Jon Solomon on the 25 Hour Marathon
If you agree with me that Christmas stands for exuberance, excess and extravagance, than a 25 hour radio show filled with Christmas music is like a too large tree topper blinding your eyes when you see it. Exactly how it should be! Mr Jon Solomon's 25 hour Christmas radio show on WPRB (Delaware) is having it's 37th (!) edition this year. It's like all the Christmas playlists, all the blogs and all the podcasts rolled into one exhilirating marathon. If there is an event a Christmas music aficionado AND producer/artist needs to be part of, it's this one.
The 2025 edition of Jon Solomon’s 25-Hour Holiday Radio Show on 103.3 fm WPRB rises on Christmas Eve at 5:00 pm ET and unfurls until Christmas Day at 6:00 pm ET.
We asked Jon to tell us how he prepares for this monstrosity (in a good way!):
So…you want to know how I prep for a Christmas radio show that’s 25 hours long?
I don’t think of myself as an anxious person, yet starting around Thanksgiving (sometimes earlier - thanks for nothing, brain) I wake up nearly every morning exceptionally stressed out simply thinking about staying on top of all the new-to-me music I want to hear for potential inclusion during my 25-Hour Holiday Radio Show.
A couple years ago my marathon on 103.3 fm WPRB reached a point where if I started playing material I hadn’t aired on past shows from the kickoff of the broadcast at 5:00 pm ET on Christmas Eve and kept going until we reached midnight, I felt like all the searching was worth it.
If this new material can reach even further all the way to 8:00 am ET, then it is time for my daughter’s show-within-the-show Maggie’s Reindeer Rumble followed by thematic sets all the way across the finish line.
I used to be so stressed DURING the show, but with a refined approach my stress gets spread equally over the first three weeks of December and that’s somehow actually easier to handle. The marathon becomes the easiest part! In theory!
My regular Wednesday night three hour program on WPRB is kindly covered by an excellent assortment of DJs during the majority of December so I can focus on marathon prep, with the exception of an All-Hanukkah Show I’ve added the past 13 years. That broadcast is similar to Christmas, just 1/8 of the length…
Having hosted this show on WPRB since 1988, I am driven to air as much new music as possible as part of the marathon, interspersed with pieces I premiere recorded for the show in-between longer sets. This keeps the show interesting on my side of the microphone and hopefully surprising and thrilling wherever folks are listening. There’s little better than dropping a reworking of a song WPRB listeners love or airing a ridiculous mashup and the playlist chat lighting up with folks in disbelief.
The marathon means a ton to me. I certainly didn’t set out to make it such a huge part of my life when I first went on the air at age 15, but I understand the importance it has now to so many folks beyond just the Delaware Valley, from those spending Christmas alone to those who grew up listening with their parents who now share the broadcast with their own children.
This year a special Best of the Marathon show will air after the proper show so I have time to include more old favorites as last year’s broadcast was entirely new finds and thematic sets (such as Ramones-o-Clock at 12:34 am ET, The All-Fall set on Christmas Day or Lindstrom’s 40:00+ hypnotic rendition of Little Drummer Boy which airs just after listener favorite Snaildartha: The Story of Jerry The Christmas Snail during the most-listened-to two hour stretch of 10 am - noon East Coast time).
With an increasing international audience, I try to program recognizing that my overnight in New Jersey is someone else’s Christmas Day.
So even if I wanted to sleep in, I get up shortly after my family heads to school. I tackle Duolingo and pour a glass of chai. Before I head in to my office at WPRB, where I work as the station’s Operations Manager, I try and do all of the following:
-Check sites like CAGG, Ernie (Not Bert) and Christmas Underground for new material to add to my Reading List in Safari for future listening. One person can’t keep tabs on everything, let alone hear it all. These resources are essential.
-Do the same with Bandcamp emails about releases going live from artists and labels I've followed there previously.
-Comb the falalala.com forums, especially posts about 2025 releases.
-Review the RSS feeds of less active blogs in the off chance they’re posting again.
-Check my inbox to see what finds listeners, friends, fellow DJs and past contributors have relayed. Some of the best material comes in this way.
People have been great about making sure they send discoveries early, or passing links my way as they encounter them between January and November.
To be honest, a lot of emails from holiday music promotion companies I can delete without listening to based on cover art alone (especially obvious AI).
I’m doing this all more often than not while catching up on releases I already had on my Reading List, erasing titles as I hear ‘em.
Songs or entire records I’m into I bring into iTunes and keep only what I rate four or five stars. There’s no need to hold onto dreck.
Gems go in a “2025 Xmas” folder for later arrangement into full sets a couple days out of Christmas Eve.
I’ve also got thematic folders in case I find new songs inspired by the likes of those listed above, plus Black Sabbath, The Misfits, New Order / Joy Division, Beastie Boys, Neil Young and in a new-for-2025 plan…Kraftwerk.
So. Many. Folders.
I figure out how some sets sound best to my ears using spreadsheets, especially when I want to avoid too many versions of the same original.
I listen before I go to work, I might fire up a CD from this stack of unreviewed annual Xmas collections in my office when I arrive or I keep pushing through the Reading List.
After dinner I’ll get to the rest, ideally.
For a couple hours, I’m caught up.
With the aural equivalent of “inbox zero” the stress dissipates and I go to sleep, braced to start this process all over the following day.
Thanks a lot for this Jon! And happy broadcasting!
This of course needs a song, a new song, a perfect song for the marathon. With a Ramones-touch! Hey ho, let's go:
The 2025 edition of Jon Solomon’s 25-Hour Holiday Radio Show on 103.3 fm WPRB rises on Christmas Eve at 5:00 pm ET and unfurls until Christmas Day at 6:00 pm ET.
We asked Jon to tell us how he prepares for this monstrosity (in a good way!):
So…you want to know how I prep for a Christmas radio show that’s 25 hours long?
I don’t think of myself as an anxious person, yet starting around Thanksgiving (sometimes earlier - thanks for nothing, brain) I wake up nearly every morning exceptionally stressed out simply thinking about staying on top of all the new-to-me music I want to hear for potential inclusion during my 25-Hour Holiday Radio Show.
A couple years ago my marathon on 103.3 fm WPRB reached a point where if I started playing material I hadn’t aired on past shows from the kickoff of the broadcast at 5:00 pm ET on Christmas Eve and kept going until we reached midnight, I felt like all the searching was worth it.
If this new material can reach even further all the way to 8:00 am ET, then it is time for my daughter’s show-within-the-show Maggie’s Reindeer Rumble followed by thematic sets all the way across the finish line.
I used to be so stressed DURING the show, but with a refined approach my stress gets spread equally over the first three weeks of December and that’s somehow actually easier to handle. The marathon becomes the easiest part! In theory!
My regular Wednesday night three hour program on WPRB is kindly covered by an excellent assortment of DJs during the majority of December so I can focus on marathon prep, with the exception of an All-Hanukkah Show I’ve added the past 13 years. That broadcast is similar to Christmas, just 1/8 of the length…
Having hosted this show on WPRB since 1988, I am driven to air as much new music as possible as part of the marathon, interspersed with pieces I premiere recorded for the show in-between longer sets. This keeps the show interesting on my side of the microphone and hopefully surprising and thrilling wherever folks are listening. There’s little better than dropping a reworking of a song WPRB listeners love or airing a ridiculous mashup and the playlist chat lighting up with folks in disbelief.
The marathon means a ton to me. I certainly didn’t set out to make it such a huge part of my life when I first went on the air at age 15, but I understand the importance it has now to so many folks beyond just the Delaware Valley, from those spending Christmas alone to those who grew up listening with their parents who now share the broadcast with their own children.
This year a special Best of the Marathon show will air after the proper show so I have time to include more old favorites as last year’s broadcast was entirely new finds and thematic sets (such as Ramones-o-Clock at 12:34 am ET, The All-Fall set on Christmas Day or Lindstrom’s 40:00+ hypnotic rendition of Little Drummer Boy which airs just after listener favorite Snaildartha: The Story of Jerry The Christmas Snail during the most-listened-to two hour stretch of 10 am - noon East Coast time).
With an increasing international audience, I try to program recognizing that my overnight in New Jersey is someone else’s Christmas Day.
So even if I wanted to sleep in, I get up shortly after my family heads to school. I tackle Duolingo and pour a glass of chai. Before I head in to my office at WPRB, where I work as the station’s Operations Manager, I try and do all of the following:
-Check sites like CAGG, Ernie (Not Bert) and Christmas Underground for new material to add to my Reading List in Safari for future listening. One person can’t keep tabs on everything, let alone hear it all. These resources are essential.
-Do the same with Bandcamp emails about releases going live from artists and labels I've followed there previously.
-Comb the falalala.com forums, especially posts about 2025 releases.
-Review the RSS feeds of less active blogs in the off chance they’re posting again.
-Check my inbox to see what finds listeners, friends, fellow DJs and past contributors have relayed. Some of the best material comes in this way.
People have been great about making sure they send discoveries early, or passing links my way as they encounter them between January and November.
To be honest, a lot of emails from holiday music promotion companies I can delete without listening to based on cover art alone (especially obvious AI).
I’m doing this all more often than not while catching up on releases I already had on my Reading List, erasing titles as I hear ‘em.
Songs or entire records I’m into I bring into iTunes and keep only what I rate four or five stars. There’s no need to hold onto dreck.
Gems go in a “2025 Xmas” folder for later arrangement into full sets a couple days out of Christmas Eve.
I’ve also got thematic folders in case I find new songs inspired by the likes of those listed above, plus Black Sabbath, The Misfits, New Order / Joy Division, Beastie Boys, Neil Young and in a new-for-2025 plan…Kraftwerk.
So. Many. Folders.
I figure out how some sets sound best to my ears using spreadsheets, especially when I want to avoid too many versions of the same original.
I listen before I go to work, I might fire up a CD from this stack of unreviewed annual Xmas collections in my office when I arrive or I keep pushing through the Reading List.
After dinner I’ll get to the rest, ideally.
For a couple hours, I’m caught up.
With the aural equivalent of “inbox zero” the stress dissipates and I go to sleep, braced to start this process all over the following day.
Thanks a lot for this Jon! And happy broadcasting!
This of course needs a song, a new song, a perfect song for the marathon. With a Ramones-touch! Hey ho, let's go:
Comments