Breakfast: rules for producers and presenters

[french frank]

Let's construct the basis for the perfect Breakfast programme:

1. Musical content: at present there are usually about 25 items, sometimes fewer, often more. Average length c 7 minutes, range per item up to about 12 minutes.

I'll offer a raise of the average length to 11 minutes, c. 17 items per programme.

2. Variety: is this necessarily a virtue? One thing I dislike is the bittiness, one minute it's Bach, next minute it's My Boy Bill, then it's Ravel, then it's Pergolesi, then it's Duke Ellington, then it's Ravel, then it's Mozart, then it's Sibelius, then it's A Short Ride in a Fast Machine, then it's Ravel, and so on. Not advocating a programme of Bach, or 'Classical', or late Romantic, but the shortness of the pieces (and the abrupt switches between classical, jazz, Broadway, world) tend to please almost no one for longer than about 6 minutes at a time.

Can we agree and disagree on those points, and then move on to an hour's worth, say, of music? Afterwards:

3. Trails:
4. Time checks:
5. Invitations to email &c:
6. Frequency of station, programme and presenter idents:
7. Presenter's links:

[antongould]

Sorry FF I somehow missed this thread.

My views
1 Musical Content
Agree that about 11 minutes as an average would be better.
2 Variety
It can be bitty, whilst I enjoyed Martin Handley this morning he was a bit here, there and everywhere. I think it would be better if one piece tended, to some extent, to "flow" from the last rather then jump from Vivaldi to Broadway.

[french frank]

Morning on 3 didn't often go above about 16-17 items during the three hours. Of course, it could be that the Controller was bombarded with complaints that the pieces were too long for first thing in the morning; but even in the old days of the Morning on 3 messageboard, c 2001, I don't remember that being a view that was expressed, not regularly, if ever. So it's understandable that the motives seem suspect now.

An average of 11 minutes would allow for the occasional 25-minute piece and still get the 1-minute news headlines on time [ ]. So, as suffolkcoastal said in the other thread, it isn't advocating a couple of long symphonies every morning, or even two 25-minute works per hour. There would still be plenty of opportunities for very short, and shortish, pieces. Perhaps an hour's worth of pieces would best illustrate the point?

[Cellini]

Maybe the Breakfast programme should be replaced with a proper R3 programme. Better than just messing with a failed format.

[french frank]

First step might be to reduce it to 2 hours. I can't see any justification for 'breakfast rules' to continue until 10am.

[Cellini]

Yes, good idea ff - or even 1 hour!!

[Norfolk Born]

There also seems to have been a steady increase in the average number of items in 'Classical Collection', with a corresponding reduction in the average time. I also detect a shift towards might fairly be described overall as a safe mainstream repertoire.

[Suffolkcoastal]

That is what my survey this year seems to be bearing out ofcachap. There is a certain group of composers and works that seem to turn up very regularly, even TTN is starting to be invaded by more 'mainstream' repetoire. The only area that seems to be well balanced is pre-1700 repetoire where the balance of composers seems to be good with only Monteverdi and Byrd being rather overplayed. Whilst the post 1700 repetoire is being dominated by a select group of composers. In terms of items broadcast for example there is over twice as much Debussy and nearly twice as much Ravel as there is Shostakovich and Prokofiev. Whilst extracts from the Jazz Suites account for over 10% of the Shostakovich broadcast and Romeo & Julet extracts and the Classical symphony account for over a quarter of the Prokofiev broadcast!

[BBMmk2]

In between the news etc, there i9s usually just under half an hours worth of music in total, so perhaps have a work of that length? :)

[Martin]

Good idea, BBM. I cannot see why we can't have some longer pieces in the morning programme. For those people who are only half listening whilst getting up or driving or dealing with matters various, it wouldn't make much difference if their attention comes and goes in three minute spans. But for those who want to have 20-30 minutes of devoted coffee-pot listening, the opportunity for a longer work would be warmly welcomed.

[Bax-of-Delights]

There was an oocasion in the last year when there was a run of R3 programmes which consisted simply of a mixture of poetry and music. I can't recall its title but I have a feeling it was run from about 5p.m. - the Sean Rafferty slot. Neither the poetry nor the music was of great length but I found the programmes fascinating and exceedingly well thought out with poetry and music linked and complementing each other. One could drop in and out of the programme and still pick up threads. It would take a little more work than simply dropping a CD of Ravel's La Valse (did I really here that AGAIN yesterday evening?) into the player and burbling on about a picture in the Times that none of us can see and the ratio of poetry/prose to the music may have to be balanced more in favour of the music but it has to be an improvement on the dog's breakfast (!) we have now. Or is that all a little too elitist? The down/up side is that there's no need for a "presenter"!

Ditch the news completely.

[Nick Armstrong]

Bax - yes, they re-ran a lot of repeats of Words & Music (usually on latish Sunday evenings)... was it in the summer or last Christmas? (I lose track of time).

Incidentally, I thought of you just now and hoped you'd found your way here, when posting about one of your namesake's masterpieces on the Advent Carols thread ;)

[Panjandrum]

There was an oocasion in the last year when there was a run of R3 programmes which consisted simply of a mixture of poetry and music. I can't recall its title but I have a feeling it was run from about 5p.m. - the Sean Rafferty slot. Neither the poetry nor the music was of great length but I found the programmes fascinating and exceedingly well thought out with poetry and music linked and complementing each other. One could drop in and out of the programme and still pick up threads. It would take a little more work than simply dropping a CD of Ravel's La Valse (did I really here that AGAIN yesterday evening?) into the player and burbling on about a picture in the Times that none of us can see and the ratio of poetry/prose to the music may have to be balanced more in favour of the music but it has to be an improvement on the dog's breakfast (!) we have now. Or is that all a little too elitist? The down/up side is that there's no need for a "presenter"!

Ditch the news completely.

BoD, the programme is called "Words and Music" and currently runs for 75 minutes on Sunday night. A stimulating and unusual juxtaposition of words and music: recent highlights have included "The Ancient Greeks", the programme starting with Ravel's depiction of sunrise from "Daphnis" and a reading of "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer".

[Bax-of-Delights]

Ah yes, Words and Music. Sunday evenings here at Bax Towers is busy with dinner and imbibing so I miss this delightful programme.
Would it work at "Breakfast" in one form or another - perhaps from 7 to 8? Pre-recorded and then poor old Rob can stay in bed for an extra hour!

[Suffolkcoastal]

You did indeed hear La Valse again yesterday evening BoD, its 32 appearence of the year, the moment Rafferty announced it the off switch was pressed, Mind you I think that the Debussy Danse sacre et profane has had nearly double the amount of broadcasts, a few weeks ago it occurred 5 times in a week!