New season on Radio 3 to include two new classical music programmes

[DracoM]

It is an absolutely naff title, as you say. Must have taken them all of three nanoseconds. And whether they ARE 'essential' remains to be seen. A very, very
hubristic title. IMO.

[amateur51]

"Essential Classics" reminds me of those budget brands in Supermarkets, even Waitrose now do a "Essential" range, cheap contents with naff labels.

Essential Classics - ask your Avon rep for details of this new range

[french frank]

Bit more info from Rog on the blog. So, Sundays are going to be:

4pm-5pm Ch Evensong
5pm-6.30pm(?) The Choir
6.30-7.45pm(?) Words and Music

then what???

7.45pm(??)-9.15pm(??) Drama on 3(???)
9.15(??)-10.00pm(??) Sunday Feature (???)

then

10-11pm World Routes
11pm-1pm(?) Jazz Line-Up

Erm, so where will Discovering Music be? Sunday afternoon? It can't be Sat'dy afternoon where World Routes and Jazz Library were because that's the new 2-hr Celebrity Favourites programme. Or are they dropping Drama on 3 and that 90 minutes will be Discovering Music?

I was going to ask on the blog but they seem not to be taking comments atm

[doversoul1]

From ff’s post

the new 2-hr Celebrity Favourites programme

:thumbs down:


No Discovering Music?! Is The Early Music Show safe?

[french frank]

I can't stand it! Everywhere you look there are going to be presenters being our 'trusted guides' and offering us 'recommendations'. I don't want so-called trusted guides or recommendations (CD Review/BaL ). I just want them to play the music .

The implication is that nobody listening before midday (Sun-Fri) will know anything about music.

[antongould]

The implication is that nobody listening before midday (Sun-Fri) will know anything about music.

Not necessarily I will listen and, I feel, I know something about music but not as much as the presenters - so I appreciate their recommendations just as I appreciate, and indeed look for, the recommendations of the experts here!

[french frank]

Not necessarily I will listen and, I feel, I know something about music but not as much as the presenters - so I appreciate their recommendations just as I appreciate, and indeed look for, the recommendations of the experts here!

Don't forget they're only going to play 'Essential Classics'. What I meant was that people who had a fair knowledge of music aren't going to need recommendations for those. The programme, plainly, is to be set at a level for new listeners so that they won't find it 'intimidating'. Just as Breakfast is a 'primary entry point for new listeners'. As is In Tune.

It's getting difficult to find any programmes that aren't aimed at 'new listeners'.

[DracoM]

DID for R3 X 7 days a week.

Bloddy Hell. Does RW 's patronising contempt for this office and the R3 audience know no bounds?

[cavatina]

I can't stand it! Everywhere you look there are going to be presenters being our 'trusted guides' and offering us 'recommendations'. I don't want so-called trusted guides or recommendations (CD Review/BaL ). I just want them to play the music.

Given how strongly the press release echoes the language of the Trust report, I'd say they're completely set to carve out a distinctive niche for the station's identity, expand the listener base, help shore up the music industry by encouraging people to buy new recordings, and demonstrate that they provide "value for money" and deserve public funding.

You don't necessarily have to like the programmes themselves to realise it's an incredibly shrewd move and exactly what the times call for. Would you really have them completely ignore the above in order to create a Purist's Paradise? How few listeners could a publicly-funded radio station have before you'd find it an unacceptable use of public money?

The implication is that nobody listening before midday (Sun-Fri) will know anything about music.

Unfortunately, maybe so. If that's the way the demographics are pointing, they'd be foolish to ignore them. If anything, you should be blaming the sorry state of musical education in the UK.

How much did you say it would have cost you to subscribe to RAJAR? If only you had a decent fund-raising program in place--and put together a team of analysts who knew what to do with the data once they got their hands on it-- you could really create some valuable new arguments to bring to the debate, both to the Trust and the media at large. One would think statistically sound, facts-based research would be infinitely more likely to have a significant impact than your personal opinions.

If you're angry that nobody seems to care about the principles behind the historical idea of Radio 3, then perhaps it would be useful for you to reframe your commentary by starting to speak the language they do understand--in a way that's going to matter.

Since he's becoming even more of a fixture, apparently, is it unkind to point out a mannerism (as opposed to disability) which is a serious problem in a radio presenter, and which I'm sure he could sort out with some suitable breathing exercises? I'm referring to his sharp, sucking, loud intakes of breath when talking. When the voice is all we've got to go on, things like that can grate on the nerves.

Yes, it is unkind. Why? Because some of us are infinitely more endowed with irritable nerves than others. So often I find I need to remind myself that what I find grating, others find charming. (Or utterly insignificant.) If I went around pointing out every time I got annoyed over some mannerism or other, I'd scarcely have time to do anything else...sometimes, the kindest thing to do is keep it to yourself.

[Panjandrum]

Yes, it is unkind. Why? Because some of us are infinitely more endowed with irritable nerves than others. So often I find I need to remind myself that what I find grating, others find charming. (Or utterly insignificant.) If I went around pointing out every time I got annoyed over some mannerism or other, I'd scarcely have time to do anything else...sometimes, the kindest thing to do is keep it to yourself.

So, by the same token, you would be happy to be operated on by a surgeon who was prone to sneezing fits: "Nurse, pass me the scalp....ahh...whoosh. Oh dear, in the patient again". Or employ an accountant that couldn't add up; or watch Russian tennis players scream as if doing the soundtrack for a 3rd rate porno movie; or....

[doversoul1]

Cavatina

A leopard and its spots. Or was it a zebra and its stripes? Anyway, this is a concern of Radio3 listeners and not a discussion just for a fun of it.

[Roehre]

I'd rather have 'inessential classics'. We get 'essential classics' aka the usual suspects over and over throughout the year. It'd be good to have a programme that went off the beaten path and explored material we don't often get to hear.

100% agreed. Could be my words. But aeolium's are better .

[salymap]

Essential to whom? If you don't yet know the 'essential' pieces you are probably not interested/musical.

If you do know them you probably know them well enough to make your own judgements with very little imput from presenters.

Either way, not a good name for the programme. IMHO ofcourse

[french frank]

Given how strongly the press release echoes the language of the Trust report[

Forget the Trust report - until they release Management's submission to the Trust for public scrutiney the inference will be that the Trust were led by the nose (as ever) into doing whatever management proposed ...It's just BBC speak.

You don't necessarily have to like the programmes themselves to realise it's an incredibly shrewd move and exactly what the times call for.

It's not shrewd unless you happen to be a commercial broadcaster and your aim is to make money.

Would you really have them completely ignore the above in order to create a Purist's Paradise? How few listeners could a publicly-funded radio station have before you'd find it an unacceptable use of public money?

Well, it had 2 million, pretty much as now, before they thought up their shrewd wheeze - and that was 12 years ago.

Unfortunately, maybe so. If that's the way the demographics are pointing, they'd be foolish to ignore them. If anything, you should be blaming the sorry state of musical education in the UK.

A cop-out. For half a century or more the Third/R3 has educated people about classical music when they were deprived of such education at school. I knew no more about classical music when I left school than the average teenager knows now.

If you're angry that nobody seems to care about the principles behind the historical idea of Radio 3, then perhaps it would be useful for you to reframe your commentary by starting to speak the language they do understand--in a way that's going to matter.

It isn't their language that matters - it's their thinking.

Cavatina, you clearly understand the issues but don't care about Radio 3; your mind runs on marketing rather than the intrinsic value of culture.


And I may add that, although there was no written rule that members should not have two accounts at the same time, I take a dim view of the way you used what was then your second account earlier in the year, and which I only uncovered by chance a week or so ago. It was sneaky.

[Norfolk Born]

Essential to whom? If you don't yet know the 'essential' pieces you are probably not interested/musical.

If you do know them you probably know them well enough to make your own judgements with very little imput from presenters.

Either way, not a good name for the programme. IMHO ofcourse

Well put, salymap! On the positive side, I use some of the time I would previously have devoted to Radio 3 discovering more and more treasures on Radio 4 and its digital 'sister'. Given the hit-and-miss nature of much Radio 4 comedy and drama, I'm increasingly lured down non-musical byways, sometimes discovering non-musical treats such as, for example, 'Cabin Pressure'. The way Radio 3 seems to be going, I shall soon have a more extensive playlist here at home than they'll have in the studio (and I haven't got THAT many CDs!)