Critics, bloggers and other media have lavished praise on Wordless Music, a concert series based primarily in New York that mines the considerable overlap among the realms of indie, experimental, classical and new music. This series popped up again in my radar because it staged its first concert in San Francisco last week. On the evening’s program was “Popcorn Superhet Receiver,” a work by Jonny Greenwood, lead guitarist for Radiohead. Also featured were pieces by Arvo Part and John Adams, among others.
These concerts, which began in New York last year, are not just attracting critical praise, but eager audiences as well. Many have sold out. Impresario Ronen Givony told Gramophone that often “more than 90 percent” of the audience shows up for the rock, but after the performances they pepper him with questions about the classical works, wanting to know and hear more. And many of these concertgoers are on the younger end of the spectrum.
These are concerts that I, as one of those younger people with similarly eclectic musical tastes, would love to go to if there were something similar going on in my area. And if I and like-minded music fans would enjoy these concerts, doesn’t it follow that we’d also lap up similar programming on the radio — or on other media delivered to us in a convenient and easy-to-find way?
There’s no doubt that programmers at classical stations face a challenge when it comes to synthesizing this mix of Beirut, Radiohead and Mum with Adams, Reich and Part — not to mention the more traditional repertoire. Giving over an entire program schedule to this fusion would probably amount to Arbitron suicide. But there’s got to be a way to flirt with it — make small changes on the margins or on other platforms to lower the barriers a bit, welcome in some newcomers with exciting sounds.
I fondly remember listening to Schickele Mix years ago, when it aired on WFDD in Winston-Salem, N.C., where I used to work as a reporter. Host Peter Schickele deftly blended all genres of music, from the Beach Boys to Duke Ellington to classical to music of other cultures, making it fun and engaging. And I learned a lot — about key modulation, Philip Glass and fugues, among other topics. Jeff Haas, son of Karl, has started a show about jazz at a station in Michigan that sounds as if it’s exploring similar territory (here’s an Associated Press article about the program, Jazz Connections).
Schickele Mix is no more — it went off the air due to a lack of funding. Who has picked up the torch? What could programmers do today to mix things up and attract a new and curious audience? Some ideas:
- Find a few young people with diverse tastes and musical knowledge, and give them a hour to take some chances. The resulting show may not belong in prime listening hours, but perhaps a new audience could find it and generate some buzz the station. Promote it online and offer podcasts with snippets of music or interviews with performers. Create a lively blog. Share YouTube videos. Reach out through all the networks frequented by younger music fanatics (and older adventurous ones too!).
- Create a dedicated web stream with a wider range of new, indie and experimental music. Put it on an HD Radio channel as well.
- Follow the example of Wordless Music and stage similar performances in your area, or work with other organizations that are doing so.
- Network with other stations interested in similar experiments. Share strategies, create and syndicate programs. This is the thinking that led to the creation of the Public Radio Exchange.
In a positive essay about Wordless Music, I think Greg Sandow did a fine job of summing up the challenge at hand:
The young audience won’t come to the concerts we want them to go to. (“We” being all of us in the mainstream classical music world.) They’ll come to the concerts they want to hear. So to draw the young audience it needs, the classical music world will have to change. It’ll have to reflect current culture.
Read more about Wordless Music at its website and check out this review of the San Francisco concert.
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Much as I like to see the WNYC horn being blown, is not “wordless music” what a lot of Classical Music and a lot of Jazz are all about in the first place?
This is a great project because it is attracting a young demographic. It is sharp, spiffy, modern, cool, hot, all of those adjectives, awesome, amazing, the bomb.
Overlap? What about Varese, Copland, Antheil, Stravinsky, Shostakovitch, Prokofiev? Didn’t they all incorporate Jazz in their work? Rock influences? John Adams? Read the John Adams piece in the August 25th New Yorker. Read Kyle Gann’s essays at American Mavericks.
The project is bringing young people into all of this. That is, as they say, abfab.
So, what is different is the packaging. That is what PubRadio needs to do, give its offerings a fresh image, and a more modern attitude. That is sort of what Alan Chapman has been doing at KUSC with Modern Masterpieces. He basically says, here it is come and get it, about genre material that KUSC would not otherwise touch.
There has recently been added to our Retail scene a store called Black and White (or something like that). It is really attractive. You see it from far away. It is very striking. That is what PubRadio needs to do, get really sharp and crisp Black and White, instead of that wonderfully warm comfortable and highly mutable gray of which so many stations are so fond.
Go all the way with some bold thing. Anything. WNYC2 does late 20th cenbtury (mostly, or a lot). WPRB just had a foutenn week every Thursday nothing but Bach in the morning Classical slot. Do a two hour block of music on early instruments. Every day. Feature it on the web site.Make stuff part of the fulfillment packages during pledge drives.
WCNY is a Classical station with Jazz every evening. Is it the right Jazz?
Public Radio need to figure all of this out. Station by station, but maybe also station managers and program managers talking to and meeting with their peers from other outlets.
And, don’t leave out this wonderful asset, the internet. Public Radio is now and has been for a while global in its reach, global in its market potential. So, the websites need to reflect the attitude. Take a look at the graphics at wnyc.org, which have just been redone. They really scream out.
Get on Shoutcast because Shoutcast includes a link to the stations web site, which iTunes does not.
Wow, I do go on, don’t I? I am not even a professional. I am just a WNYC fanatic and a WPRB zealotl, I live and breathe PubRadio.
I forgot to mention Live365. I don’t think anyone is doing any streaming at this terrific aggregator.
I subscribe to live365, and for a miserably few dollars a month, I can subscribe to all the streams I want. Live365 definitely aims at a young demographic, and it includes links to a home page. The aim is to drive traffic and encourage membership. Everyone is at iTunes, so the idea of a stream aggregator is valid. But iTunes does nothing for the station. Innova.mu has five streams at Live365. American Music Center has Counterstream there also. Kyle Gann has a stream. It is definitely a valid idea, aimed at young people. How about a whole coterie of pure classical streams from PubRadio outlets? Pick your period or periods and “bring it” as they say.
Public Radio need to figure all of this out. Station by station, but maybe also station managers and program managers talking to and meeting with their peers from other outlets.
I agree. And I have been wondering if there’s really as little discussion taking place on a regular basis as it seems, or if it’s just occurring behind closed doors (real or virtual), in venues unknown or closed off to me. The Association of Music Personnel in Public Radio have an annual conference. They also have a Listserv. Other than that, who is talking about the future of classical public radio, and where are they doing it?