Warminster Community Radio

Warminster Community Radio, known as WCR, serves the town and its immediate Wiltshire surroundings with music, information and locally made speech programmes. Its musical remit covers pop, classical, jazz, country, world music and soul, including local and unsigned performers. Community news, arts, events, education and charity activity are part of the same service, with a particular aim of reaching people who can otherwise be excluded by location or circumstances.

The project began on 1 April 1996, when Barry Mole and Mark Barnes developed the idea of a local radio service with support from the Athenaeum Theatre. Temporary broadcasts demonstrated public interest, and volunteers subsequently helped convert premises beside the Assembly Hall into studios. After years of campaigning and short broadcasts, the full-time service began on 1 April 2012, exactly sixteen years after the project's launch.

The programme includes Kathie Tyler's Food for Thought, combining hymns, reflection and religious subjects. Rob Livingstone hosts Thingummyjig, Annabel Ilic selects songs connected with her life alongside artists to discover, and Dave Hall's Country Junkie Radio Show covers country music from the 1980s onwards. Bob Maynard brings an interest in 1960s music and quizzes to his own programme.

WCR's work also includes radio drama, local-democracy reporting and practical training. Volunteers can develop skills in presentation, recording, editing and programme production, progressing towards live broadcasting. The organisation has helped schools establish radio facilities and offers recording opportunities for musicians, choirs and orchestras. These activities connect its on-air cultural output with a wider role in helping people around Warminster make and share audio.