Radio Legend Can Sleep Late -- Larry Nelson, Longtime Dj, Is Cutting Back

Talk-news KOMO-AM (1000), Seattle's oldest radio station, will turn 70 in December.

For 30 of those years, Larry Nelson has been its velvet voice. Since 1967, he's been the mainstay morning personality.

Two weeks from today, he will formally step aside to play an ancillary role at KOMO-AM, ending a transition that began in June.

Nelson is the last of the Seattle morning-radio legends who ruled the airwaves back in the late-1960s and the 1970s, before FM radio began to dominate the ratings and radio formats fragmented.

"I'd like to see who's on `The Tonight Show' - Jack Parr or Steve Allen," Nelson joked yesterday. "Twenty-nine years of getting up at 4 in the morning is enough.

"The station is going in a different direction," he said.

KOMO-AM has evolved in recent years from a mature music-and-news station to news-talk, and it aspires, says program director Rick Van Cise, to offer "NPR depth with Top-40 style." It needs to reach more younger listeners to compete for ad dollars.

Van Cise, who made a name in Seattle at news-talk KIRO-AM (710), and Gina Tuttle will continue to be the morning hosts, reading news and involving listeners over the phone.

Nelson, 58, likes to gab, too, but he is a disc jockey at heart.

"It didn't make sense to contribute to a format I didn't feel comfortable with," Nelson said.

He will continue to contribute a brief daily morning feature called "The Way I See It" and will broadcast live from various businesses on Saturdays following the University of Washington football season.

Nelson's cheerful chat otherwise will be heard on KOMO-AM only in commercials. His specialty is making personal pitches for products and merchants he believes in.

Even one-on-one, he is a natural salesman. Yesterday he recalled how one client began advertising on KOMO years ago, with a single service truck, and has grown ever since. Before long, Nelson was leaning forward in his chair, enthusiastically describing the company's miraculous new drapery-cleaning.

His personal sales touch is a holdover from the era of so-called "full-service" radio stations, the AM giants that emphasized news, patter and middle-of-the-road music.

Today, the notion of a station offering a little of everything is anachronistic. Advertisers prefer baby boomers and younger folks accustomed to listening to stations that specialize - in news, or in talk, or in music, but not a mix.

KOMO has chosen to join the information niche.

There are nine other area stations targeting those listeners: news-talk KIRO-AM, KIRO-FM (100.7), KVI-AM (570) and KHHO-AM (850); all-news KNWX-AM (770); local National Public Radio outlets KUOW-FM (94.9) and KPLU-FM (88.5); sports-talk KJR-AM (950); and business-news-talk KEZX-AM (1150).

Nelson's last weekday broadcast will be the morning of Nov. 1. He will broadcast live from the 13 Coins Restaurant in downtown Seattle. It's a nostalgic place for him. He was there to cover its grand opening - in 1967.