Commenters brought to my attention a few classical podcasts originating from stations. In case you didn’t see their additions to the original thread, here they are:
Boston’s WGBH offers Classical to Go!, a podcast featuring live performances from its studios. It doesn’t have a dedicated Web page, so here’s the direct XML link. Thanks to commenter lassus for that one.
WSHU in Fairfield, Conn., previews local symphony concerts (XML link). Thanks to Mike Crane for that heads-up. A great use of podcasts, in my opinion — strengthens community ties, puts voices of people in the arts community on the air, and helps to establish the station as a go-to place for information about local arts. That latter point, I think, will be especially important as people have more and more options for acquiring and listening to music. Even when they’re listening to streams from Saudi Arabia, they’ll still want to know where to see a live performance in their own backyards.
Know of more classical podcasts that stations are producing? Let us know.
A few odds and ends: Alan Rich shares a letter about the future of Los Angeles’ KCSN from the dean of Cal State Northridge’s College of Arts, Media and Communication. The school holds KCSN’s license. Nothing especially definitive in the letter, but Robert Bucker says the University has been reviewing the station’s mission and structure for 18 months now (which strikes me as a mighty long review — why no decisions yet?) and that KCSN’s audience is too small to qualify it for support from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
“This disconnection between the station and the larger listening audience both on- and off-campus has lead us to reflect on the future of KCSN,” Bucker writes. “The University subsidizes the station significantly, and the current state budget environment has required us to prudently avoid entering into a pledge drive that implies programmatic promises that are not sustainable into the future.”
Doesn’t sound so good, does it? Yet it’s clear that someone at the university has recognized the promotional value of the station, or at least of its website — about three-quarters of the above-the-fold real estate of the website’s main page is devoted to pictures and text about Cal State Northridge. Not about the station. I wonder whether that’s part of its problem. I’ve made a few calls but have not yet had any luck finding someone to talk about the station’s future. You’ll know more when I do.
Also, Minnesota Public Radio/American Public Media is considering budget cuts, though no word yet on how or whether its classical programming will be affected.
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Hi Mike,
I was on KCSN’s classical airstaff from 1989 to 1992. They originally switched to the classical format from “American Roots Music” to gain audience when L.A.’s big commercial classical station, KFAC, switched to Rap(!)
KCSN (then under GM Ken Mills) had an amazing, free-spirited staff in that day–including Alan Rich (who hosted the weekly opera show). For a few quarters its books were equally impressive…until commercial Jazz station owner Saul Levine switched his station to classical (K-Mozart) and gobbled up a huge chunk of the audience.