Nic Harcourt
Music Director, Host Morning Becomes Eclectic
Ruth changed my life. In early 1998 I submitted a cassette tape demo for the host gig on Morning Becomes Eclectic and music director at KCRW, and to my surprise found myself in LA a few weeks later guest hosting the program for four days. After the last show (on a Friday) and a few hours before I was due to fly back east, Ruth took me to lunch at the Rose Cafe on Main Street in Venice. I knew that the “audition” had gone well, but had no idea where they were in the hiring process, I was expecting lunch, a thank you, we’ll be in touch. Instead, she offered me the job. I was stunned and told her I needed time to think, she told me to accept the offer and figure out the logistics (partner, pets, moving your whole life from the Catskills to Los Angeles) when I got home.
Two weeks later I was on the air at KCRW and two weeks after that I did my first pledge drive. When I didn’t burn the place down, I think she decided I was worth keeping. Over the next decade Ruth gave me the freedom and resources to take the music department to the next level. When I told her I wanted to get out into the market and present shows, she told me “We don’t do that.” When I gave her the reasons why we should, she told me to go ahead. Out of that conversation came a music promotions department that “presented” hundreds of shows a year and an annual fundraising music concert event. In the entire time I worked for Ruth, she never said no to my requests. We harnessed the Internet and marketed the station’s music programming internationally. We took MBE out of the basement to broadcast live from festivals and events in New York, Seattle, Austin, and London. The station grew, a lot.
Ruth taught me to trust my instincts, just as she did herself. She taught me that in radio, if you only worry about the listeners you have, they’re the only ones you will have. She also taught me to ask for forgiveness, if necessary, not permission. Ruth had such strong belief in talent, hiring great people and allowing them to create and flourish; she was a visionary, she brought food, movies, books, politics and culture to the LA airwaves as well as music and news. Ruth gave me the time and space to discover my own creativity in a truly meaningful way. I am a different person from my time working with Ruth and forever grateful for that she included me in one of the greatest and most successful broadcast experiments ever.
