FNiMN

[vinteuil]

And 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.

... not forgetting 'Saturday Night on the Light" ( or 'snottle' as my pa referred to it) - which we occasionally listened to if the offering on the Third Programme was particularly not to our taste...

[french frank]

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,

Well, to me that it what it is NOT doing most of the time. Most of it is sequences of short pieces, sometimes with longer pieces interspersed between them; and in most cases there is no question of choosing what you will listen to because you're not told what will be played until afterwards: you choose the programme/presenter. Breakfast, Essential Classics, Classical Live, Night Tracks, This Classical Life, mixtapes, FNIMN, even sometimes the evening concert, follow that same format of unconnected pieces. Admittedly, it appears that there are fewer of the 'unclassified' music programmes such as Late Junction and Unclassified (ie Tearjerker, Happy Harmonies, Piano Flow, Game Play &c). But most of what is left (I think the Monday lunchtime concert's still intact) is for listening to while you do something else.

BUT (and I realise this) it depends how you 'consume' music. For me, listening to music is for quality time. An hour, a couple of hours of listening to chosen music is what it's about. I don't want music on all the time. Other people do want music on all the time. Welcome to Radio 3.

Off the cuff: I would reserve that type of programming to Breakfast only. Private Passions would also have a place (1 hour) though I wouldn't listen to it. CotW would ideally be at 9am, if not at 12 pm. 10am would be a programme such as CD Masters or the old Morning Performance (mostly 'live' chamber music from festivals). These would fill the morning until the Lunchtime Concert. The afternoon would be a 'concert' of longer pieces, all announced in advance, until 'drivetime' (Breakfast and In Tune would be mere concessions to how things are ). The concert from 7.30 - 9.00 would be a concert, announced in advance. These would be followed by speech programmes of the Essay/Night Waves type (Free Thinking as a title strikes me as pretentious). TTN. Jazz/world programming to be fitted in where those listeners would like to hear them. Weekends would be different. Dream on, sweet prince.

[Hitch]

I wouldn't be averse to a weekly programme dedicated to "Light Music" as long as it took a scholarly approach. Concentrate on one composer or on works written for a specific reason: newsreels, Pathé documentaries, soundtracks, public information films, concert parties, civic occasions, etc.. I imagine there are plenty of British composers and foreign equivalents to explore. Goodness knows how many fanfares, songs and suites are gathering dust somewhere. Done with a purpose, such a show might even "inform, educate and entertain"...

[oddoneout]

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.

Part of that at least was met in last night's programme. If it had been included in a programme considering unfamiliar British music, rather than a relocated R2 programme considered too lightweight for R3 the responses might have been different?

[french frank]

I wouldn't be averse to a weekly programme dedicated to "Light Music" as long as it took a scholarly approach. Concentrate on one composer or on works written for a specific reason: newsreels, Pathé documentaries, soundtracks, public information films, concert parties, civic occasions, etc.. I imagine there are plenty of British composers and foreign equivalents to explore. Goodness knows how many fanfares, songs and suites are gathering dust somewhere. Done with a purpose, such a show might even "inform, educate and entertain"...

This has been my point all along - that it doesn't matter what R3 broadcasts (at least in one-offs or short series) as long as it's done in a scholarly way (or like TTN just gets on and plays the music with minimal introduction). That was always what marked Radio 3 programmes out from others. Little of today's output seems to be very scholarly. The BBC seems to have decided that too few people want that.

[Hitch]

I quite agree. I've always thought that R3 should be the BBC's flagship radio station; it has to shoulder a thousand years of music. An on-air Grove Dictionary with personable but discreet presentation, please.

[LMcD]

I quite agree. I've always thought that R3 should be the BBC's flagship radio station; it has to shoulder a thousand years of music. An on-air Grove Dictionary with personable but discreet presentation, please.

But only the 'right' kind of music, apparently - which seems to exclude, for example, 'light' music and folk music, which seem to have little chance of being heard very often elsewhere on BBC radio. I think Radio 2's audience has changed for good, but it seems that it's not the job of Radio 3 to spare 90 minutes a week for those who miss FNiMN and similar offerings.

[Hitch]

I've just said the opposite. By all means, bring in folk and light music if it is treated as a subject to be explored rather than a way of filling the odd 90 minutes.

[oddoneout]

I wouldn't be averse to a weekly programme dedicated to "Light Music" as long as it took a scholarly approach. Concentrate on one composer or on works written for a specific reason: newsreels, Pathé documentaries, soundtracks, public information films, concert parties, civic occasions, etc.. I imagine there are plenty of British composers and foreign equivalents to explore. Goodness knows how many fanfares, songs and suites are gathering dust somewhere. Done with a purpose, such a show might even "inform, educate and entertain"...

Apologies Hitch, I didn't see this before I posted earlier. I agree with your suggestion, and would happily listen to such programmes - much opportunity to hear new material and expand knowledge, in the same way that EMS does.

[Hitch]

[hmvman]

I wouldn't be averse to a weekly programme dedicated to "Light Music" as long as it took a scholarly approach. Concentrate on one composer or on works written for a specific reason: newsreels, Pathé documentaries, soundtracks, public information films, concert parties, civic occasions, etc.. I imagine there are plenty of British composers and foreign equivalents to explore. Goodness knows how many fanfares, songs and suites are gathering dust somewhere. Done with a purpose, such a show might even "inform, educate and entertain"...

Back in 1995, as part of the 'Fairest Isle' season (marking the 300th anniversary of Purcell's death), there was a series of programmes on British light music called 'The Light Brigade'. Presented by Professor Stephen Banfield it did take a scholarly approach to light music in just the way you describe. I don't think it's ever been repeated, sadly.

In more recent years (9 or 10 maybe?) there was the 'Light Fantastic' series which wasn't anything like as scholarly. I recall a discussion session with Tom Service chairing it (say no more..). There was a lot of hand-wringing about why we don't hear more of this music and I thought well, it's in the gift of the BBC to broadcast it but they choose not to, having dropped Brian Kay's regular light music programme.

[french frank]

There was a lot of hand-wringing about why we don't hear more of this music and I thought well, it's in the gift of the BBC to broadcast it but they choose not to, having dropped Brian Kay's regular light music programme.

I think the problem there is that individual controllers have their own ideas about what they do and don't want to include at any given time, how they can shape their station. Radio 1 dropped the Andy Kershaw show when the controller didn't want it and R3 was there to snap it up: it had a fan following so would bring new listeners to R3. Radio 2 drops FNIMN and R3 snaps it up - same reason. Jools Holland? Snap! Elizabeth Alker, popular presenter, is recruited from 6Music. Radio 3 becomes less and less the scholarly Radio 3 of old. I presume this is because scholarly = elitist. Pretty much of an indictment if that's so.

For all the changes to Radio 3 over the past 25 years, I can't think of any new programme (CD Masters, alone?) designed to appeal to serious classical music enthusiasts; by this I mean serious, knowledgeable (or aspiring thereto!) listeners, not listeners to something called 'serious music'. It's been all about attracting new listeners, easing new listeners into classical music, broadening the scope of music beyond Radio 3's range. All well and good, but who loses out every time?

With some facelifts: Record Review, This Week's Composer/Composer of the Week and Music In Our Time/the New Music Show all date back to medieval times; Music Restored/the Early Music Show has been on for over 30 years. The less long-lived CD Masters came and went. Of the current programmes I don't know about SM-P's Music Map. Anything else new? The standard concerts and recitals seem to be much fewer now.

[AuntDaisy]

...
For all the changes to Radio 3 over the past 25 years, I can't think of any new programme (CD Masters, alone?) designed to appeal to serious classical music enthusiasts; by this I mean serious, knowledgeable (or aspiring thereto!) listeners, not listeners to something called 'serious music'....
...Music Restored/the Early Music Show has been on for over 30 years. The less long-lived CD Masters came and went. Of the current programmes I don't know about SM-P's Music Map....

The Listening Service?

Today's EMS was more in the style of the old Music Restored, i.e. an interesting concert with explanatory interludes.
I've tried to listen to Music Map, but still prefer the old Discovering Music approach, it seems more focussed.

[oddoneout]

The Listening Service?

Today's EMS was more in the style of the old Music Restored, i.e. an interesting concert with explanatory interludes.
I've tried to listen to Music Map, but still prefer the old Discovering Music approach, it seems more focussed.

I tried Music Map a couple of times in the faint hope it would live up to its blurb, even if only in part, but, as with Inside Music previously I was disappointed. Shan't try again. What I find particularly annoying is that is is obviously a management decision to produce a second-rate programme, since CotW and EMS still show how it should be done, and R3 has suitable people to deliver - if they are allowed to use their skills and knowledge, which they so evidently aren't.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I tried Music Map a couple of times in the faint hope it would live up to its blurb, even if only in part, but, as with Inside Music previously I was disappointed. Shan't try again. What I find particularly annoying is that is is obviously a management decision to produce a second-rate programme, since CotW and EMS still show how it should be done, and R3 has suitable people to deliver - if they are allowed to use their skills and knowledge, which they so evidently aren't.

The connections on Music Map are often fairly thin aren’t they ?

I don’t think any one sets out to make a second rate programme particularly Sara M-P who is an excellent presenter.

The problem is deeper than that and lies in what the producers perceive the audience to be and the perceived level of understanding of that audience. You rarely hear even such basic concepts as first subject, second subject , development and modulation mentioned these days and very little on how music is embedded in the contemporary culture of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.
All very surprising as TV programmes like Springwatch regularly mention more complex concepts like separation feeding, evolutionary niches , and eutrophication complete with a quick explanation. I suspect that the producers’ perception is that sort of approach would put listeners off - well it doesn’t with Springwatch which has a vastly higher audience.