Kanal K: live radio from Aarau

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Kanal K

Argovia's old roommate, gone solo.

Aargau's alt-radio: fresh releases, a trainee newsroom.

Kanal K began in 1987 as a left-alternative and trade-union campaign for a regional station in Aargau, ran first as Radio ALORA and then as Aargauer Regionalradio while timesharing a single frequency with the commercial Radio Argovia, and finally got a programme of its own in April 1997. The name was settled by a manager who had run out of patience with months of grassroots debate and simply declared it: K for Komplementärradio, and for Kultur. It stuck, and so has the station itself.

Days are a curated music programme built on K-Tracks, a weekly playlist of new international, Swiss and regional releases. Evenings go to some 250 volunteers making shows in about twenty languages, alongside editorial projects on youth, integration, politics and sustainability. It doubles as the region's radio school, sending about thirty interns a year onward, and its federal mandate runs to 2034.

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Aarau, Switzerland

Kanal K

Argovia's old roommate, gone solo.

Aargau's alt-radio: fresh releases, a trainee newsroom.

Kanal K began in 1987 as a left-alternative and trade-union campaign for a regional station in Aargau, ran first as Radio ALORA and then as Aargauer Regionalradio while timesharing a single frequency with the commercial Radio Argovia, and finally got a programme of its own in April 1997. The name was settled by a manager who had run out of patience with months of grassroots debate and simply declared it: K for Komplementärradio, and for Kultur. It stuck, and so has the station itself.

Days are a curated music programme built on K-Tracks, a weekly playlist of new international, Swiss and regional releases. Evenings go to some 250 volunteers making shows in about twenty languages, alongside editorial projects on youth, integration, politics and sustainability. It doubles as the region's radio school, sending about thirty interns a year onward, and its federal mandate runs to 2034.