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A checked tone, commonly known by its Chinese calque entering tone (simplified Chinese: 入声; traditional Chinese: 入聲; pinyin: rùshēng, lit. 'The tone of Chinese Character '入'), is one of four syllable types in the phonology in Middle Chinese which are commonly translated as tone. However, it is not a tone in the phonetic sense, but rather describes a syllable that ends in a stop consonant, such as p, t, k, or glottal stop. Note that separating the checked tone allows us to treat -p, -t, and -k as allophones of -m, -n, and -ng respectively because they are in a complementary distribution in which stops appear only in the checked tone while nasals appear only in other tones. Due to the origin of tone in Chinese, the number of tones found in such syllables is smaller than the number of tones in other syllables, and in Chinese phonetics they have traditionally been counted separately. For instance, in Cantonese, there are 6 tones in syllables which do not end in stops, but only three in syllables which do; therefore, although Cantonese only has 6 tones in the sense of 6 contrasting variations in pitch, it is often said to have 9.

Final stops, and therefore the checked "tones", have disappeared from most Mandarin dialects (a large dialect chain spoken in northern and southwestern China), but remain preserved in southeastern Chinese languages such as Cantonese, Min, and Hakka.

Tones are an indispensable part of Chinese literature, as characters in poetry and prose were chosen according to tones and rhymes for their euphony. This use of language helps in reconstructing the pronunciation of Old Chinese and Middle Chinese, since the Chinese writing system is logographic rather than phonetic.

Phonetics[link]

From a phonetic perspective, the entering tone is simply a syllable ending with a voiceless stop that has no audible release: [p̚ ], [t̚ ], or [k̚ ]. In some variants of Chinese, the final stop has become a glottal stop, [ʔ ̚].

History[link]

The voiceless stops that typify the entering tone date back to the Proto-Sino-Tibetan, the parent language of Chinese as well as the Tibeto-Burman languages. In addition, it is commonly thought that Old Chinese had syllables ending in clusters /ps/, /ts/, and /ks/^{[citation needed]} (sometimes called the "long entering tone", while syllables ending in /p/, /t/ and /k/ are the "short entering tone"). These clusters later reduced to /s/; in turn this became /h/ and ultimately tone 3 in Middle Chinese (the "departing tone").

The first Chinese philologists began to describe the phonology of Chinese during the Early Middle Chinese period (specifically, during the Northern and Southern Dynasties, between 400 to 600), under the influence of Buddhism and the Sanskrit language that arrived along with it. There were several unsuccessful attempts to classify the tones of Chinese, before the establishment of the traditional four-tone description between 483 and 493. It is based on the Vedic theory of three intonations (聲明論). The middle intonation, Udātta, maps to the level tone (平聲); the upwards intonation, Svarita, to the rising tone (上聲); the downward intonation, Anudātta, to the departing tone (去聲). The distinctive sound of syllables ending with a stop did not fit the three intonations and was categorised as the entering tone (入聲). The use of four-tone system flourished in the Sui and Tang dynasties. An important rime dictionary, Qieyun was written in this period.

Note that modern linguistic descriptions of Middle Chinese often refer to the level, rising and departing tones as tones 1, 2 and 3, respectively.

By the time of the Mongol invasion (the Yuan dynasty, 1279–1368), former final stops had been reduced to a glottal stop /ʔ/. It is sometimes thought that the influence of these invading nomads caused this final glottal stop to be lost, leading to the loss of "entering tone" syllables. The Zhongyuan Yinyun, a rime book of 1324, already shows signs of the disappearance of the glottal stop and the emergence of the modern Mandarin tone system in its place. The precise time at which the loss occurred is unknown, though it was likely gone by the time of the Qing Dynasty.

Example[link]

Entering tone in Chinese[link]

Mandarin[link]

The entering tone is extant in Jianghuai Mandarin and the Minjiang dialect of Sichuanese. In other dialects, the entering tone has been lost, and words that had the tone have been distributed into the four modern tonal categories, depending on the initial consonant of each word.

Note that, in the Beijing dialect that underlies Standard Mandarin, syllables beginning with originally unvoiced consonants are redistributed across the four tones in a completely random pattern. For example, the three characters 积脊迹, all pronounced /tsjek/ in Middle Chinese (William Baxter's reconstruction), are now pronounced jī jǐ jì, with tones 1 3 4 respectively. The two characters 割葛, both pronounced /kat/, are now pronounced gē (tone 1) and gé/gě (tone 2/3) respectively, with character 葛 splitting on semantic grounds (tone 3 when used as a component of a name, mostly tone 2 otherwise).

Similarly, the three characters 胳阁各 (Middle Chinese /kak/) are now pronounced gē gé gè, with tones 1 2 4, and the four characters 鸽蛤颌合 (Middle Chinese /kop/ are now pronounced gē gé gé gě, with tones 1 2 2 3. In these cases, the two sets of characters are significant in that each member of the same set has the same phonetic component, suggesting that the phonetic component of a character has little to do with the tone class that the character is assigned to. In other situations, however, the opposite appears to be the case. For example, the group 幅福蝠辐/腹复 of six homophonic characters, all pronounced /pjuwk/ in Middle Chinese and divided into a group of four with one phonetic and a group of two with a different phonetic, splits so that the first group of four is all pronounced fú (tone 2) and the second group of two is pronounced fù (tone 4). In situations like this, it may be that only one of the characters in each group normally occurs in speech with an identifiable tone, and as a result a "reading pronunciation" of the other characters was constructed based on the phonetic element of the character.

The chart below summarizes the distribution in the different dialects.

Cantonese[link]

Like most other variants of Chinese, Cantonese has changed initial voiced stops, affricates and fricatives of Middle Chinese to their voiceless counterparts. To compensate for the loss of this difference, Cantonese has split each of the Middle Chinese tones into two, one for Middle Chinese voiced initial consonants (Yang) and one for Middle Chinese voiceless initial consonants (Yin). In addition, Cantonese has split the Yin-Entering tone into two, with a higher tone for short vowels and a lower tone for long vowels. As a result, Cantonese now has three entering tones:

• Upper (Short Yin, 陰入)
• Middle (Long Yin, 中入), was derived from Upper (陰入)
• Lower (Yang, 陽入)

The entering tone in Cantonese has retained its short and sharp character.

Hakka[link]

Hakka preserves all of the entering tones of Middle Chinese and it is split into two registers. The Meixian Hakka dialect often taken as the paradigm gives the following:

• 陰入 [ ˩ ] a low pitched checked tone
• 陽入 [ ˥ ] a high pitched checked tone

Middle Chinese entering tone syllables ending in [k] whose vowel clusters have become front high vowels like [i] and [ɛ] shifts to syllables with [t] finals in some of the modern Hakka^[2] as seen in the following table.

Min[link]

Southern Min (Min Nan, including Taiwanese) has two entering tones:

• Upper (Yin, 陰入), tone number marked as 4
• Lower (Yang, 陽入), tone number marked as 8

A word may switch from one of these tones to the other due to tone sandhi. Words with entering tones end with either a glottal stop ([-h]), [-p], [-t] or [-k] (all unaspirated). There are many words that have different finals in their literary and colloquial forms.

Entering tone in Sino-Xenic[link]

Many Chinese words were borrowed into Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese during the Middle Chinese period, so these languages preserve the entering tone to varying degrees.

Japanese[link]

Because Japanese does not allow a syllable to end with a consonant, the endings -k, -p, -t were rendered as separate syllables -ku or -ki, -pu, and -ti (-chi) or -tu (-tsu) respectively. Later phonological changes further altered some of the endings:

• In some cases where the ending is immediately followed by an unvoiced consonant in a compound, the ending is lost, and the consonant becomes geminate.
  • Examples: 学 gaku + 校 kau (> Modern Japanese kō) becomes 学校 gakkō (school), and 失 shitsu + 敗 hai becomes 失敗 shippai (failure)

• The -pu ending changes into -u. (pu>fu>hu>u). This process can be followed by -au -> -ō and -iu -> -yū.
  • Example: 十 jipu (ten) becomes jū

It is possible to recover the original ending by examining the historical kana used in spelling a word.

Korean[link]

Korean keeps the -k and -p endings, while the -t ending has changed into -l.

Vietnamese[link]

Vietnamese preserves all of the endings -p, -t, -k (spelt -p, -t, -c, respectively). Additionally, after the vowels ê or i, the ending -c changes to -ch, giving rise to -ich and -êch. In addition, "ach" (pronounced like aik) also occurs for some words of -k ending.

Reconstruction of entering tones from languages that lack it[link]

Although it is hard to distinguish words of entering tone origin based on Mandarin pronunciation only, it is possible to do so to an extent with the help of the phonetic component of each Chinese character. Although this is not completely accurate, it is a quick way to identify characters of the entering tone.

• If a character has a phonetic component and is known to have an entering tone, other characters that have that phonetic component probably have an entering tone. For example, if one already knows that 白 (white) is of the entering tone, then one can conjecture that 拍 (beat), 柏 (fir), 帛 (white cloth), 迫 (urgent) are also of entering tone.
• Characters that begin with voiceless unaspirated obstruents and have a second tone in Mandarin almost always have an entering tone.

This section requires expansion.

See also[link]

• Historical Chinese phonology
• Sino-Japanese vocabulary
• Sino-Korean vocabulary
• Sino-Vietnamese vocabulary
• Tone name

References[link]

External links[link]

• Chinese Universal Tone Tutorial

Haley Bennett (born Haley Loraine Keeling; January 7, 1988) is an American singer and actress.

She will star in the new FX series Outlaw Country with Luke Grimes and Mary Steenburgen.^[2]

Life and career[link]

Haley Bennett was born in Naples, Florida as Haley Loraine Keeling, the daughter of Leilani Dorsey Bennett and Ronald Keeling. As a child, she moved with her father to Stow, Ohio, where she attended Stow-Munroe Falls High School, before the family relocated back to Naples.^[3][4] Later, she studied music and acting while attending Barron Collier High School in Naples. She and her mother moved to Los Angeles, California to pursue her career in the summer of 2005 after high school.^[5]

Haley made her film debut as the pop music singer Cora Corman in the 2007 romantic comedy Music and Lyrics, alongside Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore. Bennett sang several songs for the Music and Lyrics soundtrack, including "Buddha's Delight" and "Way Back into Love". Fragments of "Entering Bootytown" and "Slam" are heard during concert scenes in the movie. "Invincible" can only be heard during the end credits and is only a minute and a half long.

She appeared in the February 2007 issue of GQ in the GQ/Features section.^[6] Also that year, she signed with 550 Music/NuSound Records (part of the Epic Records family of labels), and began working on her first album with the aid of singer/songwriter Shaley Scott.

She signed a three-picture deal with Warner Brothers Pictures^[7] and starred in her second and third movies, College and The Haunting of Molly Hartley (2008), in which she played the lead role. She also made a cameo in the movie Marley & Me. She also appeared in Greg Laswell's remake of "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" music video, and starred along side Julia Stiles and Lily Cole in Shekhar Kapur's short movie Passage. Bennett appeared in the horror film The Hole, shot in 3D and directed by Joe Dante.^[8]

Haley performed her first live concert at The Mint in Los Angeles on June 19, 2008. Haley appeared in the October issue of Teen Vogue in the Young Hollywood section.

Bennett will appear in the Terrence Malick directed Lawless, scheduled to enter full production in 2012.^[9]

Filmography[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website
• Haley Bennett at the Internet Movie Database
• Haley Bennett at AllRovi
• Haley Bennett on Myspace

Dane Cook
Cook at Comic Con 2007 promoting Good Luck Chuck
Birth name	Dane Jeffrey Cook
Born	(1972-03-18) March 18, 1972 (age 40) Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Medium	Stand-up, film, television
Nationality	American
Years active	1990–present
Genres	Stand-up comedy
Subject(s)	Observational comedy
Influences	George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Denis Leary, Steve Martin
Notable works and roles	Retaliation, Dane Cook: Vicious Circle, Isolated Incident
Website	Official website

Dane Jeffrey Cook (born March 18, 1972) is an American stand-up comedian and film actor. He has released five comedy albums: Harmful If Swallowed; Retaliation; Vicious Circle; Rough Around The Edges: Live From Madison Square Garden; and Isolated Incident. In 2006, Retaliation became the highest charting comedy album in 28 years and went platinum.^[1] He performed an HBO special in the Fall of 2006, Vicious Circle, a straight-to-DVD special titled Rough Around The Edges (which is included in the album of the same name), and a Comedy Central special in 2009 titled Isolated Incident.

He is credited as one of the first comedians to use a personal webpage and MySpace to build a large fan base^[2] and in 2006 was described as "alarmingly popular".^[3] As an actor, Cook has appeared in films since 1997, including Mystery Men, Waiting..., Employee of the Month, Good Luck Chuck, Dan in Real Life, Mr. Brooks (in a non-comedic role), and My Best Friend's Girl.

Personal life[link]

Cook was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts,^[4] the second son of Donna Jean (née Ford) and George F. Cook.^[5] Cook has an older half-brother, Darryl, and five sisters. He was raised in a Roman Catholic family^[6] in Arlington, Massachusetts, where he attended Arlington High School.

Cook has described himself as being "pretty quiet, pretty introverted, shy" as a child, although he was a "wild child" at home.^[7] He overcame his shyness in his junior year of high school when he began acting and doing stand-up comedy.^[8] After graduating from high school, he studied graphic design in college as a back-up plan in case he did not achieve success in comedy.^[9] He now designs all of his merchandise, including the cover of his album Harmful If Swallowed.^[8] Cook has stated that he does not drink or do drugs.^[10]

Cook's half-brother Darryl was Cook's business manager until 2008, when it was discovered that Darryl and his wife had embezzled millions of dollars from Dane Cook. Both Darryl and his wife have been sentenced to prison for the embezzlement.^[11]

Career[link]

Dane Cook

Stand-up[link]

In 1994, Cook moved to New York City and began performing. Two years later, he moved to Los Angeles, where he still lives today.^[12] His big break came in 1998 when he appeared on Comedy Central's Premium Blend. In 2000, Cook did a half-hour special on Comedy Central Presents. Since then his special has won the Comedy Central Stand-up showdown twice in a row.^[13]

In 2003, Cook released his first CD/DVD, Harmful If Swallowed. He signed a contract with Comedy Central Records. The album is certified platinum. He released his second CD/DVD in 2005, entitled Retaliation. This album went double platinum and made Cook the first comic in 29 years to have an album at #4 on the Billboard charts.^[13] He performed at the MTV Video Music Awards, and then afterwards he joined Snoop Dogg (who introduced him) in presenting the award for Best New Artist.^[13]

On April 15, 2005, Cook performed his first HBO Special entitled Vicious Circle. Vicious Circle was filmed "in the round" at the TD Banknorth Garden. The same year, Cook shot two pilot episodes for his own sitcom, Cooked. The sitcom never got picked up and the two pilot episodes were later released on DVD as the Lost Pilot Episodes. That same year, he embarked on a 30-day 20-show college tour called Tourgasm with his long time friends Robert Kelly, Gary Gulman, and Jay Davis. The tour was filmed and was later made into a 9-episode documentary on HBO.

On December 3, 2005, Cook hosted Saturday Night Live. It was one of the highest-rated SNLs of the season".^{[14][dead link]} He would then go on to host the premiere of season 32 of SNL a year later. Both episodes were the highest rated of the season.^{[citation needed]}

In 2006, Cook headlined for Dave Attell's Insomniac Tour and hosted the 2006 Teen Choice Awards alongside Jessica Simpson. The following year he won the award for Best Comedian. On November 12, 2007, Cook became the second comic to sell out Madison Square Garden. He did two sold out shows in one night. The show was filmed and would later be put onto a DVD to be sold on Cook's third comedy album. Cook won the Big Entertainer Award at the VH1 Big in '06 Awards, and Rolling Stone magazine's Hot Comic of the Year. The following day, November 13, 2007, he released his third CD/DVD entitled Rough Around The Edges, which was filmed live at Madison Square Garden in New York City. During that time, he embarked on his first arena tour.^{[citation needed]}

On April 10, 2007, Cook broke The Laugh Factory's endurance record (previously held by Richard Pryor)^[15] by performing on stage for 3 hours and 50 minutes. Dave Chappelle would break the record five days later.^[16] On January 1, 2008, Cook later broke Chapelle's record, by performing on stage for 7 hours.^[17]

From May 23, 2008 to May 25, 2008, Cook reunited with Robert Kelly and Al Del Bene for three shows at The Coliseum in Caesars Palace. From May 29, 2008, to June 4, 2008, the trio went to Iraq to perform for the troops. Del Bene was the Emcee, Kelly was the Feature, and Cook was the Headliner.^{[citation needed]}

He finished his fourth album, Isolated Incident; a performance which aired on Comedy Central on May 17, 2009, with the release of the record following two days later. He kicked off that tour at the Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut, on April 25, 2009. This album will be the last as part of Cook's four record deal with Comedy Central Records. The new album was performed at The Laugh Factory in Hollywood, which is considered to be Cook's home base, where he goes and works on new material. He released the DVD version of Isolated Incident in November 2009.^[18]

Critique[link]

Cook's style is principally "long-form storytelling"^[19] and "multipurpose phrases"^[3] with a casual attitude. Cook says his onstage persona is a combination of the personalities of his mom, Donna, and his dad, George. "My mother is like a Looney Tunes cartoon. She's wiggly ... She has the ability to tongue in cheek a lot, and do it in a way where she's being physical. My dad is the polar opposite. He always had a little 'what the fuck' in his voice. Even if he knew nothing about what he was talking about, he could sell it. So I looked at these two extremely funny people and created a style of comedy from absorbing their actions."^[20]

He explains:

I wanted to create a stage persona for myself that allowed me to really speak about anything I want... So I can be a storyteller, I can be jokey, I can be corny, I can be a little vulgar, I can be a lot vulgar. And I'm not afraid to go anywhere to get the point of the joke across, even if I have to just blabber like a retard until it becomes apparent that I'm a retard and that the audience should laugh.

Commentators in a variety of media sources have characterized Dane Cook's humor as unfunny.^[2][3][21] Comedian Ron White has criticized Dane Cook for his lack of real material and for his inflated ego; saying "[He] does not make me laugh, at all, in any way, shape or form."^[22] When asked about his opinion of Cook on The Howard Stern Show, comedian Nick DiPaolo said "he doesn't make me laugh, but that doesn't mean he's not funny."^[23] On Boston radio station WBCN, Dane Cook was named by radio show Toucher and Rich to a tournament of the top 16 "Worst Comedians" and, based on listener voting, was voted the "Worst Comedian" of all. In the Michigan Daily, Elie Zwiebel and co-author Jesse Bean wrote that "he's managed to become one of the most overrated comics ever" and that his act is "boringly stagnant".^[24]

Jim Breuer talked about Cook's reputation within the comedy industry, saying: "Everyone kills this guy ... Not one comedian comes on [my Sirius radio show] and says 'I'm so happy for him', which is weird. ... They can't stand this poor guy." Breuer went on to say that he personally thinks Cook is a "tremendous performer".^[25]

Accusations of plagiarism[link]

Comedian Joe Rogan has claimed that Cook performed a bit on an episode of Premium Blend that Rogan had developed on I'm Gonna Be Dead Someday (sketch titled "Tigers Fucking"), and claimed to have performed the routine earlier in clubs with Cook present.^[26] Other comedians have also accused Cook of stealing their material. A 2007 article in Radar magazine about joke theft included Rogan's allegations, as well as the allegations of an anonymous "veteran comic" who accused Cook of appropriating one of that comic's "very physical routines," despite a direct request by the comedian that Cook stop using the routine in question.^[27] The piece also noted widespread Internet discussion of the similarity between the bits "Struck by a Vehicle," "Itchy Asshole," and "My Son Optimus Prime," from Cook's 2005 album Retaliation, and the bits "Guy on a Bike," "Itchy Asshole," and "Kid's Names," from comic Louis C.K.'s 2003 album Live in Houston.^[27] In 2011, Cook played himself in an episode of Louie, scripted by C.K., centering on a fictional encounter between the two comics during which they discuss the controversy.^[28]

Film[link]

Cook began with small film roles in the late 90's, including Mystery Men as "The Waffler," and opposite Dennis Rodman in 1999's Simon Sez.^[29]

In 2006, Cook starred in his first leading role as the slacker box boy Zack Bradley in Employee of the Month, which co-starred Jessica Simpson and Dax Shepard. Poorly received by critics, the film made a modest $30 million against a $12 million budget.^[30] In June 2007, Cook co-starred in his first dramatic role as the devious photographer "Mr. Smith" in Mr. Brooks, which starred Kevin Costner. The film debuted at #4 at the box office. The film grossed $10,017,067 in the opening weekend.^[31]

In September 2007, Cook starred as dentist Charlie Logan in Good Luck Chuck, which co-starred Jessica Alba and Dan Fogler. The film was the second-highest grossing film (#1 Comedy) at the U.S. box office in its opening weekend, grossing $13.6 million in 2,612 theaters. The film went on to have a total box office tally of approximately $35 million U.S. and $24 million foreign. It was received very poorly by critics.^[32] A month later, Cook co-starred as Mitch Burns in Dan In Real Life, which starred Steve Carell. The film grossed $11.8 million in 1,921 theaters its opening weekend, ranking #2 at the box office. As of July 6, 2008, it has grossed $62,745,217. It received moderate to good reviews from critics.^[33]

In 2008, Cook starred as air purifier call-center supervisor Tank Turner in My Best Friend's Girl with Kate Hudson, Jason Biggs, and Alec Baldwin. The film grossed $8.2 million in its opening weekend, debuting at #3 at the box office, but received poor reviews from critics.^[34]

In 2010, Cook auditioned for the role of Captain America for Captain America: The First Avenger, although the director, Joe Johnston, did not have him on the short list for the part.^[35]

Stage[link]

On November 18, 2010, it was announced that both Cook and Josh Hamilton will be starring in Neil LaBute's 2011 Broadway production of Fat Pig.^[36] Production will begin in March 2011.

Tours[link]

• Tourgasm 2006 (w/ Robert Kelly, Gary Gulman, Jay Davis)
• Rough Around The Edges Tour 2007
• Globo Thermo Tour 2009 (w/ Robert Kelly and Al Del Bene) – In a Shave Magazine review of the Globo Thermo tour, Jake Tomlinson expressed that "his live performance quite enjoyable", and gave the concert 4 out of 5 stars.^[37]

Discography[link]

Albums[link]

Other releases[link]

• 2006: Dane Cook's Tourgasm (3DVD)
• 2007: The Lost Pilots (DVD) Sony Pictures Television.
• 2011 In the Future Steel Panther Balls Out

Singles[link]

• (2006) I'll Never Be You – #100 (U.S. Pop), #4 (Germany)
• (2007) Forward
• (2010) Drunk Girl/Red Car^[38]

Cook co-wrote and performed the song "Ruthie Pigface Draper" for the Dan In Real Life film with Norbert Leo Butz.^[39]

Filmography[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Dane Cook

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Dane Cook

• Official website
• Dane Cook at the Internet Movie Database

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Kidd Kraddick
Birth name	David Peter Cradick[1]
Born	Toledo, Ohio, USA
Show	Kidd Kraddick in the Morning
Station(s)	Syndicated: 75+ affiliates
Time slot	Monday–Friday, 5-10am CST
Country	United States
Website	www.kiddnation.com

Kidd Kraddick is an American radio host. His nationally-syndicated morning radio show, Kidd Kraddick in the Morning, is based in Las Colinas, Texas, in Irving, a suburb of Dallas, and airs throughout the United States, syndicated by Kraddick's company, Yea Network.

Biography[link]

Early life[link]

Kraddick (David Cradick) was born just outside of Toledo, Ohio.^[1] He moved with his family to Winter Park, Florida when he was 4 years old, and began his radio career at the age of 18 on tiny WKXY in Sarasota. Within a year, he had a full time shift on Q105 which featured the original "Zoo" format^{[citation needed]}. He moved to Dallas after brief stints in Los Angeles (KHTZ) and Salt Lake City (KLRZ). Kraddick took over the night shift on the newly formatted top-40 station KEGL (The Eagle) and had a loyal following, His bits included the "Boogie Check", "Sob Story", "Guys Corner" and a segment called, "Make it or Break It" (pitting new songs against each other, competing for future airplay on the station.) Kraddick turned down offers from WLS-Chicago and KIIS-FM in Los Angeles and was promoted to afternoon drive. A short time later, he replaced the recently-terminated Moby (James Carney) on morning drive at KEGL. One notable feature he presented was, "Burn Your Buns," a segment where Kraddick, upon a listener's request, would call a certain boss or relative or friend of the listener, and play a prank with them over the phone. (Kraddick drew the ire of many of those targets over the years, to the point where the segment was discontinued.) In May, 1992, KEGL changed formats from Top 40 pop/rock to Modern Rock. The entire airstaff, including Kraddick, were released. Kraddick briefly filled in at DFW station KLIF-570AM, then was hired in November, 1992, to headline the new airstaff at Top 40 KHKS-106.1 "Kiss-FM" in Dallas-Fort Worth. (The station was a resurrection of Top 40 KTKS-106.1, which left the local airwaves in 1987. 106.1's departing format, Smooth Jazz, relocated to KCDU-107.5 Fort Worth.) By 2003, Premiere Radio Network syndicated Kidd's show to several markets, in mostly medium to small cities across the US, with KHKS becoming the flagship station. In 2006, Kraddick acquired his company, "Yea Networks!", from Clear Channel, but continued syndicating his show using Citadel Broadcasting (Formally ABC Radio Networks). His show is now heard on 115 affiliates across America.

Radio Personality[link]

In the early 1990s, Kraddick launched two radio oriented businesses. A monthly publication for morning personalities called "The Morning Mouth" and a show prep "sharing service" for air personalities called "BitBoard".^[2] Kraddick subsequently sold both entities; BitBoard is now operated by Clear Channel Communications^[3] and The Morning Mouth is owned and operated by Talentmasters in Atlanta, Ga.^[4]

Personal Life[link]

Kraddick is currently single, and was married. He has a daughter, Caroline from his ex-wife.

Kidd Kraddick in the Morning[link]

"Kidd Kraddick in the Morning" was born as a local radio program, and has survived through numerous cast changes. However, the two longest-running cast members are Kellie Rasberry and Big Al Mack.

Kidd Kraddick voices a number of characters on the show. He makes extensive use of voice altering technology in improvising many characters as they come up during show discussions. Besides that, Kraddick regularly lends his vocal talent to the "Mommy Test," in which he plays "Pooladsanj Pooladsanj" (or, "Poo Poo"), the fictional son of Kellie Rasberry. More recently, Kidd is playing "Wally," a self-loving Wal-mart cashier in the new bit "Somebody's Hot for Wally"; he also plays J-Si's wife, Kinsey, the ultimate Valley Girl as well as "Curious Johnny," a rambunctious young boy whose fixation with Kellie Rasberry (Hottie) borders on creepy. The show is broadcast from 6-10am CST on weekday mornings and is nationally syndicated in more than 75 markets.

References[link]