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| Broadcast area |
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| Frequency | 650kHz |
| Branding | WSM Radio |
| Programming | |
| Format | Country music;Americana;bluegrass music |
| Affiliations | |
| Ownership | |
| Owner |
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| History | |
First air date | October 5, 1925 (100 years ago) (1925-10-05)[1] |
Former frequencies | |
Call sign meaning | "We Shield Millions" (slogan of former owner,National Life & Accident Insurance Company) |
| Technical information[3] | |
Licensing authority | FCC |
| Facility ID | 74066 |
| Class | A |
| Power | 50,000 watts unlimited |
Transmitter coordinates | 35°59′50.2″N86°47′32″W / 35.997278°N 86.79222°W /35.997278; -86.79222 |
| Links | |
Public license information | |
| Webcast |
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| Website | wsmradio |
WSM (650kHz) is a commercialAM radio station, located inNashville, Tennessee. It broadcasts acountry music format (withclassic country andAmericana leanings, the latter of which is branded as "Route 650") and is known as the home of theGrand Ole Opry, the world's longest running radio program.[4] The station is owned byRyman Hospitality Properties, Inc.[5] After nearly 40 years broadcasting from a studio within theGaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center, WSM moved to a showcase studio inside the former home ofRoy Acuff, just outside the Grand Ole Opry House, in July 2024.
Nicknamed "The Air Castle of the South", the station broadcasts with 50,000 watts around the clock from a facility inBrentwood, Tennessee. It has one of the largest daytime coverage areas in the country, providing at least grade B coverage as far southeast asChattanooga, as far northwest asEvansville, Indiana, as far west asJackson, Tennessee and as far south asHuntsville, Alabama. At night, WSM'sclear channel signal reaches much of North America and nearby countries.
WSM reaches a worldwide audience via its Internet simulcast. It is the National Primary Entry Point (PEP) for theEmergency Alert System (EAS) in Middle Tennessee and the southwestern portion ofIndiana.
Bill Cody has been the host of the station's morning show,Coffee, Country and Cody since 1998, and has been in radio since 1975.[6] Since its establishment on January 1, 2020, the country music oriented TV networkCircle simulcastCoffee, Country, and Cody, following a period of several years where theHeartland network.[7] Cody'sPure American Country syndicated show is flagshipped at WSM.Larry Gatlin, lead singer of the Gatlin Brothers, hosts an hourlong gospel program on the weekends as of 2016.Tracy Lawrence's syndicated programHonky Tonkin' has been flagshipped at WSM since 2015.[8]Dailey & Vincent host a monthly radio show on the station.Chris Scruggs, grandson ofEarl Scruggs, hosts a weekly showFriends and Neighbors with his house band, the Stone Fox Five, after most Friday Night Opry episodes.Mandy Barnett hosts aNashville Songbook series for one hour each Monday evening.Charlie Worsham hosts theAir Castle Community Hour, mainly featuring artists in the Nashville music scene. Jason Coleman hosts a Sunday night piano music show in honor of his grandfather, longtime Nashville keyboardistFloyd Cramer.[9]
The station broadcasts theGrand Ole Opry on Saturday nights.[10] Following theOpry on most Saturday nights is theMidnite Jamboree, anaftershow that was originally founded byErnest Tubb in 1947 and continues to be sponsored by Tubb'seponymous record shop.[11] Following theJamboree is the regionally syndicatedSutton Ole Time Music Hour.[12]
Syndicated programming on WSM as of 2024 includes reruns ofBob Kingsley-eraAmerican Country Countdown,Into the Blue,TheCrook & Chase Countdown andY'all Access with Kelly Sutton.[9]
In 2017, WSM launched "Route 650", a full-timeAmericana music streaming station available via its website, mobile app and services likeTuneIn.[13]
In 2018, WSM launched "Opry Nashville Radio", a full-time streaming station billed as being "based on the Grand Ole Opry and Nashville lifestyle" and focusing mainly on contemporary country music. During December, this channel flips to allChristmas music.
As recently as 2020, the station was live and locally operated during the overnight hours, but the overnight host position was eliminated in February 2020.[14]
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Founded by theNational Life and Accident Insurance Company[16] as a platform to sell the company's insurance products, WSM first signed on October 5, 1925.[1][17] The call letters were derived from the company's motto, "We Shield Millions".[18] Studios were first located in the company's building on Seventh Avenue and Union Street in downtown Nashville; this was the original home of theOpry, until 1934.
WSM is associated with the popularization of country music through its weekly Saturday night program, theGrand Ole Opry, the longest-running radio program in history. TheOpry began as theWSM Barn Dance on November 28, 1925, withUncle Jimmy Thompson as the first performer.[19]George D. Hay, a newspaper reporter from Memphis, was WSM's first program director.[20] On December 10, 1927, Hay is quoted as saying "For the past hour we have been listening to music largely from Grand Opera, but from now on we will present 'The Grand Ole Opry'",[20] contrasting the preceding program on theNBC Red Network with WSM's local broadcast.[21]
The station traditionally played country music in the nighttime hours, when listeners from around the United States would tune in.[17] During daytime hours, the station broadcastlong-form radio, including both local and NBC network programs, in addition to music.[17] WSM is credited with helping shape Nashville into a recording industry capital. Because of WSM's wide reach, musical acts from all across the eastern United States came to Nashville in the early decades of the station's existence, in hopes of getting to perform on WSM.[citation needed] Over time, as more acts and recording companies came to Nashville, the city became known as the center of the country music industry. Disc jockey David Cobb is credited with first referring to Nashville as "Music City USA", a designation that has since been adopted as the city's official nickname by the local tourism board.
On November 11, 1928, theFederal Radio Commission implementedGeneral Order 40, which assigned WSM to a frequency of 650 kHz, as Tennessee's sole "clear channel" allocation.[17][22] In 1932, the station boosted its power to 50,000 watts.[2] On September 30, 1950, WSM added a television sister station on channel 4, operating as a primary NBC affiliate; WSM-TV was Nashville's first TV station.[23]
The studios remained in its original location until the mid-1960s, when the company built a newheadquarters building downtown and new studios for WSM-TV on Knob Road in west Nashville (the TV station had been located nearBelmont College). Upon completion of the new headquarters, National Life and Accident Insurance Company chose to relocate WSM radio to their new TV studios, and WSM radio, joined in 1968 by its new FM sister, broadcast from that location from 1966 to 1983. For most of its history, WSM, along with WSM-TV and theGrand Ole Opry, was owned by the Nashville-basedNational Life and Accident Insurance Company. In 1974, National Life and Accident Insurance Company reorganized itself as a holding company, NLT Corporation, with the WSM stations as one of the major subsidiaries.
After television became popular (thus largely eliminating the audience for full-length radio programs), WSM adopted amiddle of the road (MOR) music format during the daytime hours, and continued to play country music at night. It was not until 1980 that WSM adopted the 24-hour country music format of today.[17]
Country and bluegrass legendJohn Hartford parodied the distinctive style of WSM DJs on the 1971 albumAereo-Plain, humorously changing the station's call letters to the phrase "Dorothy S. Ma'am".
In 1981, the American General Corporation (now part of theAmerican International Group) bought NLT. At one time, American General was the parent company of the Life and Casualty Insurance Company based in Nashville, former owner of WSM-TV rival WLAC-TV (nowWTVF), and WLAC-AM-FM, but divested the broadcast properties in 1975, long before the NLT merger. American General was not interested in NLT's non-insurance operations, and sold WSM, Inc. (which includedOpryland Hotel,Opryland USA,Ryman Auditorium, TheGrand Ole Opry, the fledglingThe Nashville Network cable television outlet, WSM-FM, and WSM) toGaylord Broadcasting Company. WSM-TV, due to FCC ownership limits at the time, was sold instead to Gillett Broadcasting and changed its callsign toWSMV-TV. However, there was still considerable overlap between the stations' on-air personnel for some years after the ownership change. Gaylord would also move the WSM radio stations to new facilities at the Opryland Hotel, departing their shared building on Knob Road, which still houses WSMV today.
WSM broadcast in the C-QUAM format ofAM stereo, which could be heard over several states at night, from 1982 until 2000.
In 1996, the station was named Radio Station of the Year at theInternational Bluegrass Music Awards.[24]
In 2001, management had sought to capitalize on the success of sister stationWWTN's sports trappings by converting WSM to an all-sports format. Word was leaked to other media resulting in protests, including longtime Opry personalities and country music singers, outside the station's studios. Management eventually made the decision to keep the station's classic country format.
In 2003, WSM-FM and WWTN, sister stations to WSM, were sold to Cumulus Media. Cumulus intended to purchase WSM as well, but Gaylord decided to maintain ownership at the eleventh hour. Through a five-year joint sales agreement, however, Gaylord paid Cumulus a fee to operate WSM's sales department and provide news updates for the station. Gaylord Entertainment continued to control WSM and operate all other departments, including programming, engineering, and promotions. The agreement ended in 2008, at which point all control of the station reverted to Gaylord. In 2012, Gaylord Entertainment Company was renamed Ryman Hospitality Properties. Ryman sold minority stakes in the Opry businesses toNBCUniversal and Atairos in April 2022, but spun WSM's license off into a subsidiary that remained separate from that transaction and wholly owned by Ryman.[5]
From 2002 until 2006, the station was a choice onSirius Satellite Radio, which carried a full-time simulcast of WSM's signal, except duringNASCAR races. Briefly in 2006, the channel converted to "WSM Entertainment", a separate satellite radio feed that carried the same classic country music format as the AM signal. About a year after the channel was eliminated, then-rivalXM Satellite Radio announced the carriage of theGrand Ole Opry onNashville! channel 11 beginning in October 2007, as well as theEddie Stubbs Show onAmerica channel 10 beginning in November 2007. After the merger between Sirius and XM, the Grand Ole Opry broadcasts were moved to the service'sThe Roadhouse channel, which is heard on both Sirius and XM.
Following the devastating2010 Tennessee flood that inundated Gaylord Opryland and the Grand Ole Opry House, the station broadcast from a makeshift studio at its transmitter site for six months, while theGrand Ole Opry rotated between several performance sites, until the buildings at the Opryland complex were repaired.[25] WSM's administrative offices next door to the Grand Ole Opry House were completely destroyed by the flood, resulting in the loss of several priceless documents from the station's history, and later demolished.
In 2024, WSM vacated its longstanding studio inside the Magnolia Lobby ofGaylord Opryland Resort & Convention Center, and began a transition to a new showcase studio inside the home originally built forRoy Acuff on the grounds of the Grand Ole Opry House.
WSM's unusual diamond-shaped transmittingantenna (manufactured byBlaw-Knox) is visible fromInterstate 65 just south of Nashville (inBrentwood) and is one of the area's landmarks. It is located near the I-65 exit 71 interchange with Concord Road (State Highway 253). When the tower was built in 1932, it was 878 feet (267.6m) tall and was the tallest antenna in North America. Its height was reduced to 808 feet (246 m) in 1939 when it was discovered that the taller tower was causing self-cancellation in the "fringe" areas of reception of the station (it is now known that 195 electrical degrees, about 810 feet, is the optimum height for a Class A station on that frequency). For a period duringWorld War II it was designated to provide transmissions to submarines in the event that ship-to-shore communications were lost. It is now one of the oldest operating broadcast towers in the United States.[26]
As a tribute to the station's centrality in country music history, the diamond antenna design was incorporated into the newCountry Music Hall of Fame and Museum's design in 2001.[27] The tower was listed in theNational Register of Historic Places on March 15, 2011.[26][28]
In 1939, WSM began operating an experimental high-frequency, high-fidelity AM"Apex" station,W4XA, on 26.15 MHz.[31] This was replaced in 1941 by a commercial FM station, initially with the call signW47NV and operating on 44.7 MHz. This was reported to be first commercial FM to be fully licensed; although a few FM stations had begun broadcasting earlier, they were operating under experimental or "Special Temporary Authorizations" and had not yet been granted operating licenses.[32][33] In 1943 the call sign was changed to WSM-FM, however the station was shut down in 1951, although its antenna is still mounted atop the Blaw Knox tower at Brentwood.
Seventeen years later the current incarnation ofWSM-FM was established after a National Life subsidiary purchased WLWM and renamed it WSM-FM in 1968. This WSM-FM (95.5 MHz) was WSM's sister until 2008, whenCumulus Media, the full owner of WSM-FM since 2003, ended its joint sales agreement with the AM station. Despite having the same base call sign, the two stations are no longer related; incidentally, both the current WSM-FM on 95.5 MHz and the current occupant of the 103.3 frequency vacated by the original WSM-FM,WKDF, are now sister stations, with each separately broadcasting a country music format.
Television channel 4 (originally WSM-TV, and nowWSMV-TV), was started by WSM, Inc. in 1950 and sold toGeorge N. Gillett Jr. in 1981.
Coffee, Country and Cody - Bill Cody, Kelly Sutton and Charlie Mattos
WSM at Work: Mike Terry
On Air with Eryn: Eryn Cooper
WSM at Night: David Reed
Late Nights with Lexi: Lexi Carter
Opry Star Spotlight: Zack Bennett
