Ode to… UK Christian radio

15 years after setting up a radio station aimed at Christians in and around
London, Premier Christian radio, The UK’s biggest Christian radio station
launches a national service through Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB)
To mark this historical day in the development of Christian media
in the UK here’s a look at how Christian media all started.

The first time i discovered Premier Christian Radio was probably around
2001 when I went on an evangelism mission around the East end of London.
It was all our friend in London listened to on his car stereo
as it crackled in and out on it’s MW frequency depending on how tall the office blog was that you were driving past at the time.. The great thing about Premier is they have always been one of the Christian media companies that are at the forefront of multi-platform media, because they have had so much
competition in the market and were only afforded a Medium Wave slot
they quickly made the most of the internet and started broadcasting
around the world. As the years passed they started utilising all possible
platforms including Satalite radio channels.

But, hold on! You have to go back over 10 years before the birth of Premier radio long before all this technology and DAB was concieved and the
Internet was in mass circulation and even before i was born, the foundations for Christian radio were being built. Here are two people I suggest were founding members of Christian radio in the UK. Tony Cummings (Cross Rhythms Music Editor), Chris Cole (Former CEO – Cross Rhythms Radio, Regional Director – God TV),

Chris Cole started the routes of Cross Rhythms radio in the mid 1980’s by presenting a Christian radio programme on Plymouth Sound. At this time the Communications act in Britain meant that the BBC and Commercial radio stations were legally required to provide religious broadcasting within their schedules, but there was no oppertunity for religious radio stations to exist in their own right.

Whilst all this was going on there was a man named Tony Cummings who had dropped out of school at the age of 16 with no qualifications, had set up his own black music fanzine until he became a Christian in 1980 and transferred his passion for the industry into the Christian sector. After a few years writing for Buzz magazine. In 1990 Tony launched Cross Rhythms magazine which was bought out by Chris Cole’s marketing company the following year. Also in 1991 Cross Rhythms took over the Umberleigh Rock Gospel Festival based down south which became a reputable summer festival for unsigned british Christian artists who had a ministry to nurture.
In 1998 Cross Rhythms went into partnership with United Christian Broadcasters (UCB), known for their hugely succesful daily devotional ‘The Word for Today’, to become a satalite baseed radio station

It’s 2002 in the Christian media timeline and personally I’ve started getting my own community radio gigs and i’m desperately trying to follow in the footsteps of these great media pioneers. In the Christian media scene Cross Rhythms are granted their own licence to broadcast as a Community radio station in Stoke-on-Trent and i go for a week’s work experience to get a feel for radio in 2004.

By now community radio is thriving and Christian radio is getting bigger and bigger year by year. Cross Rhthyms have a vision to see 10 community stations within the UK and build to toward that number by adding community radio stations in Plymouth, Teeside and Coventry to their network. Down in London Premier, who are still on the crackly medium wave that i discovered in 2001 succesfully bid for a DAB licence in the city. UCB lost out in the bid for a licence but have, in the last few years gained a number of local DAB licences around the north of England and expanded their output to a number of different niche stations at a cost of over £7 million per year.

The future of UK Christian radio.

The future looks good. For years Premier Christian radio have had a loyal audience and attracted big advertisers to support their work. They’ve raised the £650,000 needed to broadcast on DAB for a year and no doubt within the year they’ll pick up more followers who will also want to support the cause. But, that all depends on whether they can keep up the quality of programming and make it accesible to a wider UK audience. Early signs show that they are more creative, their music policy is broader and they are going to be a popular choice with Christians and non-Christians around the country.

Elsewhere around the country, Christian community radio stations still exist and are still being created although there is now a shift away from having ‘Christian radio stations’ to radio stations with a Christian ethos such as Alive Radio in Dumfries.

Personally, looking back to those Sunday Mornings hoping for something better, I feel that that has been acheived and there isn’t much more new as industry professionals that we can do. Maybe the aim now is to stop trying to saturate the market and getting one ahead of each other but support the people with the biggest influence whether it be Premier Radio’s national output or our local Christian community station.