The Pulse - Business Roundtable

Fresno State Weekly

Step “Through The Listening Glass” for a tumble down the musical rabbit hole to a wonderland of musical delights based on the premise that intelligent, artistic and well crafted music can transcend eras and genres to become a singular entity based simply on enjoyment and appreciation.   Once you’ve stepped through you’ll hear contemporary singer-songwriters standing shoulder-to-shoulder with vocalists of the swing era, jazz masters playing off trip hop artists, folk musicians giving way to the purveyors of the standards, rhythm and blues blending with tasty rock and encompassing everything in between in a sonic landscape designed for aural pleasure.  You won’t want to be late for this very important date, every Wednesday night from 6:00 to 9:00 P.M. for “Through The Listening Glass.”

About Don Fischer

Don Fischer has worked in radio on and off since 1972. His broadcast career began at KOLI, Coalinga, and took him to San Luis Obispo, Los Angeles and eventually to Fresno. In 1980, he teamed with former college radio friend, Dean Opperman to launch the Breakfast Club at the newly licensed KKDJ. That show ran for 14 years, and during most of the 1980’s was Fresno radio’s highest rated morning music and personality show. During his career, Mr. Fischer was a successful program director at both KZOZ in San Luis Obispo and KKDJ in Fresno. His appreciation for country music occurred as a teenager in Buffalo, New York at a regular babysitting gig for neighbors who had a comprehensive collection of vintage country and western records. "They found out I had worn out the grooves on their collection and they fired me but the seeds were sown," he says. In 1975 he began the Lone Star Show on campus station KCPR in San Luis Obispo, programming classic country along with the outlaw and progressive sounds of the 1970’s. It quickly became a huge success and lasted until late 1978 when he moved to an on-air position at KNAC in Los Angeles.

The idea for the Fresno Barn Dance radio show, the a half-hour devoted to western swing and progressive country western, was born in 1982 at the Bar LE Western Swing Rancho, north of Fowler, CA. Don and Steve, listening to old Bob Wills LP’s, decided to develop a show that would the wave of growing interest in the music of Asleep at the Wheel, The Original Texas Playboys, Cowboy Jazz, and others. In the half-hour format, the show worked nicely, and first appeared on KFSR at 5:30 on Saturday evenings. The show moved to Saturday mornings, and later to KVPR, appearing just before "Prairie Home Companion." During the 1990’s, Don and Steve were directors of the Fresno Free College Foundation, owners’ and operators of KFCF 88.1 FM, where their show, The Fresno Barn Dance, Western Swing Extravaganza, aired. At the same time, they were producers and directors of the "William Saroyan Radio Project," and "The San Benito Street Radio Players," producing over a dozen William Saroyan plays for radio in ten years. In 2002, Don and Steve returned to KFSR to host the new National BIG Fresno Barn Dance, two hours of Old-time Country, Western Swing, and Honky-Tonk music.

Today, both Barile and Fischer bring a vast knowledge of music to their show, drawing on many years of experience and familiarity with musical genres. Barile is well versed on the subject of western swing music, and has written extensively about its beginnings and history in Fresno. Fischer continues to immerse himself in honky tonk as well as early Rock-a-Billy and Rock and Roll music. He is a connoisseur of the Southern California country rock scene of the late sixties and seventies as well. Fischer can also be heard on KFSR Wednesday nights from 6pm-9pm where he plays an eclectic mix of contemporary music from rock to jazzy electronica on the program fittingly titled Through the Listening Glass. Between the two of them, there is more radio experience than they’d like to count.