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Member Profile
Richard Ajello - a Music Pioneer on the ACAP Board
By James Rudolph

[ACAP interviewed Richard Ajello in his spacious office on the first floor of the Instituto Tecnologico Orson Welles, located in a San Isidro casona on the Pera de Amor at the end of Avenida Salaverry. Background music was playing throughout the interview, much to the delight of Richard, who repeatedly interrupted our conversation, either to name the song, sing a few bars or express his admiration for the particular musicians and/or the musical style.]

ACAP: You have had a unique career, much of which has involved music. Where did you get your love of music?

I come from a mixed marriage: my mother was Hungarian, and my father, a Sicilian born in Palermo. So you might say I have the spirituality of the North and the sentimentality of the South. I grew up in New York, where my mother was a pianist, a concert pianist, and my father liked to sing Italian songs, so I was always around music. I didn't play an instrument, save a little piano. I sang in my high school glee club and in Gilbert & Sullivan's musical, The Mikado. I'll never forget the chorus [Richard then procedes to sing several song lines in Japanese]. So I have this background and love of music, with a tendency towards international music. Of course I listened to radio and heard heard all the famous big bands.

ACAP: You brought Muzak (instrumental background music that was played everywhere in the U.S. in the 1950s) to Peru. Can you tell us about that?

I met my Peruvian wife at Carlton College, in Northfield Minnesota. After graduating, I left for Peru, where we were married in February 1948. A month later, we returned to New York on a Grace Liner named the Santa Isabel, where I took a job with radio station WHOM, which programmed a wide variety of ethnic music.

My mother-in-law would often visit us, and she dearly wanted her daughter to move back to Peru. “Qué voy a hacer en el Perú?” I asked her. Well, not too much later, an opportunity came along. Fortunately the Muzak people were well acquainted with members of the Board of Carlton College. I had always been fond of Muzak, and so was delighted to meet its President of Musak, Mr. Charles Cawley. I told him I wanted to put Muzak in Lima Peru. This was 1953; I had the first-ever international franchise granted by Muzak. I was naturally very happy, knowing that my working relationship with Muzak was solid, and I was determined to make a success of it.

I left for Lima to set up the commercial operation the way Muzak suggested. The exclusive Muzak musical library arrived in ten specially prepared iron boxes. Each disc was recorded on vertically cut 16-inch electrical transcripts.

The instrumental arrangements were played by 40-50-piece orchestras in Muzak's own studios. Muzak and the composers signed exclusive agreements that prohibited Muzak from entering the commercial record business. You cannot buy Muzak anywhere. We are constantly adding new music to our vast library of over 20,000 selections.

ACAP: Is that Musak I hear when I go to Ripley?

No way! Ripley and Saga play loud disco-type music on CD players. There are no musical criteria to their musical sequences; it mainly has lots of percussion, but no melody. Have you noticed that people don't whistle anymore? That's because the music of today lacks melody.

We constantly read about stress, tension and fatigue caused by noise. Many of us are in situations where we are constantly bombarded by repetitive, loud percussion music. Not to mention family sound equipment that is inadequately installed. Fortunately there is functional work music that is arranged and programmed by experts who have the technical and musical know how to combat these problems.

ACAP: Richard, please tell our readers about your pioneering activities in radio.

As a kid in Manhatten in the 1930s, I was impressed by a tall, imposing, experimental radio transmitting tower situated north of the George Washington Bridge on the Jersey palisades. At night I was absolutely fascinated by its flickering lights to warn airplanes.
As I had many friends who were amateur radio operators, I inquired about the tower and was told the structure belonged to a Major Armstrong, who was experimenting with frequency modulation broadcasting. It was the first time I ever heard about FM.

Regarding amateur radio and short wave, I was an avid listener to all the shortwave bands. This helped me develop certain language skills, and I was thrilled when I heard stations from all over the world. I kept a log of the call letters and the frequencies. This hobby ended when I was drafted in 1942.

When I returned to Peru in 1953, receivers were sold with the AM/FM band, but there were no FM radio stations on the air. My interest in obtaining an FM radion station liscence, though, was met by resistence from AM radio station owners. Much valuable time was lost until the Minister of Justice intervened on our behalf and we received out commercial FM radio station liscence the first in Peru in September 1960.

We owned and operated Stereolima 100 FM for 33 years. Its programing was unique, and has not been equaled to this day. I loved every moment of my time spent with Stereolima 100, el Color de la Radio. My wife Marcela was a most valuable partner throughout the years. She took charge of all administrative matters, and for many years she produced her daily program called Mujeres del Siglo 20.

[Richard then opened a cabinet containing a small portion of his record collection a hundred or more 33 1/3 rpm long-play comedy records that he used to play on his Sunday morning program, “Great Moments in Comedy.” He then showed us the medals he had received from the governments of France, Poland, and Bulgaria in appreciation for his cultural collaboration via Stereolima 100 FM. Richard also received special medals from the Association of Radio and Television Broadcasters of Peru for his “invaluable contribution to radio in Peru.”]

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