Scott McKenzie

Luckily for me, my brother and sisters average a decade older than me.  It gave them a chance to be in their teens just as my musical tastes were forming.  My brother especially had an incredible record collection, so at a very early age I was glued to the radio and when I wasn’t, I was spinning discs at home.  Also around then, my cousin received a tape recorder which I “borrowed” hoping she wouldn’t want it back.  By the time she did, I had grown very comfortable talking into the microphone and had already started tinkering with the machine to get special effects by changing the speeds, looping it around to get it to run backwards and other tricks.

By age 12 I had committed to figuring out how I could be on the radio.  From this side of the speakers it just seemed like an amazing job.  So I hand-wrote a letter to my favorite DJ in Columbus, Ohio thinking it would end up in a bag of fan mail and never be seen, just like I had never heard back from Stevie Wonder.  But this time I did get a response, and it was full of answers to my questions about how to get started with my radio career.

Following his advice, I hosted morning radio shows all four years in college and then sent out tapes to see if I could actually do this for a living.  The day I came home from graduation, my friend Dave told me about a job opening at a small station in a small town nearby.  The next day I put on a suit and brought that tape over to the Program Director, Mr. Swinehart.  The tape wasn’t that good, so the suit must have done the trick because he hired me that day and I went to work the next week.

After that it was down to Tallahassee for job two, back up to my hometown of Columbus for job 3, over to Boston for job 4, and then down here to Orlando for my dream job at one of the industry’s most respected stations, MIX105.1.  22 years later I’m still livin’ the dream, doing what I’ve always wanted to do.

It’s still an absolute thrill to be a part of starting so many people’s days, and I’m extremely thankful that you’ve allowed me, my wife Fran, and our daughter Lauren the opportunity to settle down in such an awesome city.  This bio seems pretty normal, but trust me, we’re all a bunch of loons around here.

Thanks again for waking up with us each day.  You’re awesome.