Imagining the listener

Who is my listener?

I ask myself that question all the time as I pick music to play on my radio show. I know very little about who’s really listening, and because I’m on from 3 to 5 a.m. Tuesdays, maybe few people are. The host who follows me told me that in the last Arbitron book before I started, my slot was the lowest-rated on the station. (Nowhere to go but up!)

I’ve had calls and e-mails from a few people since I’ve started. A man in Fredericksburg, Va., listens to my show as he delivers bread to bakeries early in the morning. I like knowing that. But that’s about it for hard facts.

Whatever the case, I always have many potential listeners. I’m unlikely to please them all. Even listeners familiar with the station might not like what I do, which is somewhat inevitable on an eclectic station such as WPFW. I’ve received only minimal guidance about what to play or not to play. I don’t follow a playlist that someone else draws up. There’s hardly even a music library for me to use. So how do I decide what to play?

I take license to play anything that might fit elsewhere within the station’s wide-ranging lineup. Within my two hours I cover jazz, funk, reggae, dub, ragtime, Latin music, African music, I’ve even gotten some Burmese fusion in there, some poetry, the list goes on. I try to flow from thing to thing with some smoothness, but I think I still jump genres more than most hosts.

I’m basically just doing my thing and hoping it hits the mark. I don’t know anything for certain about my audience. So I won’t imagine a listener. I should just go with my gut, which tells me to focus on hitting the mark — but what’s the mark?

There are many, but here’s one. I will, on second thought, imagine a listener. It’s me. Not this me, but who I was at least 10 years ago when I was driving to the public radio station where I used to work. It was a bit before seven a.m. and when I got to the station’s I’d be signing on for the morning. There was always a pleasant solitude to those early mornings. The high clouds above me were colored with a pink glow. (Somehow Winston-Salem always had beautiful sunrises and sunsets. Like, way more often than here in D.C.) The glow made the road the color of slate and the grass and trees pop out a bit from the scene.

Then this piece of music came on the radio, which was playing my station, at that time of morning airing an overnight classical music service. I was floored. The piece was Chopin’s Berceuse in D-Flat, performed by Artur Rubenstein. It’s now one of my favorite pieces of music. Rubenstein communicates ideas and feelings so delicate and beautiful as to seem nearly impossible. I bought a copy and have listened to it many, many times since. Each time I listen, its impact has yet to soften. (Spend a mere dollar on it here.) It’s introduced me to nuances of feeling — and, therefore, life — I wouldn’t have encountered otherwise.

So I want to play a piece of music for a listener out there who is driving to work or listening at home or wherever and possibly not even paying much attention to the radio. Then something breaks through the mental static and asserts itself, with clarity, emotion, maybe elegance, maybe frivolity or humor. The day is changed. And maybe a life.

Radio hosts: who do you imagine as your listener? And how do you reach that person?