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I started collecting radio station jingles in the 60s. My parents moved our family from Ohio to Fort Lauderdale, Florida in 1962. I was in my early teens and was just getting interested in Rock and Roll music. Of course, that involved listening to the radio. By far, the best station for Rock and Roll in South Florida was WQAM. One thing I noticed right away were the unusual (to me) jingles they played. They had this weird voice singing the station’s ID, “Wonderful WQAM”. I was fascinated. I called the station and asked how they made that sound. I wasn’t aware that the jingles were used on stations all around the country and the world. The DJ explained to me that the sound was produced by a Sonovox. The singer held “speakers” against his throat while a musical instrument played the station’s id through the Sonovox. He then sang the jingle and the sound of the instrument, piano, sax, trumpet, guitar, whatever, came out of his mouth producing the “weird” sound I heard. I found out that those jingles were made by a company in Dallas called PAMS. The name of the series was “Series 18 Sonosational”.
From then on I was hooked. I wanted to know everything there was to know about the jingles. I bugged the DJs with request for jingles instead of records. I begged them to dub jingles to tape for me. Only one did. (Thanks Johnny Knox!) I learned the order the jingles would play in the carts and was able to predict the next jingle that would play. When WQAM got a new series, I had to listen every minute so I could to hear them all.
At night when WQAM had the boring Alan Courtney talk show on instead of music, I scanned the radio dial listening to stations all around the country to hear their jingles. I heard the same jingles WQAM used on stations like WABC, KAAY, WLCY, WLS, WTIX, KXOK, etc.
After graduating college, I kind of lost interest in jingles to some extent. Sometimes when I made 8 tracks or cassettes of music to listen to in the car, I’d mix in a few of WQAM’s or PAMS demo jingles but never really thought about collecting. In the early 90s, my interest was rekindled. I decided I wanted a complete collection of WQAM’s jingles. I asked if anyone knew where I could get them on some chat group on the internet. Everyone said to try Ken R. I found out Ken R had thousands of jingles from PAMS and other companies. Unfortunately, he didn’t have many of WQAM jingles. I found other people who collected jingles and started trading.
Now I have amassed a huge collection of jingles from radio stations all around the world. But I still haven’t found all of WQAM’s!
Below are links to lists of my jingle collection in plain text and Excel Spreadsheet formats. If you have jingles for stations that I don’t have, or I have something that you want, then please email me. We can set up a trade or make other arrangements to suit.
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My biggest interests are (but in no way limited to):
- Anything for WQAM and the other Storz stations (WTIX, WDGY, WHB, KXOK & KOMA).
- PAMS Series 14 through 40 for any station
- PAMS “Smart Set”, “Holidaze” and “Tuned Young” for any station
- Ullman Onederful Series for any station
- Pepper “Fun” Series for any station
If you have have anything you think I’d like to have or if there’s anything I have that you’d like, please send me email. I will trade with you or make other arrangements for dubs.
 Email: Jingles@560.com
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My favorite jingles were produced by PAMS of Dallas. In my opinion, they produced the best radio id jingles. Almost every Top 40 station had one or more series from PAMS. There were 49 “Numbered” Series and many “Named” series. The numbered series were the most popular. My favorites are Series 14 through 37, which non-coincidentally were produced during the 1960s and what is covered here.
For more detailed information on PAMS please visit www.PAMS.com.
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