We’ve been posting periodic updates about the disturbing decisions being made about KCSN in Northridge, CA (the L.A. area). We just received this bit of historical perspective from Helen Peppard, of CreativePR.
Not SO many years ago, the greater Los Angeles area boasted the largest number of radio stations airing classical music of any city in the country. Commercial station KFAC (which morphed into KMZT), public radio station KUSC, and Pacifica station KPFK all had powerful signals and large listening audiences, and a significant part of their broadcast day was devoted to classical music. In addition, KCRW, KCSN, KPCC, KXLU and other outlying stations had a considerable amount of classical music in their formats. The public radio audience seemed to enjoy mixing music genres, news, comedy, call in talk, even old time radio into their listening day. It was an adventure! And you often discovered you liked country music more than you had thought you did, or the career of Cole Porter was pretty fascinating, or occasionally a caller to a talk show really had an interesting question—and what fun it could be to listen to an episode of “The Shadow.”
Then money became the biggest issue in programming. What kind of programming brought in the most donations. The government pretty much dropped support of public radio, and stations couldn’t survive without maximizing income from their listeners. And so what we have today is not so rich, not so interesting, and not nearly as “educational,” which was, of course, the original intent.
So today, we have most stations with a single format, because every station has devolved into broadcasting only programming what brings in the most money. Los Angeles now has only two stations (not counting outlying stations) broadcasting classical music—KUSC, which is all classical music, and KCSN, which has been broadcasting classical music weekdays during the day, with a grand potpourri of other musical genres comprising the balance of their format. And now it appears that the benighted administration of Cal State Northridge, the license holder for KCSN, will be changing that format, because the station isn’t bringing in enough money! Despite the fact that the college boasts a major music department and has just built a state of the art performing arts center, the powers that be insist that it’s more important that their radio station make money than that it promote the arts, including classical music!
Helen Peppard is a graduate of USC with a degree in Music. She worked at KUSC for a number of years, as well as at KCRW and KCSN, and did stints at half a dozen major arts institutions in Los Angeles. She also wrote for Daily Variety and The Daily News.
Radio stations aren’t the only endangered species in the classical music world. Elizabeth Schwartz of Portland, OR links in her blog to an article about some ongoing challenges at the Oregon Symphony. See it here: Struggling Symphony Fights for Survival. And see this more tempered response by David Stabler: Chicken Little to Oregon Symphony: The Sky is Falling. David Stabler lives up to his name. He’s very sensible and stable.
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Good insights there re the L.A. scene. A few thoughts of my own:
So today, we have most stations with a single format, because every station has devolved into broadcasting only programming what brings in the most money.
Not only that, but research indicates that airing a single format alone — regardless of the format — can help to increase audience. Stations tend to split up their audiences if they air more than one kind of programming. Some people like the mix — I’m one of them — but there seem to be more who prefer getting one kind of programming all the time.
And now it appears that the benighted administration of Cal State Northridge, the license holder for KCSN, will be changing that format, because the station isn’t bringing in enough money! Despite the fact that the college boasts a major music department and has just built a state of the art performing arts center, the powers that be insist that it’s more important that their radio station make money than that it promote the arts, including classical music!
And KCSN isn’t alone in weighing these considerations (if in fact they are, since we still don’t know much firsthand about what’s going on there). Universities all over the country have been selling or trying to sell their radio stations because they don’t see broadcasting as within their core missions. Some involve students more closely in the station’s operations to help justify the expense.
Thanks Marty!