Piano World Home Page Forums General Discussions Musicians Welcome! The Day the Music Died - NPR Sells Out

Some of you may already be aware of these changes at NPR (National Public Radio). I am sad to hear of it, public radio has always been a bright spot for me. At the same time, I've been irked with the local NPR (and NPR, in general) for their efforts at squashing small community radio stations.

"Last week it was revealed that National Public Radio was laying off employees in its cultural programming division and, according to Philip Kennicott in the Washington Post, "gutting" its showcase classical-music program, "Performance Today." And this was all happening at the same time it was expanding its West Coast operations to concentrate on "the business side of entertainment. That would be movies, TV and pop music. Classical music, what most people still associate with public radio, hasn't much of a business side anymore, and little of what it does have is on the West Coast. Looks like Beethoven is rolling over again." More info
Here

Seems harder and harder to find good classical radio anymore.

It is sad. Here in the SFO bay area we have exactly one (1) commercial classical music station. And it has a "top 100" format. That is to say, a recording is more likely to be programed if Yo-yo, Murray Perahia, or, say, Winton Marsallis Jr is the artist. If they play a horn concerto, it is nearly always Winton, if they play a piano concerto, it's gonna be Murray, etc... Virtually the same music every day, which is probably, unfortunately, the secret to their survival: casual listeners prefer the familiar. The program director admitted as much in a newspaper inverview a couple of years ago. He also stated that they were one of the very few truly profitable classical staions in the nation.
But at least it is there - a welcome refuge in a radio dial populated with blaring junk.

Build one's own CD collection is another alternative. That's what I did. It has its limitations but it is one way to compensate...

Yes, it's a desert out there. Here in San Diego, where I live, we have only a Tijuana-based FM station that broadcasts snippets of pieces (chopping them off quite arbitrarily, sometimes in the middle of an uncompleted harmonic resolution) with no announcers at all. If you want to know what is being played, or who is playing it, you have to go to the station's website!

NPR is no longer a worthwhile organization, in my view, and does not deserve to be supported.

A question: does anyone know if the new mobile subscription services broadcast serious music?

You mean, KPBS doesn't broadcast classical music anymore? (Or am I just jumping to a wrong conclusion based on your post?)

I'm so glad that we have WCPE out here in the Triangle area. They are a 100% listener supported Classical station, and they have a broad playlist, which I like. They also do streaming audio as well, although I heard that their ability to do that is threatened by some sort of legislation (kind of fuzzy on the details though). I'm not sure what I'd do if I didn't have the option to listen to WCPE. The NPR station here had scrapped their classical music format and went to all news and talk. So we really only have one option here for the classical music.

[Edited to add the URL's to WCPE's website]

If you're referring to the new Satellite Radio there are 2 services: Sirius & XM
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From the Sirius.com website:
Classical Channels:

080 : Symphony Hall
The complete orchestral experience of classical music


082 : Vista
The lighter side - soloists, ensembles, and chamber music.

085 : Classical Voices
Masterpieces, sung by the world's greatest vocal artists.
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From the xmradio.com website:

XM110 - CLASSICS
From sacred to symphonic to a touch of the modern, XM Classics brings you the richness and range of classical music in depth. Enjoy sparkling excerpts, full-length masterpieces and frequent guest appearances.

XM111 - FINE TUNING
The world's most interesting music is on Fine Tuning from XM - a unique mix of classical, jazz, rock and dozens of other styles. It's a musical oasis for the sophisticated listener...a place where the Chieftains, the Beatles, Miles Davis and Charlotte Church live together.

XM112 - VOX
Vox brings you the human voice in all its glory and variety, from lieder to opera to oratorio. BBC opera broadcasts and vocal rarities from the BBC archives are all on Vox.

XM113 - POPS
Find it all on XM Pops, classical music for the rest of us.
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I don't own a satellite radio & have not listened to either service. Both have a LOT more channels than listed here including jazz, blues, etc -- just check out their websites. They have a lot more details on the exact nature of the programming on each channels & whether or not it's commercial free.

XM Satellite Radio Website

Sirius Satellite Radio Website

_Brad

Well, I guess for me (despite my irritation with their FCC lobbying) NPR is still the main stop on my radio dial. Aside from the classical music, I really think "All Things Considered" and CBC's "As It Happens" are the two best news programs on the radio. I'm also a pretty regular listener to "Car Talk", "Splendid Table," "The Savvy Traveler," "Fresh Air," "Science Friday" and "Calling All Pets". And I can never pass up an opportunity to hear Daniel Pinkwater reading his short stories.

Building a classical music CD collection is one possibility (though at about 1,500 cd/lp albums -excluding non-classical- my own collection is something of a mixed joy), but a good collection can't really compensate for programs like "Performance Today" "the Metropolitan Opera" or "From the Top" --the "Performance Today" provides a rare forum for exploring contemporary performances, events, recordings, and such. The local station I listen to does several unique programs --early music, all organ, contemporary composers--and provides me with a window into music I might not otherwise encounter.

I hope NPR reconsiders this decision.

Stuck_Key:
Thank you very much for the helpful info.

I posted this to one of the other forums, but thought I repeat the information here in this NPR thread:

Condoleeza Rice, National Security to President Bush, turned in a respectable performance at the piano earlier this week --playing the Adagio from Brahms' Sonata No. 3 in D Minor with Yo-Yo Ma.

You can hear the performance online via the NPR "Performance Today" website

http://www.npr.org/programs/pt/

Note on the website there is link explaining the "reformatting" of Peformance Today.

MichaelP wrote:
It's ridiculous to have a classical station play only snippets of pieces with no identification whatsoever. For a while we had another station broadcasting in AM (not the best quality, but at least the signal was strong)from Mexico which had a decent format with a single announcer, Peter van de Graf (sp?), who introduced each piece and often gave an interesting historical tidbit about it. Even though I know a lot about the classical repertoire I always learned something new listening to him. The really annoying thing was when a voice would break in midway through a piece to give the station call letters. It must have been some Mexican broadcasting requirement. Alas, this station has abruptly switched to a pop voice format. Now we only have the aforementioned FM station along with a usually weak signal from KUSC in Los Angeles. That station I do enjoy when I can get it, especially Jim Sveda's evening broadcast. Unfortunately, I'm afraid classical radio is dying. Too bad since I grew up listening to it all the time (in Cincinnati where the first classical station was WGUC).

Tavner:
Perhaps you might like to join me in picketing the studios of KPBS. Or perhaps even fire-bombing them.

How about starting an E-mail campaign and see if we can get NPR to change their mind? It just takes a minute to send them an E mail at www.npr.org and see if something can be done about Performance Today before it is completly lost.

Actually, I heard from others who have similar lobbying experience that e-mails are generally not taken as seriously as hand-written letters. I believe the reason given was that it's very easy to duplicate an email message and send it off whereas one would actually have to take the time to hand write a letter, and then put it in the mailbox and send it in. A friend had spoken with her friend, who served as a congressional page, and that person said that hand-written letters are actually read and answered, whereas form, typewritten letters are put into another pile and probably not touched while emails are generally deleted, treated as if it were junk mail or spam.

I thought that was rather interesting to know. I'm not sure if NPR might similarly treat their correspondences this way, but at any rate, I offer this observation as food for thought.