Northsound 1

Northsound 1 is an Independent Local Radio station based in Aberdeen, Scotland, owned and operated by Bauer Media Audio UK as part of the Hits Radio network. It broadcasts to Aberdeenshire and North East Scotland.

As of March 2024, the station has a weekly audience of 128,000 listeners according to RAJAR.

History
Until Northsound Radio's establishment, the only local radio output available to listeners in the North East of Scotland was a regional opt-out from the BBC at Beechgrove, which broadcast specialist music programmes for a couple of hours a week along with some opt-out regional news coverage. When a commercial radio franchise for Aberdeen, Peterhead and the surrounding areas was advertised by the then-regulator, the Independent Broadcasting Authority, a group of local businessmen applied under the consortium of North of Scotland Radio Ltd and won the franchise.

After a change of name, Northsound Radio commenced broadcasting at 6am on 27 July 1981 from its original studios in an old schoolhouse on Kings Gate, near Anderson Drive in the city. Originally, the station was broadcast from 6am to 8pm each day on 1035 kHz (290 metres) and 96.9 FM (VHF).

For a two-year period from 1994, the station was the main sponsor of Aberdeen Football Club, with the logo appearing on the players' shirts.

On 9 January 1995, Northsound Radio was renamed Northsound 1 and Northsound 2 was established as a classic hits station using the station's AM frequency. Both stations have since started broadcasting on DAB radio and online.

Free concerts
From 1997 until 2007, Northsound held free music concerts in Aberdeen almost bi-annually. Northsound delivered its first major outdoor event when the Tall Ships arrived in Aberdeen, which called Free at the Quay. Following its success, Free 2000 was staged at the Queen’s Links at Aberdeen Beach followed by Free at the Dee at Duthie Park.

Due to the numbers attending, Northsound decided to move the event to Hazlehead Park and the event was renamed to simply Free 2007. More than 30,000 people attended Free 2007 which saw Beverley Knight, McFly, Shayne Ward, Booty Luv, MacDonald Brothers, Ali Love, Unklejam and others perform free.

Northsound are also sponsors and organisers of Aberdeen's free Hogmanay street party, where in previous years stars such as Sandi Thom, Travis and Amy MacDonald have played to large crowds.

Programming
Local programming intended exclusively for the Northsound 1 transmission area is limited to 4 hours per day on weekdays, and is produced and broadcast from Northsound's Aberdeen studios between 6am-10am.

Northsound 1 also airs networked programming from Clyde 1 in Clydebank, Forth 1 in Edinburgh, Tay FM in Dundee and Hits Radio in Manchester.

The station's local presenters are Jeff Diack and Lauren Mitchell (Jeff and Lauren In The Morning).

News and sport
Northsound 1 broadcasts local news bulletins hourly from 6am to 7pm on weekdays and from 7am to 1pm at weekends. Headlines are broadcast on the half hour during weekday breakfast and drivetime shows, alongside sport, traffic and business bulletins.

National bulletins from Sky News Radio are carried overnight with networked Scottish bulletins at weekends, produced from Radio Clyde's newsroom in Clydebank.

Extended sports coverage airs under the Superscoreboard banner on Saturday afternoons.

Notable DJs

 * Nicky Campbell - now a BBC journalist and television presenter.
 * Alan Fisher - worked at the station as a reporter/newsreader and is now a senior correspondent with the global news channel, Al Jazeera English based in the United States.
 * Robin Galloway - later became a continuity announcer and newsreader for Grampian Television. He now currently presents the breakfast show on Pure Radio in Glasgow & Tayside.