As WAMU changes its music offerings, folkie Mary Cliff is gone from the airwaves

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Hat tip, DCRTV

As WAMU changes its music offerings, folkie Mary Cliff is gone from the airwaves

Local

By John Kelly Columnist February 4
@JohnKelly

Mary Cliff wasn’t the only WAMU-FM presenter who got the boot in last week’s purge — Chris Teskey, Echo Propp and Jen Hitt did, too — but she is certainly the most revered among Washington folk music fans. Mary had been hosting her radio show, “Traditions,” pretty much forever, starting at WETA in 1973 before moving to WAMU in 2007.

J.J. Yore, WAMU’s general manager, said that as he and his staff planned for the station’s future they decided to cut costs and focus the programming on its low-powered sister station 105.5 FM more on bluegrass, “a tradition that also has a very long-standing history in the Washington, D.C., area,” he said. “Unfortunately, it meant that Mary Cliff, along with a few other weekly shows, were eliminated. .?.?. We feel great that we were able to bring her to the public for a number of years, and we wish her well.”

[mike_c]

1. Mary Cliff's shows are one of my most outstanding memories of life in the DC area...

...along with WHFS. Good times.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

2. I have hours of WHFS on tape,

starting as open reel and then converted to cassette. I still own and listen to Walkmans and their clones, as recently as this morning on the commuter bus.