Marriage solid as (classic) rock; Beau & Tom celebrate 20 years

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This article was published 19/03/2009 (6367 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Theirs was an arranged relationship, but it was chemistry that kept them together.

The ensuing decades brought many challenges — two sons born in the same year, the deaths of both their fathers, a succession of women, job relocation — yet their bond remains steadfast to this day.

As they prepare to celebrate their 20th anniversary, the Winnipeg pair reveal the key to their longevity.

"We have different personalities," Wolfgang Frietzche explains. "I’m more of a control freak and…"

As is often the case, his partner completes the sentence: "And I just don’t give a s–t."

They jest, of course. But what did you expect from a couple of cheeky radio jocks like Beau (yes, his real name is Wolfgang) Fritzsche and Tom Milroy — the longest-running duo on the Winnipeg airwaves?

Beau and Tom, as they’re more commonly known, spent 18 years waking up Winnipeggers with music, traffic, weather reports and witty banter at Q94 FM (now Curve 94.3) before moving up the dial to become the morning team at 99.9 BOB-FM.

Friday, from 6 a.m. to noon, they’ll co-host a special edition of the Beau and Tom Show and call on guests and listeners to help them celebrate.

"It is kind of like a marriage," Fritzsche admits. "There are weeks when I’m sure I see Tom more than my wife."

That’s partly due to the fact that March 20, 1989 was also the start of an intimate — OK, close-knit — friendship.

Not only do these guys spend their weekday mornings face-to-face in an enclosed broadcast booth, plus many evenings out doing promos and charity events, their families have been socializing for years. They even go on vacations together.

"Our wives got along well, so we started going to each other’s houses," says Fritzsche.

"Beau had a pool," Milroy quips. Both have two sons, ages 25 and 21.

Although their paths never crossed until they got teamed up at Q94, the native Winnipeggers, who are close in age, were leading pretty parallel lives up to that point. Milroy grew up in North Kildonan, Fritzsche in East Kildonan. After high school, the former pursued his radio dreams at Red River College while the latter honed his craft through the Career Academy of Broadcasting. It was a correspondence course.

"I sat in my basement pretending to be a radio guy," Fritzsche recalls. "The lessons were on LPs — 72 of ’em — and you had to tape your lessons and send them to Toronto."

He got his first job at a station in Thompson while Milroy started out in Dauphin.

Both say they were drawn to broadcast careers by the "cool" factor, although Fritzsche’s dream also included bleachers full of screaming fans. (The name Beau came about in 1979 when he got hired at Winnipeg’s CKRC and the program director gave him the handle Buster Bodean.)

"I got into radio because I loved sports and I wanted to be a play-by-play announcer," he says.

"How’s that working out for you?" Milroy jibes.

Three times, the duo became a trio with a feminine edge. Caroline Hunter (QX 104) teamed up with the guys for two years, followed by Frazier (now at Fuel 90.3 FM in Calgary) for five and Dez (Daniels) for seven.

"What a lot of people don’t realize is how much doing morning radio is like a marriage," says Daniels, who currently does the 2-7 p.m. shift weekdays on 102.3 Clear FM. "The upside of that can be great intimacy, the downside is that you sometimes feel the urge to strangle the person sitting across from you. And you certainly learn quickly about each other’s good and bad stuff."

Milroy says they get mad at each other from time to time, but the anger doesn’t last.

Adds Fritzsche: "All these years, we’ve never taken each other too seriously."

carolin.vesely@freepress.mb.ca