Essential Classics - The Continuing Debate

[underthecountertenor]

PTSD

It must be something to do with this forum that meant that, for a while, I thought this was Petroc Trelawny something something.

[Richard Tarleton]

I think I'd be the same if I were as knowledgeable as Rob but had to demean myself in order to keep my job.

Knowledgeable in RC's case a given. But interviewing is a very particular set of skills, involving listening, responding, not just ploughing through a set list of clunky questions.... Look no further than Michael Berkeley, AMcG (most of the time), or just across the corridor at Kirsty Young....Discussions on CDR, no problem, but outside the comfort zone (e.g. writing,cooking, gardening....)

It was simply a new job description bolted onto the existing format which neither RC nor SW is particularly equipped for.

[JFLL]

Knowledgeable in RC's case a given. But interviewing is a very particular set of skills, involving listening, responding, not just ploughing through a set list of clunky questions.... Look no further than Michael Berkeley, AMcG (most of the time), or just across the corridor at Kirsty Young....Discussions on CDR, no problem, but outside the comfort zone (e.g. writing,cooking, gardening....)

Yes. Of course they could keep the half-hour interview slot (if they must) but give it to people who were good at interviewing. But that would be anathema, because of the idea that it it is Rob's or Sarah's 'show', and that takes precedence over common sense. Gleichschaltung rules.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

It was simply a new job description bolted onto the existing format which neither RC nor SW is particularly equipped for.

My point is that they should be asked to do this kind of thing. Instead, they should be imparting their in-depth knowledge of music, enabling listeners to learn about that art-form - not personal trivia.

[amateur51]

Yes. Of course they could keep the half-hour interview slot (if they must) but give it to people who were good at interviewing. But that would be anathema, because of the idea that it it is Rob's or Sarah's 'show', and that takes precedence over common sense. Gleichschaltung rules.

But not interviewing Fafferty-stylee please!

[french frank]

The thing is, if the half-hour interview were not a regular part of Essential Classics, there wouldn't be any justification at all for having a Masterchef judge being interviewed on Radio 3. We have an hour-long Private Passions. Why have an inferior Private Passions taking up over two hours a week?

Think of the interview as a self-justifying, self-standing programme five days a week and there would be no place for it on Radio 3. Clamp it into a rigid daily format - presenter, artist of the week, guest, brainteaser and whatever other clever idea they've thought up ("Five reasons to Love ...') and it becomes accepted.

Essential Classics as a programme is as appalling as its unoriginal title and mostly a waste of 3 hours broadcasting a day. But that's just the view of someone who isn't the target audience of Breakfast/Radio4 Today listener.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

[Bax-of-Delights]

Very surprised that James May didn't know and had never heard Holst's Beni Mora Suite - the unannounced "gift" from RC this morning. While it doesn't appear on R3 as often as some of the lollipops that churn around I would have thought it might have surfaced more than a few times in May's listening career.

[HARRIET HAVARD]

Wonderful news. Next week will be film music week on EC. And we are promised it will include the Dam Busters March..... Can't wait.

Would love to know what R3 in general, and this programme in particular, now see as the core audiance. Mogadon Man/Woman presumably!

Pass the valium.

[Don Petter]

Neither E nor C, one would have thought.

[Penn Igor]

Wonderful news. Next week will be film music week on EC. And we are promised it will include the Dam Busters March..... Can't wait.

Would love to know what R3 in general, and this programme in particular, now see as the core audiance. Mogadon Man/Woman presumably!

Pass the valium.

Don't know whether to laugh or cry, do you.

Given what the staff/presenters have done to our beloved R3, difficult to know where you would start to sort the poor wretched thing out. Trouble is the rot goes right through the BBC, from top to bottom.

[zola]

"Sarah's Essential Choice" today is Beethoven's Grosse Fugue. Can't really object to the Grosse Fugue being played BUT two hours later in the lunchtime concert there is a performance of Beethoven's Grosse Fugue. Not much co-ordination there.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

"Sarah's Essential Choice" today is Beethoven's Grosse Fugue. Can't really object to the Grosse Fugue being played BUT two hours later in the lunchtime concert there is a performance of Beethoven's Grosse Fugue. Not much co-ordination there.

That does suggest a lack of competence. However, I do remember a time when Tchaikovsky's 2nd Symphony used to crop up over-frequently (even in the days when they bothered to think about programming in an intelligent way).

[Don Petter]

"Sarah's Essential Choice" today is Beethoven's Grosse Fugue. Can't really object to the Grosse Fugue being played BUT two hours later in the lunchtime concert there is a performance of Beethoven's Grosse Fugue. Not much co-ordination there.

Even less than that! It was also played in Tuesday's Lunchtime Concert, albeit in the two piano arrangement.

[zola]

Even less than that! It was also played in Tuesday's Lunchtime Concert, albeit in the two piano arrangement.

Ah, looking closer I see that the lunchtime concert listing in Radio Times for today is for the two piano version. And I have noticed this week that the items listed for the lunchtime concert in Radio Times have in fact moved around the week and appeared on different days. So perhaps someone did notice the clash. Ignore original post !