FNiMN

[french frank]

FF, there were two complete works last night - the William Blezard suite and the RVW Folk Song suite, and I think it is permissible to consider overtures as such, since they are also found in their own right as part of a conventional R3 type concert. However I understand what you are saying in terms of what you prefer to listen to.

My main argument which applies to most of my carping is that it's NOT the individual musical pieces that I complain about: it's the overall programme format. Who would bother to tune in, either live or on Sounds, for one single piece of music unless it was pretty substantial and held particular interest. Next week looks more typical of FNIMN: 16 'songs' (both senses) from the musicals.

If only 200,000 R2 listeners come over to R3 to hear their favourite R2 show, that adds 200,000 new listeners to R3's audience, even if they only listen to FNIMN and then go away again. But if R3 were to add a few more similar shows it might bring in even more because "Radio 3 broadcasts light music and music theatre. More please."

[gradus]

My main argument which applies to most of my carping is that it's NOT the individual musical pieces that I complain about: it's the overall programme format. Who would bother to tune in, either live or on Sounds, for one single piece of music unless it was pretty substantial and held particular interest. Next week looks more typical of FNIMN: 16 'songs' (both senses) from the musicals.

If only 200,000 R2 listeners come over to R3 to hear their favourite R2 show, that adds 200,000 new listeners to R3's audience, even if they only listen to FNIMN and then go away again. But if R3 were to add a few more similar shows it might bring in even more because "Radio 3 broadcasts light music and music theatre. More please."

I for one would tune in for a performance of a single song if I thought it particularly enjoyable but each to his/her own.

[cloughie]

My main argument which applies to most of my carping is that it's NOT the individual musical pieces that I complain about: it's the overall programme format. Who would bother to tune in, either live or on Sounds, for one single piece of music unless it was pretty substantial and held particular interest. Next week looks more typical of FNIMN: 16 'songs' (both senses) from the musicals.

If only 200,000 R2 listeners come over to R3 to hear their favourite R2 show, that adds 200,000 new listeners to R3's audience, even if they only listen to FNIMN and then go away again. But if R3 were to add a few more similar shows it might bring in even more because "Radio 3 broadcasts light music and music theatre. More please."

It would likely be R2 listeners who have now seen the final ‘old Light Programme’ and feel disfranchised by the creeping changes over the years - ‘Listen to the Band’ and ‘The Organist Entertains’ and other programmes aimed at an older, ageing, audience.

[cloughie]

I for one would tune in for a performance of a single song if I thought it particularly enjoyable but each to his/her own.

Yes - thank you gradus for ‘Spring can really…’ prompt!

[french frank]

I for one would tune in for a performance of a single song if I thought it particularly enjoyable but each to his/her own.

Does that assume you've already heard it and already found it 'enjoyable'? If you just looked through a playlist would you be just as eager to hear it?

[Serial_Apologist]

I've just noticed that the playlist gives the composer of the London Fields Suite as Baby Tate, rather than Phyllis Tate

I strongly suspected that as soon as I saw the post! AI (artificial insemination) taking over to save wage costs no doubt. And was this particular Wolf Tommy, or, as I suspect, Hugo?

[oddoneout]

I strongly suspected that as soon as I saw the post! AI (artificial insemination) taking over to save wage costs no doubt. And was this particular Wolf Tommy, or, as I suspect, Hugo?

Wiki says Tommy for the song in question.

[oddoneout]

This makes depessing reading. For me, 18 pieces in 134 minutes is the same old mixed melody ragbag, with Mozart and Elizabeth Maconchy rubbing shoulders with Baby Tate and Tommy Wolf. Time is better spent, as far as I'm concerned, putting on a CD than searching out one song however superbly performed, even in an upmarket version of R2's programme. In all, it's just another 134 minutes removed from Radio 3. But if you enjoy it, you'll probably come to enjoy the rest of Radio 3's programming.

You wouldn't have liked the lunchtime concert I attended today - 17 items in an hour - with a few words between each one!

[LMcD]

Yes - thank you gradus for ‘Spring can really…’ prompt!

I did think that Clare Teal - fine singer though she is - 'jarred' a bit in the context of most of the pieces played, but not enough to scream, sigh, tut-tut, shout at my radio or switch off!

[french frank]

You wouldn't have liked the lunchtime concert I attended today - 17 items in an hour - with a few words between each one!

I would neither have liked it nor disliked it! If I saw what the programme was I wouldn't have gone in the first place. Currently having to elevate my foot at regular intervals, I've been lying down listening to various versions of K488. When it finishes, I get up

[smittims]

Well, that's probably better for you than a longer work . Compton Mackenzie recommended a certain record af a Mozart Trio because it was the right length to listen to while shaving.

I've hardly ever listened to FNIMN, except many years ago when on holiday in a chalet with a 'piped' radio which had two channels: 'Ocean Sound' which was ghastly, and Radio Two. This was in the days when Derek Jameson used to broadcast his trenchant views on life and the universe , which led a rival to say he probably thought 'erudite' was a kind of glue.

Ad many years before that I often listened with my parents to 'Grand Hotel ' , a similar programme, which included a lot more classical music than one might expect today.

[cloughie]

Well, that's probably better for you than a longer work . Compton Mackenzie recommended a certain record af a Mozart Trio because it was the right length to listen to while shaving.

I've hardly ever listened to FNIMN, except many years ago when on holiday in a chalet with a 'piped' radio which had two channels: 'Ocean Sound' which was ghastly, and Radio Two. This was in the days when Derek Jameson used to broadcast his trenchant views on life and the universe , which led a rival to say he probably thought 'erudite' was a kind of glue.

Ad many years before that I often listened with my parents to 'Grand Hotel ' , a similar programme, which included a lot more classical music than one might expect today.

Don’t knock it. The Palm Court Orchestra was where many an orchestral player, particularly string players honed their craft before moving on to the major orchestras, or indeed included experienced players ‘moonlighting or daylighting’ from their regular job. Indeed Martin Milner as a freelancer led the Buxton Spa Orchestra from where he no doubt picked up the schmaltz that so impressed JB when auditioning a leader for the Halle!

[french frank]

Don’t knock it. The Palm Court Orchestra was where many an orchestral player, particularly string players honed their craft before moving on to the major orchestras, or indeed included experienced players ‘moonlighting or daylighting’ from their regular job. Indeed Martin Milner as a freelancer led the Buxton Spa Orchestra from where he no doubt picked up the schmaltz that so impressed JB when auditioning a leader for the Halle!

I don't know that anyone wants to 'knock' anything, especially for being popular. But these discussions usually end up with someone saying, 'Whether it should be on R3 is another matter'. But that is what 'matters'. Whether a programme is good, bad, liked, disliked and so on is 'another matter'.

I would say that Radio 3 has a duty to feature great composers and lesser (even indifferent) composers, major works and minor works, works so little known that no one has any opinion about them one way or the other. So it seems not unreasonable to suggest the station should stay broadly within its specialist music areas of classical, jazz and world music. Extending the range of music just to attract more listeners is a cheap marketing ploy.

[LMcD]

I don't know that anyone wants to 'knock' anything, especially for being popular. But these discussions usually end up with someone saying, 'Whether it should be on R3 is another matter'. But that is what 'matters'. Whether a programme is good, bad, liked, disliked and so on is 'another matter'.

I would say that Radio 3 has a duty to feature great composers and lesser (even indifferent) composers, major works and minor works, works so little known that no one has any opinion about them one way or the other. So it seems not unreasonable to suggest the station should stay broadly within its specialist music areas of classical, jazz and world music. Extending the range of music just to attract more listeners is a cheap marketing ploy.

Broadly speaking, isn't that what it's doing most of the time? I don't think a 90-minute concert of 'light' music (which is not a derogatory term in my book) on a Friday evening means that the station is failing in its principal mission,

[smittims]

I still think Radio Two would be improved by having FMIMN restored, not to mention the 'BBC Festival of Light Music ' where I was pleased to hear Ifor James play Ernest Tomlinson's Rhapsody and Rondo for horn and orchestra though I gather there's a vocal anti-classical element in its regular audience. Here's the rub: by a sort of 'cascading process' Radio 3 is becoming what Radio Two used to be, and Radio Two is becoming what Radio One used to be.

I don't knock Radio One: at least it has a clear identity, and they're honest enought to admit that there are barriers, whether we like it or not: something Radio Three management seem to be squeamish about. . I don't think even Sam Jackson knows what Radio Three's identity is any more (and please don't tell me its' 'the home of classical music': that's just allied propaganda.