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Radio is all about connection. When listeners wake up and turn it on every day, they’re inviting a personality into their home, their car, their workplace and their life. There are no visual judgments to get in the way. It’s left to the listener’s imagination and to the personality’s voice. Listeners become familiar with that personality’s beliefs, family, life and attitudes and learn about the world through their words. The listener trusts him or her.
But radio is an ever-changing medium. On-air personalities come and go, station formats change and companies buy and sell call letters every day. But WYYY-FM 94.5 (Y94) morning host and program director Kathy Rowe, 52, has defied all the odds of the fluctuating business. She’s been on Y94 for 30 years steady and in radio even longer. She’s a voice, a personality and an icon who listeners have brought and continue to bring into their homes and lives every day. She’s not just a personality. To many, she’s a friend.
Although opportunities to head to bigger markets came Rowe’s way over the years, she’s always opted to stay near her hometown of Mattydale out of a love that is obvious when she speaks about the area. “I grew up here, my family’s here, most of my kids are here,” she lists. “I just really love being a part of the Central New York life and lifestyle. I think it’s cool that we’re able to give a voice to different events and organizations. It’s that fabric of the city thing. I really haven’t had any desire to go anyplace. I really like it here.”
And so, for more than 30 years she’s stayed local and made her way quickly through the radio ranks: from Onondaga Community College’s radio station, WOCC, to WOLF-AM 1490 to WAQX-FM 95.7 (95X) and in 1982 to WYYY, then 94 Rock with its album-oriented “rock of the 80s” format, but now Y94. She has emceed events and introduced bands, championed causes and organizations, interviewed countless celebrities, watched the entire medium shift from tape to digital, mothered three children and throughout it all has remained current with the trends, respected by her peers and loved by her audience.
As her husband, Syracuse Jazz Fest founder and producer Frank Malfitano, says, “She’s superwoman.”
Sound Salvation
Radio was a natural avenue for Rowe. From the time she was young, she was always fascinated by the medium and picked up on the personal connection it breeds. Her mother, Marie, listened to Phil Markert constantly on WHEN-AM 620, whom Rowe calls “the best there ever was” and a personality that influenced her in her most crucial growing years.
“I’ve spoken to her WOLF-AM 1490 sisters,” Malfitano says. “And they told me that when Kathy was a little kid she stood in front of the mirror with a hairbrush pretending it was a microphone. So she really loves radio and it shows. She’s a pro.”
She grew up in Mattydale and attended St. Margaret’s School for nine years before attending North Syracuse High School, where she was extremely active, participating in cheerleading, softball, basketball, tennis, soccer and student government. “My mom still lives in Mattydale in the house we grew up in,” Rowe says warmly. “That was just a great, small community to grow up in. It sounds corny and cliché, but you did really know your neighbors and everybody sort of looked out for one another, so I have a soft spot in my heart for Mattydale. We still go to the Hollywood Theatre where I went to see Willard in 1971. It’s ridiculous.”
Rowe went on to study radio and television at OCC and got her first airtime shift on the college’s station, WOCC, which was neither AM or FM, but available on a carrier current exclusively throughout the campus. (Today the station is all online.) She reflects fondly on her time on college radio where she could play and say anything she wanted. Her own show was music-based and featured numerous musical guests, but she also did news updates throughout the day for other shows.
“There were no rules back then,” she says with a smile. “It was not heavily formatted so we were free to experiment in any and all directions. And so, for five minutes it was amazing.”
After graduating from OCC in 1979 she didn’t waste any time pursuing her dream career, heading right to the Top 40 station WOLF, and was quickly hired by Ron Bee, then paired with Rick Gary for their popular morning-drive show. Although Rowe wanted to work in news initially, Bee immediately saw her potential as more of a radio personality. At the time, there were no on-air opportunities at the station, but Bee still wanted to have her on staff with the promise of getting Rowe on the air lined up for the future.
“She was wonderful,” he says from his current home in Arizona. “She just had an excellent on-air voice, personality and worked in very well. And it wasn’t long before she started working her way up. But shortly afterward she got a couple chances to work on-air as a deejay and then she moved fast. Once she hit, her career exploded.”
Rowe stayed at WOLF until 1981 when she made the switch to 95X and in September 1982, made yet another jump to what Rowe calls “the place to be” at the time, 94 Rock. In a mere four years, she had already landed at her ideal station, one that saw an impressive list of professionals pass through including three major names. Then-program director Howie Castle likewise had a previous WOLF stint; before that he was a part of Radio Caroline, a high-powered AM Top 40 pirate station that broadcast from a ship off the coast of England. Castle later worked in markets including Pittsburgh, Indianapolis, Denver, Seattle, Orlando, Fla., and San Diego. Michele Michaels went on to become a top radio personality in Pittsburgh at WDVE FM-102.5. And Tommy Nast has worked his way up radio, music and entertainment industry ladders for 30 years to become one of the most successful in the industry as a founder of Rock Band Entertainment among other ventures.
But within three months of Rowe’s landing at the station, the format switched from rock to light rock/adult contemporary, and rebranded as Y94. “But they kept me along for the ride, which I’m really happy about,” she says gratefully.
Joel Delmonico, Clear Channel regional marketing manager for Rochester, Syracuse and Binghamton, began just months after Rowe in 1982 and remembers the switch in January 1983 from 94 Rock to Y94 being a major and very positive change. “They had just started using radio research, so they were one of the first to really target demographics,” he explains. “So that station quickly became No. 1 in so many demographic groups. It was just a huge success and she’s been the face of the station since it started.”
Over the years the station has changed ownership numerous times and Rowe has worked shifts all around the clock. But with every change in personnel or time slot, she’s adjusted and kept relevant in the market, always coming through with strong ratings. In the most recent Arbitron rankings, Y94 landed in the top three with adults 25 to 54 (the most highly desired demographic for advertisers). Additionally, she’s served as a voice for women in the community, delivering insight from a female perspective in a male-dominated industry, although Rowe has never felt confined by gender.
“It’s just a vibe that I’ve never felt and I’m really being honest about that,” she says about being regarded differently because she’s a woman. “It’s a combination of things: luck and timing and talent and desire. So when all of those things are working, it just works out.”
Rowe remains grateful and mindful of the people who have influenced and shaped her over the years, a long list she can rattle off with a moment’s notice, but Bee and her radio production professor at OCC, Vincent Spadafora top the list. Likewise, they regard her as one of their greatest successes.
“She was an excellent student,” Spadafora says. “She had a great personality, hard worker, creative, excellent voice and production skills. I knew from the get-go she would make it.”
Today Rowe has made it as the perfect host for the Y94 morning show she presides over weekdays from 5 to 9 a.m. with co-host Shannon Thannhauser and producer/digital director Ronnie Miller. “Big” Jim Donovan does the news updates, Dave Eichorn is the show’s meteorologist, Kathy Denman reports traffic and a mix of new and old soft rock hits play with breaks that find the hosts talking about current events, both local and national, and what’s happening in the world of entertainment. Although many radio personalities are bound to voice-tracking (prerecording their shows), Rowe is all live during her favorite time slot.
“I love mornings because I love the immediacy of it,” she explains. “It’s very in-the-moment and there’s a lot of interaction. And I love that probably more than anything. Radio’s kind of the original social media in that it’s always been interactive, either through general conversation or contests or whatever it is, you have people call in and participate. That’s just exciting. You have special guests and celebrity interviews—just a lot of energy and activity and it’s awesome.”
Rowe’s personality reflects her natural knack for dealing with the relative morning chaos in a smooth manner. She’s got a calm cool about her and a sense of humor that Delmonico compares to that of Jon Stewart of The Daily Show or Stephen Colbert of The Colbert Report.
“It’s sophisticated,” he says. “She takes what’s going on in the world and twists it like she’s holding up a mirror and telling us, ‘Don’t get too serious.’ I can see the little smirk on her face. She’s got a great sense of humor and it keeps her contemporary. And she’s very hip! That’s an important part of her personality.”
Her cool ways also enable her to conduct successful celebrity interviews during which Rowe can maintain a respect for her guests without being star-struck. That balance has made for years of insightful talks with guests like Anthony Bourdain and Cyndi Lauper and surprising interviews with quieter guests like Michael McDonald and Daryl Hall.
“Both {McDonald and Hall} were painfully shy people,” she says. “It was really hard to bring anything out of them. Then others are really easy to talk to, over the top, edgy and make for really easy interviews and always have great stories to tell. But I find that most celebrities are humble beyond what people think or at least the image you might get from TMZ—always looking for that crazy, out-of-control angle, when most are just like regular people, like you and me, just going to work. They just happen to be musicians and we know them, but they don’t know us. It’s kinda crazy like that.”
Rowe has also used her power on the airwaves to support causes and organizations including the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) Syracuse Walk, Habitat for Humanity, the March of Dimes and the Carol M. Baldwin Breast Cancer Research Fund, which she calls her and the station’s “pet project.”
Delmonico recalls a specific fundraiser the Syracuse Clear Channel stations (Y94, WBBS-FM 104.7, WHEN-AM 620, WSYR-FM 106.9 and WWHT-FM 107.9) held two days after 9/11 in which they raised money to be split between the Red Cross and Salvation Army. Delmonico had predicted the stations would raise between $50,000 and $60,000. They tapped out closer to $750,000, more than any other Clear Channel cluster raised, including those in New York City. He attributes successes like that to the on-air personalities that carry the importance of the cause to the listener.
“She’s very genuine, unaffected,” he says. “She talks to you as if you’re sitting next to her or across the table over coffee. That’s what it feels like. That’s the magic of radio: making that connection and talking about what your listeners care about. It sounds so easy, but it’s a huge talent. You can pick music up anywhere, but it’s the personalities that surround it that mean something. It’s her insights, the way she connects.”
Love Under the Golden Arches
Rowe’s connection with her audience signals something deeper within her personality. In radio, the daily life of the voice often becomes a major part of the daily program. Events happening in the personality’s life or the lives of those close to her start to dominate the on-air conversations and reveal what matters most to that voice. For Rowe, common characters in her dialogue include her three children, Stephanie, 28; Michael, 25; and Scott, 24; and her husband, Malfitano, a faithful listener who tunes in every single day.
But others have become a part of that narrative as well. “People are really nice and kind and sometimes you get a little surprised or taken aback by how much they know you,” Rowe says. “Radio is just very personal. It’s hard to fake it, so most of the time what you say is who and what you are. So, there was a woman who, when I had my daughter Stephanie—she ended up naming her daughter Stephanie because she was a fan. And they’re a year apart, so every year on my daughter’s birthday when I make mention on the radio she gives me a call to remind me of her daughter. It’s just really sweet. Those kinds of things happen every once in a while. It’s very nice and humbling. I appreciate that very much.”
But humble as Rowe is, she’s also strong and confident, traits that come through on the radio and define her in day-to-day life and relationships. They are traits that others around her admire, including Malfitano.
When Rowe and Malfitano met in 1990, it was a purely professional relationship as Rowe was married and Malfitano was attached. Malfitano would come to the station to promote events at the Landmark Theatre where he was executive director, but after he left Syracuse for a time and then returned a few years later, both found themselves available and they went on a date, appropriately, to a jazz concert in Ithaca on April 4, 1998.
On the way, the pair stopped for gas and Malfitano recognized they were both hungry. Looking toward a McDonald’s he asked Rowe, “Ya want a burger?” The most unromantic of moments became one of the greatest because it proved to Rowe that Malfitano was being real.
“I thought that was really cool actually because usually on a first date, you’re putting your best foot forward maybe, a little bit of the faade or a show,” Rowe explains. “You go to the greatest restaurant, you say all the right things, you look your best and we were just hungry and needed food and went to McDonald’s. It was totally real. I kinda chuckled at that and thought, well, this guy’s pretty cool. I can do this. It worked out.”
Malfitano and Rowe married on April 4, 2003, the anniversary of their first date. Today, the relationship remains strong. They also work in industries that overlap and allow them to understand and admire each other’s life’s work. Malfitano, however, is unbeatably vocal in his amazement and in his desire for Rowe to be given the recognition she deserves.
“She’s cool, she’s respected, she’s a pro,” he says. “I could go on forever. I think this {recognition of a Syracuse New Times cover story} is overdue. But I think that happens to women in this community and in America all the time, especially if you’re unassuming. You don’t draw attention to yourself and fly under the radar and you’re professional and quietly effective. But I’m constantly surprised by her every day. She’s always reinventing herself. There’s consistency, but there’s always surprises. She’s always learning and doing things to remain contemporary and current in a medium that keeps changing meteorically. She’s as fresh today as she was 30 years ago. That’s what’s amazing. She’s the real celebrity in this duo. Everybody in town knows I married up. It’s true! I look up to her.”
It’s difficult to maintain any career for 30 solid years. It’s harder still to work for one company for the same amount of time. And it’s hardest yet to stay relevant in a position under attack by ratings and community opinion, to keep talking about what matters, knowing the audience, understanding the social climate and to keep connecting just the same as 30 years ago.
“Radio is all about the personal connection and no one does that better than her,” Delmonico says. “She lives the lifestyle, is
the target audience. She epitomizes Central New York. You’re most
successful when you can make that friend connection and she excels at
that.”
Kathy Rowe is the best there is! Truly one of a kind, Syracuse is lucky to have her! I miss working with her, and I miss her friendship. Kathy, congratulations on 3o years, and so glad you got this recognition!