A couple of quick tidbits:
WDAV in Davidson, N.C., cut short its on-air fund drive yesterday with three days and $100,000 to go. “We cannot be oblivious to what’s happening in the world — and especially in our region,” said Ben Roe, g.m. “There’s a bit of a crisis in our community right now. Our audience sees WDAV as an oasis of calm in an unsettled world. In times like these, we need to provide the around-the-clock classical music our listeners rely on.” More details at DavidsonNews.net.
Robert Everett-Green of the Toronto Globe and Mail reviews the revamped Radio 2 service from the CBC. I find his review more trustworthy than some other CBC critiques thanks to its even-handedness — it’s free of the vitriol that colored most assessments of the network’s new direction. Yet he’s not entirely satisfied, either.
Some notes about happenings in the classical radio world on a midsummer Friday. Dailynews.com reports than longtime radio personality Martin Perlich resigned on Tuesday from his job as Program Director at KCSN in Northridge, CA. Perlich is very well respected for his award-winning interviews with musicians. He’s retiring at age 70 with his legendary energy unabated. His retirement leaves a big hole in the radio landscape and raises even more questions about the fate of KCSN, where there have been rumblings of changes, but no hard news yet. To quote the article … Continue Reading
Who makes money off of classical music radio, or any music radio, for that matter? Is it the artists? The stations? The record companies?
If classical music radio were profitable, there would be a lot more stations doing it. That’s why it makes no sense at all for the Recording Industry of America (RIAA) to try to levy a Radio Performance Tax on stations. For the past 50 years or more, record companies have been sending free recordings to stations and begging for airplay. The money the companies made off all that free airplay was pure profit.
After making money off the stations for all those years, now the record companies have become ingrates and want to charge the stations. They are saying that the radio stations are getting their products for free and making money off them, and they ought to pay for the privilege. Virtually all of the record companies still standing are overseas, so any tax money earned would immediately leave the country.
It won’t succeed — this time. Congress isn’t going to allow it. As of last week, a majority in the House and about 13 senators have opposed the effort. You can read about it here. Here’s the other side of the argument in Wired.