History
CHEZ was launched at 6pm on March 25, 1977 by CHEZ-FM Inc., a company owned and operated by Harvey Glatt and based at 126 York Street in the Market. Harvey Glatt owned Treble Clef music stores and was a concert promoter at the time.
The initial signal strength was 100,000 watts, and the first song was "Isn't She Lovely" by Stevie Wonder. The original morning show host was Mike O'Reilly, better known at the time as frontman in the rock group Bolt Upright and the Erections.
The station focused on the 18-34 year old demographic by playing English progressive rock music. CHEZ also ran children's programming, talk programming and even some French programming when it first launched on air. Shows like CHEZ Ottawa, The Source, Jazz 106, Medium Rare and In the City distinguished the station from others in the Ottawa market.
During the first few years on air, CHEZ-FM competed with AM station CFRA, then a pop leaning music station, and after less than 10 years on the air CHEZ attained the number one position in the Ottawa market with nearly 300,000 weekly listeners.
CHEZ had two sister stations, 101.1 FM CHEQ and 630 AM CJET, under the umbrella of Rideau Broadcasting, located in Smiths Falls.
From 1987 to 1993, CHEZ news director Ken Rockburn hosted the syndicated newsmagazine show Medium Rare from CHEZ's studios.
In 1994, CHEZ 106 shifted to classic rock, partly due to the competing CJSB moving its active rock format from AM to FM.
The station and its holdings (Rideau Broadcasting), Canada's last major independent radio station, was sold to Rogers Radio in 1999, joining CKBY (Y105) and CIWW (1310 News) in the Ottawa market. CHEZ quickly went on to hire their main competition, CKQB's morning show of Doc & Woody, in late 1999.
In 2000, Rogers Communications moved its operations out of the Market, and CHEZ-FM is currently located at 2001 Thurston Drive.
On December 10, 2007 after 10 years off the Ottawa radio airwaves, Darren Stevens returned to the weekdays 3pm - 7pm on CHEZ-FM. "The Real Darren Stevens Show" enjoyed a brief run, with his final show on Wednesday February 20, 2008. In a strange twist of fate, on March 29, 2008 Stevens returned 'home' to the rock station down the dial to CKQB-FM which is the location where he started his career during the 54 Rock AM period & the FM launch of 106.9 The Bear.
Like Winnipeg sister CITI-FM in 2012, CHEZ 106 adopted the World Class Rock slogan, but still remains classic rock.
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