global Saskatoon since April 2019.
Tessa Vanderhart is leaving CBC Winnipeg to join The Winnipeg Free Press as a reporter. Vanderhart, who had been an assignment producer with the public broadcaster for the last two and a half years, was previously an online editor with The Winnipeg Sun.
Catherine Émond is taking on a new role with Telefilm Canada following recent work with the Min. of Canadian Heritage and Multiculturalism to grant $7.5 million in new funding to Telefilm for Francophone productions in 2019-20. Émond will lead a major strategic project to help the organization and its partners adapt to industry changes. Francesca Accinelli, director, Promotions and Communications, assumes the interim direction of government and public affairs.
RADIO/AUDIO/PODCAST:
Bell Media has rolled out a rebrand of 13 of its iHeartRadio Canada stations. It’s billing “Pure Country” as the first-ever national country music radio brand encompassing stations from Northern B.C. to Nova Scotia including Pure Country 94 (CKKL-FM) Ottawa; 103.5 (CKHJ-FM) Fredericton; 99.5 Truro, NS (CKTY-FM); 93 (CJBX-FM) London; 106 Orillia (CICX-FM); 96.7 (CHVR-FM) Pembroke; 105 (CKQM-FM) Peterborough; 91.7 (CICS-FM) Sudbury; 890 (CJDC-FM) Dawson Creek; (CJFW-FM) Terrace, BC; 101 (CKXA-FM) Brandon, MB; 92.7 (CHBD-FM) Regina and 99 (CKLC-FM) Kingston. The stations will be anchored by local morning and drive home shows, but will feature syndicated midday, evening and weekend programming. Shannon Ella , previously with BX93 London and KHJ Fredericton, will host middays across the network. Syndicated Nashville-based offering The Bobby Bones Daily Show will air evenings, with Bones’ Country Top 30 Countdown also airing on weekends. Sophie Moroz and Jeff Hopper, co-hosts of The Morning Pickup on the Pure Country Ottawa station, will host the iHeartRadio Pure Country Countdown, Saturday and Sundays. A Bell Media spokesperson said there are no staff reductions as a result of the rebrand, with midday on-air announcers at affected stations to be reassigned. Twelve of the 13 rebranded stations were already country format with the exception of Kingston, which was formerly modern rock station 98.9 The Drive. The Drive had been running without announcers since January when most of its staff were laid off or moved over to sister station 98.3 Fly FM (CFLY-FM). Its new on-air lineup, starting June 24, will feature Gord St. Denis and Chelsea Lacroix (previously both on-air at Corus Ottawa) on mornings; Trinette Atkinson (who also serves as music director and is former PD at Larche Communications’ Sudbury stations) on afternoons; and program director Brittany Thompson, who is also a weekend personality CFLY-FM, on evenings. Read more here.
CBC has plans to roll out a new national business show originating out of Calgary this fall. The Cost of Living, hosted by Paul Haavardsrud, will debut on CBC Radio One on Saturday, Sept. 7 at 11:30 a.m. (noon NT). The weekly 30-minute show will cover business and economic stories and how they affect the day-to-day lives of Canadians. Susan Marjetti, executive director of CBC Radio and Audio, said the show is part of the public broadcaster’s commitment to better reflect a wider range of experiences and perspectives from across the country.
CBC’s Upfront presentation on Wednesday included the unveiling of plans to launch the new CBC LISTEN app this fall as the one-stop destination for all CBC Music, CBC Podcasts and CBC Radio content. Listeners will be able to tap in to local and national CBC Radio One and CBC Music shows, live or on-demand, for free, and gain access to more than 175 curated music playlists featuring new releases from Canadian artists. The public broadcaster also revealed its slate of new and returning original podcasts for the upcoming year. They include: Chosen Family (June 19, Season 2) with Montreal comedians and queer BFFs Thomas LeBlanc and Tranna Wintour exploring the intersection of art, community and sexuality; Uncover: The Cat Lady Case (July 9, Season 4), the investigative series looks into the cold case of seniors who went missing from the Muskokas without a trace; Uncover: Sharmini (Sept. 10, Season 5), the investigative series follows reporter Michelle Shephard as she revisits a 20-year-old unsolved murder; Hunting Warhead (Fall), an exploration of the dark web with a task force that includes journalists and police officers; The Story Store (Fall), a collaboration between CBC Podcasts and CBC Kids, The Story Store is open for business, taking orders from real kids across Canada and turning their suggestions into fun-filled adventures; Asking For It (Winter), Kaitlin Prest (The Shadows) helms this fiction series that centres around one woman’s tumultuous journey through three relationships; Someone Knows Something: Izzett (Winter, Season 6), host David Ridgen investigates the 1995 disappearance of Don Izzett, who was discharged from the military for being gay, embarked on a road trip – and never made it home. There will also be new seasons of Tai Asks Why, The Secret Life of Canada, and PlayMe.
Jocelyne Blouin, 68, on May 27, of cancer. Blouin started her career as a meteorologist with the Meteorological Service of Canada (MSC) in 1974 in Edmonton, also contributing to local Radio-Canada broadcasts. She was transferred to Montreal with MSC in 1976 and was offered a part-time position as a weather presenter with Radio-Canada television two years later. She committed herself full-time to television in 1980. After 33 years with the public broadcaster, Blouin retired from Le Telejournal in June 2011. It’s estimated she delivered over 15,000 weather forecasts over the course of her career. In 2016, Blouin and fellow meteorologist Jean-Charles Beaubois launched the Blisly app which predicts how the weather might affect your health, including asthma, allergies, and migraines.
Sarika Sehgal, 42. Sehgal, who had a career that took her from CICI-TV Sudbury to the network anchor desks at CBC Newsworld and CTV News Channel, had left journalism behind in the last 10 years to become the founder and director of the Khel Centre for Creativity & Inner Peace, a creative and spiritual retreat near Erin, ON. After graduating from Humber College, Sehgal had a meteoric rise starting as producer on a national morning show in Toronto before stints at CTV News Sudbury and A-Channel in Edmonton. Within a year, she joined CTV Calgary (CFCN) to co-produce and anchor the station’s noon-hour newscasts. She then landed in Hamilton to executive producer and co-anchor for CH News. In 2003, Sehgal returned to Toronto to co-anchorToronto Tonight on Toronto 1 (CKXT-TV). Following the show’s cancellation in 2005, she joined CBC Newsworld as host of one-hour current affairs and news program CBC News: Today, also taking turns hosting CBC News: Tonight and CBC News: Around the World. She left the public broadcaster in Aug. 2007 to travel the world on a soul-searching journey that would take her to 15 countries. She joined CTV News Channel in late 2011. In a manifesto Sehgal wrote for the Khel website, she explained her decision to walk away from television saying “Like so many North Americans, my entire identity and ego were tied to my work. And that happened for nearly 20 years.” Read more here. A memorial will take place June 7 at 2 p.m. at the Bellfountain Village Church in Caledon, ON.
Gord Kidder, 74, on May 22. A graduate of Mohawk College, Kidder had a long broadcast sales career that included 17 years with CHUM Radio, and seven years with CFRB-AM Toronto. He became a partner in Muskoka Information Radio in 2011, serving the South Muskoka Region. A resident of Port Sydney, ON Kidder was named for an uncle who was killed while a PoW at Stalag Luft III during WWII. He was in the Czech Republic to take part in 75th anniversary ceremonies around The Great Escape, in honour of his uncle, when he suffered a cerebral hemorrhage and fell into a coma. He never regained consciousness. Nearly $100,000 was raised to airlift Kidder back to Canada that included matched donation pledges from Gary Slaight, president and CEO of Slaight Communications, and former CHUM Group chairman Jim Waters. Read more here.
Garfield Ogilvie, 61, on Jan. 31, in Las Vegas from pancreatic cancer. Ogilvie started his broadcast sales career at OZ FM in St. John’s, NL, in 1980. He moved on to CJSB Ottawa in 1982 and then Urban Outdoor Trans Ad in Toronto where he was director of Eastern Canadian sales. He forayed back into radio in 1995, becoming the general sales manager of the CHUM Radio Group in Kitchener (CKWW and CFCA), and later spent several years as vice-president of business development with the Radio Marketing Bureau. In 2000, Ogilvie joined Clear Channel Outdoor as vice-president of national sales, based in Toronto. That was the start of 10 years with Clear Channel that would see him move to Chicago, Minneapolis, Las Vegas, and Dallas-Forth Worth with the company. For the last eight years, he’d been director of sales and marketing for PGA Tour facility TPC Summerlin in Las Vegas. A celebration of life will take place in Toronto on June 22. Those interested in service details are asked to reach out directly to Garfield’s son Mitchell, via email at mitchogilvie@gmail.com.
Sportsnet has released its NBA Finals broadcast schedule, following the Toronto Raptors’ victory Saturday night which sees the team head to finals for the first time in franchise history. Sportsnet will air Games 1, 3, 5, and 7 vs. the Golden State Warriors on TV, exclusively on Sportsnet and Sportsnet ONE, and online via Sportsnet NOW. Games 2, 4, and 6 will air on radio on Sportsnet 590 The FAN and 680 NEWS. Sportsnet’s coverage tips off this Thursday, May 30 at 8:30 p.m. ET / 5:30 p.m. PT with Game 1 on Sportsnet, Sportsnet ONE, and Sportsnet NOW. Matt Devlin will handle TV play-by-play, alongside game analyst Leo Rautins. On radio, Eric Smith has the call with analysis from Paul Jones. Brad Fay, Alvin Williams and Sherman Hamilton will provide analysis courtside, in addition to NBA insiders Michael Grange and Arden Zwelling. Tim & Sid will have interviews and analysis at 6 p.m. ET / 3 p.m. PT to tee up pre-game action on Sportsnet, while Tim Micallef and Sid Seixeiro will join fans live from Jurassic Park at Maple Leafs Square for Games 1, 5 and 7. Sportsnet’s Raptors and NBA podcast Free Association with Donnovan Bennett and JD Bunkis will also produce new episodes throughout the finals. Find the full schedule here.
Sherry White is the recipient of the 6th annual Nell Shipman Award, presented annually by the Toronto ACTRA Women’s Committee (TAWC) to honour a female-identifying producer, writer, showrunner, mentor or programmer who has advanced gender equity in front of and behind the camera in the Canadian film and television industry. White recently directed an episode of upcoming Global drama series Nurses after showrunning and directing Season 2 of Little Dog for CBC. She’s previously been an executive producer on ABC drama Ten Days in the Valley, a writer and executive producer on Seasons 2 and 3 of Netflix/Discovery’s period drama Frontier, and wrote award-winning feature film Maudie, among other credits.
Corner Gas Animated returns to The Comedy Network on Canada Day. Season 2 will debut July 1 with two back-to-back episodes beginning at 8 p.m. ET/PT. The new 11-episode, half-hour season includes cameo appearances from Michael J. Fox, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Chris Hadfield, Russell Peters and Jann Arden.
The Canadian Media Producers Association (CMPA) has issued a new report on the economic benefits generated by Canadian feature film Indian Horse. Shot over 33 days in and around Sudbury and Peterborough, the critically-acclaimed film generated $15.3 million in economic activity, contributed $10.2 million to the national GDP and created 126 full time jobs. Additionally, each dollar of federal tax credit invested in the film generated $49.33 in economic activity and contributed $32.83 to the GDP. In addition to utilizing federal and provincial tax incentives, the film also received funding from the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation (NOHFC). The production directly benefited 172 Northern Ontario businesses while engaging a number of local crew members, actors and extras, many from nearby Indigenous communities. Economic analysis for the study was carried out by MNP LLP for the CMPA with financial support from Telefilm Canada. The full study is available here.
Hockey broadcaster Jim Hughson and writer and NHL communications executive Frank Brown have been named as this year’s Hockey Hall of Fame NHL Media Award recipients. Hughson will receive the Foster Hewitt Memorial Award, while Brown will be honoured with the Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award for excellence in hockey journalism. Hughson began broadcasting hockey games in the South Peace Hockey League at CKNL Radio in his hometown of Fort St John, B.C. Stops at CKIQ Kelowna and CKNW Vancouver would follow, before Hughson made the move to Toronto in the early 1980s to call play-by-play for the Toronto Maple Leafs on CBC TV. Read more here.
Jason Botchford, the popular Vancouver hockey writer and contributor to TSN 1040 (CKST-AM) radio who passed away last month at age 48, will be remembered at a tribute event at Vancouver’s Commodore Ballroom on June 20. The event will be presented by The Athletic and hosted by TSN 1040’s Mike Halford and Jason Brough. All proceeds raised will go to the Botchford Family Fund. Details here.
The Western Association of Broadcasters Conference 85th annual conference gets underway at the historic Fairmont Banff Springs from June 5-6. This year’s keynote speakers are four-time Olympic champion Hayley Wickenheiser and Brad Wall, former Premier of Saskatchewan. Rounding out the conference lineup is featured speaker Paul Jacobs of Jacobs Media and Dr. Peter Popplewell with Canopy Growth Corporation, in addition to a town hall with Numeris and an industry update from Radio Connects. The event will conclude with the President’s Dinner and Awards Gala where Bob Ridley and Boyd Kozak will be inducted into the 2019 WAB Hall of Fame. Read more here.
SUPPLY LINES:
Not A Subscriber? – Subscribe Now – Free!
Broadcast Dialogue has been required reading in the Canadian broadcast media for 25 years. When you subscribe, you join a community of connected professionals from media and broadcast related sectors from across the country.
The Weekly Briefing from Broadcast Dialogue is delivered exclusively to subscribers by email every Thursday. It’s your link to critical industry news, timely people moves, and excellent career advancement opportunities.
Let’s get started right now.
