WRCH (FM)


WRCH is a commercial FM radio station licensed to New Britain, Connecticut and serving Greater Hartford. It is owned by Entercom and airs an adult contemporary radio format. In the evening and overnight it carries the syndicated Delilah program from Premiere Networks. On Saturday mornings, Your Weekend with Jim Brickman is heard and on Sunday mornings, Smooth Jazz Brunch airs.
WRCH's transmitter is located on Rattlesnake Mountain atop the WTIC-TV tower, off U.S. Route 6 in Farmington. A backup transmitter is in "Radio Park" behind the Connecticut School of Broadcasting, its former studio location. The studios and offices are located on Executive Drive, also in Farmington. WRCH broadcasts in the HD Radio hybrid format. It offers smooth jazz programming on its HD2 sub-channel. The HD3 sub-channel carries a simulcast of sports talk-formatted WEEI-FM in Boston.

History

On July 1, 1968, WRCH-FM signed on the air. It was the FM counterpart of WRCH-AM. Both were owned by Central Connecticut Broadcasting. While the AM station aired a full service, middle of the road format, WRCH-FM carried a beautiful music format. It played quarter hour sweeps of mostly instrumental cover versions of pop songs and Broadway showtunes. Easy listening was a popular format in that era, with several stations in the Hartford area also playing beautiful music, including WKSS, WWYZ, WKCI and WTIC-FM. Over time, as those stations switched to other formats, WRCH continued its easy listening format.
In 1977, WRCH and its AM sister station WRCQ, were acquired by the Radio Corporation of Hartford. In the 1980s, WRCH gradually increased the number of soft vocals and decreased the instrumentals, to the point where it became a soft adult contemporary station. The transition was gradual and many of its listeners stuck with WRCH as a companion in the office and at home, and it remained one of the top rated stations in Greater Hartford.
In 1998, CBS Radio acquired WRCH, while its AM counterpart was sold to Mega Communications. WRCH joined the CBS Radio cluster, including WTIC and WTIC-FM, as well as WZMX. WRCH continued its Soft AC format, although picking up the tempo a bit into the 2000s, shifting to mainstream adult contemporary music.
On February 2, 2017, CBS Radio announced it would merge with Entercom. The merger was approved on November 9, 2017, and was consummated on the 17th. The only noticeable effect from the merger for listeners was the switch of Boston sports stations on WRCH's HD3 subchannel, as the simulcast changed from the now-Beasley-owned WBZ-FM to Entercom-owned WEEI-FM.