Magnum.Media has tapped Chris Tarr to serve as group director of engineering for its 16 radio and three LPTV stations in Wisconsin.
Tarr stepped down from his role at Entercom last week after accepting an offer from Magnum.Media in mid-March. He had been with the broadcaster for 16 years and most recently held the title of director of technical operations for its Wisconsin cluster. Tarr was quoted in the release as saying, “I made lifelong friends at Entercom and am so proud of all we accomplished with the Milwaukee and Madison facilities.”
At Magnum.Media, Tarr steps into a newly created position for the family-owned business. According to Tarr, he and Dave Magnum had been friends for 15 years before he recruited him. Tarr also called Magnum a kindred spirit and said he expects the role to be “a perfect match” for him and his lifestyle.
The media company was founded in 1991 by Dave and Lynn Magnum. Initially, the Magnums kept the stations on the air with the help of contract engineers, namely Steve Konopka, Mark Burg, Bruce Herzog, Jim Zastrow, Jon Zecherle, Darrel Sanders, Bob Gorjance, John Church and Chuck Gennaro.
However, Magnum explained in the press release that “the more we’ve grown, several of those great contract engineers have strongly encouraged me to bring on board a group chief to take our stations under his wing,” which is why he sought out Tarr. He also noted that the choice was greeted with approval from those same engineers.
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“Working with Chris is no doubt going to make our on-going adventure in broadcasting even more of a blast as we head into our fourth decade,” said Magnum.
Chris Tarr currently serves on the Society of Broadcast Engineers’ national board as the Mentor Committee chair and has earned CSRE, AMD, DRB, CBNE accreditations. Additionally, in 2007 the society recognized him with the Wulliman Award for service to the SBE and engineering community in southeast Wisconsin.
