I have an aunt who sends me clippings — articles about music from all kinds of sources. This week she sent me an article by David Schiff with the title printed above. It was from the New York Times, dated May 31, 1998.
It could have been written today.
Today there are just a few strong personalities left on the air… Across the country, station managers and programmers seem to believe that their audiences want a continuous and homogeneous flow of background music, interrupted as little as possible by announcements.
The article goes on to describe the modern idea of radio as “a peaceful harbor,” a “getaway,” a “safety zone,” a “safe haven.” The goal of all this smooth programming is to reach the “fringe” audience, not the core classical music lovers. “Education” is a dirty word, and classical music is only for the old.
Just as programmers express horror at the thought of educating the fringe audience, they tend to dismiss the idea of reaching out to the young.
There’s much more, but you’ve heard it all before. Nothing much has changed in 10 years. These ideas sure haven’t resulted in growth for the classical radio industry. Hey, Program Directors. How about a New Year’s Resolution to try something creative, diverse, interesting, and DIFFERENT on your stations this year?
Happy New Year!
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Absolutely on the money. Programmers should pick out some genre, theme, concept, one or more, and do concentrated programming based upon those choices.
One such choice that I noted in an earlier response was to every broadcast day do early music for a specific two hour period, day time or evening. And, make sure that what is programmed is available in CD or download form.
Another choice which the above suggested to me is new releases.
Another is music from a specific country.
I belong to three public stations.
On one, a station with Classical music evenings and over night, and with a 24/7 mp3 stream, classic Jazz is heard not infrequently. Jazz has significantly influenced Classical music since early in the last century. The reverse is true. McCoy Tyner channels Hindemith
On another, a Jazz station, there are programs playing both doowap and R&B, the station saying that they flow out of Jazz roots.
There are many other ideas which programmers could use.
>>RSM
That’s pretty much what we do for our classical programming here at WTJU. Each announcer picks works that are worthy of the listener’s attention — and sometimes there’s difficult listening involved. But by not worrying about how bland we can make the sound, we get to do fun things like have an early music show, run complete operas, have a vocal music program, contemporary music shows, etc. The kind of programming you’re talking about is happening somewhere in the world.
Ralph Graves, host of “Gamut” (WTJU, Wed. 6-9 AM)
http://gamut-playlist.blogspot.com/
http://wtju.net/
Ralph-
After reading your post, I went right to your web site. I really liked the way you add descriptive material when I open Jazz or Classical in a new tab.
I think that your programming looks great, except for the heavy dose of Rock. Rock does not need PubRadio to push its artists. There is plenty of good Rock on commercial radio. But, Classical music, I believe is totally dependent on PubRadio for its dissemination and survival. My home station, WNYC is the only decent radio source for information on Classical music in the whole New York City area.
Best of luck to you guys at UVa.
>>RSM
Ralph: Thanks for reading and commenting! I lived in Charlottesville for a summer and have driven through often, and I’ve always loved WTJU.
Richard: You wrote:
I think that your programming looks great, except for the heavy dose of Rock. Rock does not need PubRadio to push its artists. There is plenty of good Rock on commercial radio. But, Classical music, I believe is totally dependent on PubRadio for its dissemination and survival.
Reading this prompted me to chime in. On the contrary, I think rock does need public radio. More noncommercial stations across the country have adopted the Triple A (Adult Album Alternative) format in recent years, and I welcome it. (The format was in fact pioneered by a noncommercial station — Philadelphia’s WXPN.)
Much of the “rock” played on commercial radio, with possibly a few exceptions, is completely derivative, repetitive and uninspiring. As with all kinds of music, most commercial stations play only the narrowest slice of the rock music produced today and in previous decades. If it weren’t for Triple A stations, much of today’s most noteworthy and groundbreaking music of many genres (not just rock, but folk, electronic, dub, reggae, funk, you name it) would never see the light of day on radio. Noncommercial stations such as WXPN and KCRW have been credited with breaking artists and bringing them to prominence.
So, as a fan of the real rock-and-roll and its descendants in the more contemporary genres of indie, alternative or whatever you want to call it, I say, thank goodness for WTJU, college stations and Triple A outlets — without them, radio would be much poorer.
Mike, I certainly will not argue with you. I have a huge collection of groups like The Band, Blind Faith, The Doors, ELP, Genesis, Led Zeppelin, Peter Gabriel, Pink Floyd, The Rolling Stones, Steely Dan, Traveling Wilburys, The Who. So, I am stuck in a different time, a time warp.
>>RSM
Mike, the more I thought about it, the more I saw your point. I was aided in coming to agree with you by my own beloved WNYC, where John Schaefer on “SoundCheck”, and David Garland in several of his many guises, “Ear to Ear”, “Spinning On Air”, both introduce new and emerging talent in the whole indie area, pop, rock, folk, etc.
So, if the UVa station is doing that same sort of thing, then I certainly need to recant my comments and wish them well.
>>RSM
Last I heard, WTJU was indeed playing a broad and eclectic mix of rock — great listening.
Marty’s comments (and those from the article she cites very much depict the classical music landscape here in Cincinnati. While we do have a rich musical scene here, the airwaves have become clogged with what “top forty” classical music seemingly meant more to soothe than to educate, inspire, or otherwise stretch the listener’s ears in new directions.
Yes, some music can be very hard to listen to. But in the proper context, a listener can at the very least be given the opportunity to understand the composer’s perspective, or the historical context in which it was written.
Responding to Tim Butz, two of the three Public Radio stations of which I am a member have done quite well with late 20th and now 21st century music.
WNYC (www.wnyc.org) has wnyc2, a 24/7 web stream which streams a lot of recent music, along with WNYC-FM where there really are no limits under the leadership of Terrance McKnight and David Garland. FM is also streamed.
All of the reports are that WNYC’s music programming is doing quite well getting and keeping an international audience.
WPRB gives its “DJ’s” free rein as they are all volunteers. Marvin Rosen specializes in the very new and the very old. Marvin just had his second 24 hour marathon of all music from this current century. At least for the first eight hours, from 6:00AM-2:00PM, there was no music which could not be aired or streamed to any audience. It was all pretty melodic.
So, you know,it is quite possible to get out of the admittedly beautiful rut of the Classical Top 40.
Sorry, above, WPRB is at http://www.wprb.com