Dedications

Requests, anniversaries and remembrances

The dedication is one of the oldest devices in radio and it has survived on polka stations long after it disappeared elsewhere. There is a reason for that. This is community music, and a large share of the audience has some personal connection to the bands, the halls, or the people who used to dance to a particular record.

How dedications work here

Each show handles its own dedications. Requests reach the host of the programme you want them played on, not a central desk, because it is the host who builds the hour and knows whether the record you have asked for fits where you want it.

Practical notes for anyone sending one in:

• Name the show. A dedication for the Sunday live broadcast is a different request from one for a pre-recorded evening hour, and the lead times are different.
• Name the record if you can. “Something by the Dyna Brass” is workable; naming the track and, if you know it, the album makes it far more likely to be played as you intended.
• Allow time. Pre-recorded shows are usually finished several days before they air. Live shows are the only ones where a same-day request has a realistic chance.
• Keep it short. A dedication read on air works best at two or three sentences.

The shows that take them

Dedications are read on all of the regular programmes. See staff and shows for the full list, or the programming grid if you are trying to work out which show suits the occasion and the timing.

Why the form is gone

Earlier versions of this page carried a submission form that asked for a name, an email address and a message, and posted them to a hosted service that has since stopped running. A form that quietly delivers nothing is worse than no form at all, so it has been removed rather than left in place.

Nothing submitted through the version of the site you are reading is transmitted anywhere, and no personal details are collected by these pages.

Why people still send them

Dedications on a polka station are rarely decorative. A large share of them mark anniversaries of weddings where the band on the record played, birthdays of people who took their children to those dances, and deaths in a community small enough that the audience recognises the names. The record chosen usually matters as much as the message.

That is why hosts read them properly rather than running them together at the top of the hour, and why a request for a specific version of a specific song is treated seriously. For the person listening at home it is not a formality — it is the reason the radio is on.