Host of CBC Weekend Mornings, Stan Carew, has announced he is hanging up the microphone after 47 years in radio.

On his show Sunday morning, Carew said he was turning 65-years-old in August and has been contemplating retiring.

"I've spent the last month thinking about the recent cutbacks here at the CBC and there's a process that's followed after layoffs are announced and I've been unable to talk about the situation until now," he said.

Carew says he's been working for 49 years, starting part-time at Rubins of Halifax clothing store on Gottingen Street during his final year of high school.

He went to Saint Mary's University, but by his own admission, spent more time in his freshman year playing cards in the student union building than going to class. He says he was asked to reconsider his academic goals by the university.

His father got him a summer job in the Canadian Coast Guard where Stan says he got to walk on Sable Island and experience 24-daylight from the deck of the coast guard ship Narwhal.

'The best job I ever had'

In the fall of 1968, a friend gave him a line on a job as a studio operator at Halifax radio station CHNS. He was hired and has worked in radio ever since.

Carew says now it is time to stop.

"It's time for me to give up the best job I've ever had, as host of this radio program," he told listeners.

But Carew says he approaches retirement with a plan firmly in place. He says he will devote his time to music, something he says has taken a back seat to radio for many years.

He claims his next job will be as a minstrel, travelling from place to place playing music. He has hired an agent and is looking to play community centres and house concerts in the Maritimes.

"I'm not going to regret the 4:45 a.m. alarm, but I am going to miss talking to you, and listening to you on Saturday and Sunday mornings."

Carew's final show will be Sept. 27.