Tag: carlisle

WDCV Live at Dusk Review

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WDCV’s plan for a live concert on the Dickinson campus finally came to fruition Saturday November 4th. Concert planners worked a majority of the semester to secure the musical acts of the night: Izzy Heltai, The Split Pistols, and The Skiffs. The Social Hall made for an exciting venue perfect for dancing to the upbeat pop rock of The Split Pistols and the wacky rock of the Skiffs. The opener of the night, Izzy, graced the audience with his alluring voice and mesmerizing acoustic guitar. A one-man band from Massachusetts, Izzy captivated the audience with his original music that centered around his unique, raw vocals and deep lyrical abilities. He ended with a new song, Anybody to Anybody, off of his upcoming new EP ‘Sweet Apathy.’ Izzy wowed the crowd with his heartwarming songs, and set the stage for the following acts. The Split Pistols, hailing from nearby Lebanon, immediately introduced themselves with their loud electricity, and pushed the audience to their feet. Playing mostly original songs, The Split Pistols turned the heads of students walking by in the HUB. The lead singer, Vaughn, repeatedly jumped off the stage to dance with the audience during solos. His ability to command an audience paired with his dancing resulted in an upbeat set that was a perfect segue into closing act, The Skiffs. Also hailing from Lebanon, The Skiffs showed their love for Ween by covering many of their songs, most notably Ocean Man. They continued to wow the crowd with their funny songs and dedicated musicians. The guitarist and singer both captivated listeners with their personalities, exemplified through guitar solos vocal range.

                                              

WDCV Live at Dusk was a success, and most audience members stayed for all three sets, leaving tired but satisfied from a night of dancing. If you’d you like to check out music from the three artists WDCV brought to campus, you can find their music below. Further, both Izzy Heltai and The Split Pistols will be releasing new music in early 2018!

 

Izzy Heltai http://www.izzyheltai.com/ and can be found on Spotify

 

The Split Pistols on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/thesplitpistols/ and Youtube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCP8UGfwMsi0j_d6YLmnWFQA

 

The Skiffs on Soundcloud https://soundcloud.com/theskiffspa/ciggy-song

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu 

WDCV’s Climate Consciousness

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Community Post: Interview with community DJ Ken Shultes   

Ken Shultes, a Dickinson alum and the man responsible for reaching Dickinson’s carbon neutral goal, brings his work with him to his radio show each week. Ken’s Sustainability Jam Hour focuses on current climate change issues, and emphasizes the actions we can perform to help our environment. He believes that music is a useful tool to explain these current events in a fun, interesting way.

Ken graduated Dickinson College in 1989, and has lived in the Carlisle area almost ever since. For 18 years, Ken managed facilities here at Dickinson, but in the past three years he has been the Associate Vice President for Sustainability and Facilities Management. He is in charge of directing the college to reach its 2020 goal of carbon neutrality, in which the college will reduce 25% of its emission due to heating and cooling buildings, along with other actions. This is a huge responsibility, and requires the action of every student, faculty, and staff member. Therefore, Ken uses his radio show as a means to remind people of their responsibility to our environment and Dickinson’s climate conscious pledge.

Climate change and global warming are heavy subjects, so Ken hopes to make it a fun and approachable conversation through his choice of music. Three years ago, when the Sustainability Jam Hour first started, Ken maintained a small list of songs that he thought connected to sustainability, climate change, and nature. But as time went on, he found a multitude of songs that reflected what he believes in. By now, he can argue for almost any song’s connection to sustainability; it’s quite impressive. Although each song relates to climate change in some way, genres differ immensely throughout Ken’s show. His show features a little bit of everything, like classic rock, alternative, show tunes, kid’s music, and indie pop, although he admits he has not been convinced enough to play much heavy metal. Ken has three children who inspire his music tastes and open his mind to songs he previously did not consider seriously. After playing a couple songs, Ken spends a few minutes talking and reflecting upon what he believes these songs connect to, whether that be a certain action we should all be taking, such as turning off lights when we’re not using them, or current events that will affect our ability to properly reduce our impact upon the earth. Ken sprinkles in important, educational facts along with his music, creating a fun show that has an crucial purpose and a strong effect on its listeners.

Ken is appreciative of his time here at WDCV, as it is a creative release in the middle of his work day. He finds the Sustainability Jam Hour to challenge his ability to talk about climate change in a fun way, to make it an approachable subject for his listeners. He welcomes music as a tool to further this conversation. These days, any song he hears automatically tests him to find a connection to climate change, and he hopes his listeners can develop an ear for sustainability as well!

 

 

Listen to Ken’s show, Sustainability Jam Hour, on Mondays from 10 am to 11 am, and learn how you can reduce your impact upon the earth!

 

 

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

Finding a Voice at WDCV

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Community Post: Interview with community DJ Greg Bear     

Throughout our discussion of Greg Bear’s WDCV show, the word “freedom” came up quite often, as Greg finds that it perfectly describes his experience with the station over the past two and half years. He and his wife and daughter moved to the Carlisle area from Philadelphia over ten years ago, and though he still misses the bustle of the city, his radio show here at WDCV, entitled Alloy: A Mixture of Jazz and Progressive Music, has become one of his favorite endeavors unique to Carlisle.

When he is not hosting Alloy, Greg is a graphic and web designer, and he finds that his day job and his radio show both provide different yet deep creative fulfillment. The show’s name encompasses Greg’s love for jazz and his growing appreciation for more experimental kinds of music that don’t traditionally fall in the jazz genre. As a result, Alloy features a wide range of music, from current releases to perennial classics. After finding the initial song that sparks his inspiration for a playlist, Greg carefully curates the rest of the show around this song’s theme, which differs each week. This theme could be a word or a phrase, and after the show, Greg puts out a newsletter describing the through-line of how the songs connect to one another, while directing listeners to Alloy’s website where he posts all of the music from each show. Occasionally, Greg will also release podcasts featuring conversations with artists whose music he has featured on the show. These podcast conversations provide Greg, and his listeners, insight into each artist’s creative process.

                                       

Each week Alloy offers a diverse mix of music and sounds. After almost three years at WDCV, Greg thinks he has gradually come closer to finding and articulating his tastes and his voice, though he admits he is still searching. One artist regularly featured on Alloy is guitarist Bill Frisell, whose music has expanded Greg’s understanding and appreciation of jazz and experimental music, as well as the limitless potential of the guitar as a solo and collaborative instrument. Daniel Lanois and Brian Eno are also popular name the resurface in his shows, though Greg notes that his playlists are driven more by music that resonates with him than specific artists. His music tastes have changed drastically over the years due to the opportunity WDCV has given him to search out new artists and discover genres he wouldn’t have originally sought out. Greg views this special platform to share music as one of the best parts of college radio and one of the best aspects of his experience with Alloy. The show has allowed him to explore all dimensions of the music world and discover new ways of interfacing with his favorite genres while highlighting new music and providing him a bit of freedom in each week’s playlist.

 

Listen to Greg’s show Alloy, Tuesdays from 9 am to 11 am.

 

Check out his website at http://www.alloypm.com/

 

 

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

Bluegrass on the Grass Review

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Bluegrass on the Grass, a Carlisle summer tradition, took the Dickinson College Academic Quad by storm on Saturday, July 8th. Lasting 8 hours, the festival hosted five different bluegrass bands, hailing from Tennessee to West Virginia. Families, students, and devoted bluegrass fans from Carlisle and beyond alike showed up and gave their support for a festival that has been around for more than 20 years now. Festival-goers arrived as early as 8 am to claim the best spots on the Academic Quad, in the shade of course, and camped out there throughout the whole festival, proving just how loved this festival is! Children danced along to the quick fiddles, families enjoyed the crooning of their favorite bluegrass singers, hungry listeners appreciated the local food vendors, and Bluegrass on the Grass volunteers savored the support they felt from the festival lovers.

This tradition started many years ago by the infamous Davis Tracy. A retired Dickinson Counselor and faculty advisor for WDCV FM, Davis Tracy and other local bluegrass lovers hosted bluegrass concerts on Tracy’s farm back in the 90s. They wished to expand their barnyard concerts, invite other bluegrass musicians and listeners, and create a festival out of their love for bluegrass, and in 1996 Tracy and others created a reality out of this dream. Tracy and his band took the stage on the Dickinson campus for the first time in front of about 200 people, and since then the festival has grown to nearly 4,000 attendees and a multitude of bluegrass bands who have received high regard in the bluegrass world. There is no doubt that every summer, the town of Carlisle gleefully awaits this music festival.

                                            

The bands featured this year included some familiar faces, such as the Dismembered Tennesseans, but also comprised of new sounds, most notably from Mile Twelve, a relatively new band with a young, fiery sound. An astounding fiddler, Michael Cleveland, along with his band Flamekeeper, joined the line-up this year as well, and left the crowd in pure amazement of his incredible skill and musical ear. The music lasted from noon until 8 pm, interspersed with raffle contests, in which Bluegrass on the Grass merchandise and other impressive prizes were given to upwards of one hundred winners. Dennis Gotthard, a local vinyl collector, sold a multitude of vinyl to festival-goers, and impressed the crowd with his boxes and boxes of bluegrass vinyl for the true bluegrass fans. Bluegrass on the Grass was an immense success this year, attracting new faces both on stage and in the crowd. It was a lovely day filled with great music, and no doubt the town of Carlisle excitedly looks forward to next year’s event!

                        

For more information about this event, check out http://blogs.dickinson.edu/bluegrass/

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

WDCV’s Hidden Celebrity

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Community Post: Interview with DJ Bob Zieff
Bob Zieff is the kind of person who actually has articles written about him in books, newspapers, and Google searches. There’s even a song written about him, called “Who the Hell is Bob Zieff?” He is a big star in the music world, and he DJ’s here at WDCV every week. He leads an intriguing life, guided by his love for music, specifically jazz and classical music, specifically of the 20th century, of which he has loved since the age of twelve. Outside of WDCV, Bob is a jazz composer. He studied music at Boston University and spent many years composing for jazz musicians of all kinds. Bob has connections to many famous jazz artists, including Chet Baker and Richard Twardzik, whom he mentored. Bob’s following reaches more than just neighboring states; people from Japan, Sweden, Germany, Norway, and many more know Bob Zieff as one of their favorite jazz composers. A CD of his was recently released, a compilation of musicians performing some of his best creations. Bob is very modest about his fame though, and when asked what he likes to do other than DJ, rather than focusing on his own musical creations, Bob laughed about the jazz book that he’s been writing for decades now.

It’s amazing that someone as profound and inspiring as Bob has been a member of WDCV for almost twelve years now. In Bob’s show, Jazz Pathways, he hopes that his music choices will help others learn more about jazz. During his two hours at WDCV each week, he does not care about what’s deemed as popular, because as Bob says, “if you want to know what’s bad, listen to what’s popular.” Rather, Bob is interested in the complex, colorful nature of the jazz that is great to listen to because of the skill of musician and composer alike, not just because of the aesthetic it creates. Bob enjoys playing music that represents something:a musical progression, a harmonic riff, a compositional puzzle. 

 

By doing this, he introduces a lot of jazz artists who are not very popular in the jazz world.He wants to paint jazz as approachable to all listeners, which is why he is so perfect for WDCV. Artists include Lester Young, CharlieParker, Duke Ellington, and Benny Goodman among others. By listening to Bob’s show, he wishes that all listeners can learn just a little bit about what he has dedicated much of his life to.

Listen to Bob’s show, Jazz Pathways, on Sundays from 12pm to 2pm for a lesson on jazz!   

Click here to listen to the Enrique Heredia Quartet play the music of Bob Zieff!

Click here to purchase Bob’s latest publication from Fresh Sound Records!

 

 

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

Digging with DJ Joe George

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Community Post: Interview with Community DJ Joe George

Joe George’s music taste is as eclectic as his DJing experiences. Joe’s WDCV radio show Dig! features Alternative Rock, Industrial, Punk, R&B, Hip-Hop, Jazz, and more. He prefers not to define his tastes other than describing it as “just good music.” The show’s name reflects his concept of digging through the multitudes of new music produced every day. A large part of Joe’s weekly show focuses on new these new releases, but he notes that artists from his youth, such as The Beatles, Roxy Music, and David Bowie have shaped and influenced how he hears newer music today.

Joe is a Dickinson alum, class of 1989, and was involved with WDCV all four years as a DJ, Music Director, and Program Director. His experiences in college bolstered his love for music, and gave him the perfect opportunity to share his eclectic tastes with anyone listening, both on and off campus. He also worked as a DJ in local nightclubs until 2013.

Outside of WDCV, Joe has been in retail banking for 17 years.  He and his wife also write a bi-weekly art column for The Sentinel newspaper, in which they explore the fruitful art scene within and around central Pennsylvania.

                                           

Joe continues to DJ professionally for special events, including receptions, fund raisers, parties, and even Dickinson class reunions. Joe prides himself as being very good at judging the atmosphere of the event, and can pick music that will entertain any crowd. Different venues demand certain sounds, specific artists, and genres; Joe enjoys creating “soundscapes” that please his customers and make the event memorable.

When it comes to his Tuesday morning WDCV show, Joe shares music he finds to be exhilarating and thoughtful. Therefore, Joe’s two hour show on WDCV is a creative release for him, in which he combines new and old tracks. And while he has spent the prior week carefully curating his program he still mixes live on the air. He believes college radio is something special, a unique kind of sharing platform in which every listener walks away with a slightly, if not completely, changed perception of music. To Joe college radio is a place to explore. During his WDCV show, Joe hopes to make his listeners feel something, whether that be satisfaction or confusion.

He enjoys when listeners call in to talk about his music tastes and playlist choices, and finds real satisfaction from sharing his love of music with all WDCV listeners.

 

 

Listen to Joe George’s Dig! on Tuesdays, 6am to 8am, and be sure call in to let him know what you think!

 

 

 

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

The Blues According to Danny

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    Community Post: Interview with Community DJ Danny Dicker

Danny may posses a quiet personality, but he speaks through the music he plays here at WDCV. Danny does his research on his music, knows the many covers of his most favorite songs, and could tell you the background story of most blues songs and their singers. His show name, The Crossroads, echoes a Robert Johnson song with the same name. The blues artist inspired not only Danny’s show name, but also his love for blues and rock. During his one hour show, Danny plays both old and new songs that have charmed him with their unique sound. He attempts to create a diverse collection for his listeners by connecting some jazz songs to his favorite blues artists and using music to talk about the                                                                                   unique time period in which we live today.

Danny has only been a DJ for two years, but has already found a home here at WDCV. He moved to Carlisle about seven years ago with his father, and works in the Dickinson catering business throughout the day. He enjoys seeing live music, though he admits it’s been hard to support that passion as he gets older and must work more. To make up for this, Danny plays his own favorite music with his guitar. During the past four years, his talent has grown by playing great blues and rock songs, most commonly by The Black Keys, one of his favorite bands. He could talk forever about this band, their differing sounds throughout their albums, their seemingly soon-to-be break up, and that one chance he almost had to see them live. It is his love for this band and others alike that bring out his true personality, one wrapped tightly around bluesy guitar riffs and a steady rhythm.

                             

His favorite artists range from Mac DeMarco to BB King, from The Beatles to Isaac Hayes. Danny’s favorite backstory of a blues song is the history of Blind Willie Johnson’s “Dark Was the Night, Cold Was the Ground.” A mixtape containing this song was shot into space for other life forms to find, as a representation of what our music sounds like, to convey human emotion.  Danny explained how this song was chosen to express the feeling of loneliness, and it only makes sense that it should be floating in space by itself until other life forms eventually find it. These backstories that Danny discovers bolster his love for music. They are unique, and present a special imagination to each song that he cannot find in any other genre. It only makes sense that Danny is so excited each week when he arrives at the WDCV station for his show, because it gives him chance to share this beautiful genre with all of his listeners.

 

 

Tune in to Danny’s show, The Crossroads, Thursdays from 10pm to 11pm, to hear a taste of the blues!

 

 

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

Love For Sinatra

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Community Post: Interview with Community DJ Deeg Shank

Dolores “Deeg” Shank is the perfect example of a music lover who is committed to the appreciation and exploration of what she loves most. She grew up outside of Philly and at a young age of 12, she discovered Frank Sinatra on a John Denver TV special. Once she witnessed Frank’s charisma and smile, and heard his stylish sing, she was taken. Flash forward to sophomore year of high school, when Deeg would listen to her favorite radio station constantly, which sponsored a four hour show dedicated solely to the lovely creations of Mr. Sinatra. This radio show inspired Deeg to create her own Sinatra show when she arrived at Dickinson College as a freshman.

She loved being a WDCV DJ throughout her time as a student, and missed the opportunity to be on air once she graduated and moved on. But after twenty-three years without WDCV in her life, Deeg returned, and of course continued her Spotlight on Sinatra show, just like she had done as a student. Deeg taught high school for many years, but has now retired from that and taken on dancing. Deeg’s spare time is filled with ballroom dancing, belly dancing, swimming, cooking at the local pool as well as substitute teaching at Big Spring High School during the school year. It is through activities like this that Deeg is introduced to much of the music she listens to outside of Frank. She is very open to ballroom music and Top 40, and in fact recently attended a Justin Bieber concert that was mostly enjoyable. Over the years she has also seen a variety of other artists, including John Denver, James Taylor, Jimmy Buffet, Bruce Springsteen, Michael Buble, and The Rolling Stones, while she laments never having seen Michael Jackson and George Michael.

                                  

Her love for Frank has taken Deeg on quite a journey throughout her life. She saw him in concert 12 times throughout his life, one of which he gave her a kiss on the cheek. Additionally, Deeg has met two of Frank’s children, been to his favorite restaurant in New York City multiple times, and has become well known in the Frank Sinatra community due to her full back tattoo devoted purely to Frank. Deeg receives compliments on this creation from those who both love Frank and just barely know about him. She decided to get this tattoo as an homage to Frank, the one artist who has inspired her throughout her whole life. Deeg’s love for Frank stems from his originality and musical expression throughout his years as a famous singer. She admires the way in which he lived his life completely by his own standards, and no one else’s. In Deeg’s opinion, he is a great man, who deserves the recognition she hopes to bring him through her show.

Deeg only plays songs by Frank Sinatra, but she loves playing covers of his songs to spice up her show and bring new voices to her listeners. Her favorite albums by Frank include “Nice and Easy,” an album filled with slow ballads, “Trilogy,” recorded in 1979 when Frank was 63 years old, and a couple Bossa Nova albums created back when Frank collaborated with Antonio Carlos Jobim. Deeg has been sending Frank Sinatra’s music into the air waves for years now, and finds joy in the fact that someone, somewhere will hear his music and smile. This has been proven to her when a listener called in one evening to thank Deeg for playing such great music while they were stuck on the side of the road with a flat tire. Because of Deeg’s radio show, that experience wasn’t as awful as expected. Moments like those prove to Deeg that her music, her love for Frank, and her dedication to WDCV are a positive force in this world. 

 

Listen to Deeg’s show, , from , for an insight into Frank Sinatra’s best creations.  

Listen to Deeg’s show, Spotlight on Sinatra, Mondays from 6pm to 8pm, for an insight into Frank Sinatra’s best creations.  

 

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

If All Music Is Sound, Is All Sound Music?

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Community Post: Interview with Tom Wilkins

Tom Wilkins has been a WDCV DJ for the past 5 years. He moved to Carlisle when he married his wife, about 28 years now. He has spent the past 15 years teaching high school with a focus on special needs education, though Tom seems adamant about retiring soon. Tom sought interest in WDCV when his daughter went off to college and joined her college’s radio station, which inspired him to follow in her footsteps. He reached out to WDCV and has been spinning albums ever since.

Initially, he chose a specific theme for each week, picking from all different styles of music. After a couple years, Tom found this extremely restrictive and felt the limits of his weekly themes when, one day, a listener called him during his radio show. The caller asked why he chose to play such mainstream music when WDCV’s mission is to play underrepresented artists. Although this caller possessed a rude attitude, his question shook Tom in multiple ways. Why did he feel the need to play music he knew people could easily listen to, when what he really wanted to play was music that intrigued and challenged him?

From that moment on, Tom began playing untraditional music. “Experimental, weird music,” as Tom put it. Some names are more recognizable, like Brian Eno, one of Tom’s favorite artists, but others are more strange to the common listener. The songs and artists he plays are typically more recent, though this genre of music has been around for a very long time. Tom describes his taste in music as “familiar enough to engage you, but unfamiliar enough to challenge you.” He wants to share the music that makes him think, the music that requires active focus rather than passive listening. He questions, “if all music is sound, is all sound music?” To Tom, all sound can be music if you open your mind to it. He spends a lot of time searching for more music to share with his listeners each week, either by reading magazines or listening to shows similar to his own, which allows him to connect with others who share his taste in music. This show is important to Tom musically, and he hopes that through listening in on his radio show, others too can learn to appreciate music that is abnormal and untraditional, yet challenging and intriguing.

                  

Listen in on Tom’s show, String Theory, on Tuesdays from 8pm to 10pm to hear Tom’s favorites! 

 

If you have any questions, email Julia Ormond at ormondj@dickinson.edu. Thanks for reading!

New Show: “Crossing Paths”

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WDCV presents a new radio show, “Crossing Paths”, Wednesdays from 3:00- 3:30!

 

Mollie Montague, a sophomore at Dickinson College, has presented WDCV with a new show that focuses on Carlisle community members. Last year, when Mollie was a freshman, she realized she spent her whole first year focused on school and the Dickinson community, that she completely missed out on the wonderful community and residents of Carlisle. She decided to take part of the “Heart and Soul” project conducted in Carlisle last year, which opened her eyes to the wonderful lives of Carlisle residents. This inspired Mollie to create a radio talk show where she conducts interviews with Carlisle residents in order to truly connect herself with those who love Carlisle as much as she does, and to connect Carlisle with Dickinson College. We all have busy lives, but Mollie believes that just by listening to these interviews, we can all better understand the community we live in and those who live with us.

Mollie intends to bridge the gap between Carlisle and Dickinson, one interview at a time. Her show, “Crossing Paths,” airs Wednesdays from 3:00 to 3:30. She hopes that everyone can lend an ear to create a more thoughtful relationship between Dickinson and the beautiful town we all live in.

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