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HISTORY
98.7 DZFE has been fostering
a joint appreciation of classical music and biblical
precepts since 1954.
DZFE was the second radio station established by
American missionaries, who founded the first station (DZAS)
of Far East Broadcasting Company in 1948. FEBC’s mission of
bringing “Christ to the World by Radio” was first directed
toward China. However, in 1954, FEBC stepped forward to
answer a government bid for the establishment of a classical
music station.
On 1 June 1954, DZFE marked its inaugural broadcast, signing
on at 6PM for an evening of Strauss II, Rimsky-Korsakov,
Filipino musical (My Nipa Hut), and Bach motets and
chorales, before signing off at 8PM.
DZFE continued its association with classical music into the
age of FM radio in the 1970s. Following the government
restriction to one AM station per network, FEBC took DZFE
off air, but soon resurrected it —this time on FM— in
response to appeals from the public.
Recent Challenges
In 1997, DZFE decided to move closer to its listeners by
transferring out of the FEBC Compound in Karuhatan,
Valenzuela, to Makati City.
The new millennium brought a new set of challenges. The
withdrawal of foreign subsidies following 9/11, in addition
to other fiscal difficulties, spurred a decision to reduce
the broadcast by 40% in 2003. (We have had to resort
periodically to this self-preserving measure: In 1976, DZFE
cut broadcast to a mere six hours, from 4PM to midnight. In
1986, DZFE was off the air from noon to 6PM.)
In 2005, owing to the proliferation of tall buildings around
our Makati antenna, DZFE transferred its transmitting
facilities to a leased site in Antipolo. We also downgraded
from 20kW to a leased 5kW transmitter to control power
costs.
Renaissance
A new
dawn of sorts began in 2006 when we reclaimed 10 hours of
our broadcast week, restoring quality programming to our
10PM to midnight block.
The prevailing concern since then has been to regain our
signal strength. In April of 2009, after four years of
problematic transmission at 5kW (and below!) off a leased
transmitter, DZFE finally began broadcast from a newly
purchased transmitter, entirely funded by donations from
FEBC and DZFE supporters here and abroad. The transmitter, a
Nautel NV20, is the first of its kind in the Philippines.
DZFE is processing an increase in transmitting power from
10kW to 15kW.
At the same time, work is in progress to gather the people
and the funding to sustain a return to a daily 18-hour
schedule of quality classical music and Christian values
programming. The target date for this is January of 2010.
About DZFE
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