FB Friend: Grant Hubbard
Today’s Awesome Facebook Friend is: Grant Hubbard.
Nashville, April 1989. GMA (Gospel Music Association) Week, the artist/DJ reception. It was my second time to attend the GMA, the first representing WLIX on Long Island, NY. I was introduced to a guy in his first week on a new job with Word Records. That would have been Grant Hubbard.
Since that hectic week in April ’89 I’ve had the privilege to spend a good deal of time with Grant. There were another 15 or so GMA weeks (before those gathering were halted for a variety of reasons we won’t go into here). Grant and I served on a number of Christian radio industry committees through the years and there were a number of trips to Nashville for me and into whatever market I happened to be working for Grant. We’d always find a way to steal a couple of hours for a meal or simply some hang time. During those GMA weeks I’d hang out at the Word and later Sparrow Records suite with Grant, playing Play Station and talking.
And there were phone calls. For awhile, till Grant gained super-executive status, they were weekly tracking calls (that’s where the record company rep would call the radio station guy “tracking” the record company’s singles or asking the radio station guy, “PLEASE play my records”). But even after those tracking calls were below Grant’s pay grade we spoke regularly.
As radio and records, and our own individual roles, have changed we don’t get the opportunity to speak as often. But, and I believe this is reciprocal, I know that Grant will always take my call, always have time to chat, share a concern or prayer. And on those all too rare occasions when we do bump into each other at some event or other, it’s always a joy to see Grant again.
