Repeats

[aeolium]

Another aspect to the various discussions about R3 content is the quantity of repeated material now on the station.

Through the Night is often praised, and deservedly, but it has been remarked here (e.g. by Roehre) that it often contains material that has been broadcast on TtN before. I do from time to time recognise performances that I have heard before.

Breakfast is a selection of short works or extracts, with plenty of chat, and the same works are frequently repeated, as Suffolkcoastal has documented.

Essential Classics is another magazine programme in which there is much repeated repertoire, if not necessarily in the same recordings.

Composer of the Week often seems to be featuring the same fairly narrow group of major composers and in some cases the programmes are repeated from a fairly recently compiled CotW week. The programme itself is also repeated on the same day.

Lunchtime Concert now features more repeats (as well as the unsatisfactory practice of dismembering concerts to fit across more than one day's LC broadcast). For instance, all the concerts in this week's LC series are repeats apart from the Monday Wigmore Hall live concert.

Afternoon on 3 often features repeated broadcast material in a magazine format, though the Thursday opera feature is usually a performance that has not been broadcast before.

Among other repeats this week are: Saturday Classics, The Early Music Show, Words and Music, Sunday Feature and Drama on 3 (the last seems to provide more repeats than original broadcasts these days).

So if you turn on to R3 and get the impression you're listening to something you've heard before in the same recording/performance, then you probably are.

[doversoul1]

Among other repeats this week are: Saturday Classics, The Early Music Show, Words and Music, Sunday Feature and Drama on 3 (the last seems to provide more repeats than original broadcasts these days).

Re: the Early Music Show. This will be the third repeat in a row. I have a sinking feeling that the EMS production team has been disbanded.

[Dave2002]

Another aspect to the various discussions about R3 content is the quantity of repeated material now on the station.

Through the Night is often praised, and deservedly, but it has been remarked here (e.g. by Roehre) that it often contains material that has been broadcast on TtN before. I do from time to time recognise performances that I have heard before.

Some things hardly ever get played, so even a TTN repeat can be welcome. I think Mielck's string quintet has been played twice (at least 3 times - it was on on 25th January this year) in the last 5 or 6 years on TTN - and that's it! I've possibly got a copy which I managed to record for playing in the car on CD, but it may have been lost or thrown out. A great shame.

However - I've just found it on YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rrX7HK7_Lk not sure if it's the same performance.

[Mary Chambers]

On the whole, I don't object to repeats. Very few people can listen to Radio3 all the time, so it's easy to miss good broadcasts - and if they're very good they are worth hearing more than once.

[aeolium]

Some things hardly ever get played, so even a TTN repeat can be welcome.

Yes, and that's one of the reasons TtN gets praised. On the other hand, some performances are repeated quite soon after their previous broadcast - this Friday's TtN trio performances by the Altenberg Trio for instance were broadcast in mid-July this year. I just included TtN as an instance of a wider trend. I'm not opposed to repeats on principle (in fact I'd like to hear more from the archive) but more the quantity of repeats and especially repeats of broadcasts that were relatively recent - this is especially the case with Drama on 3.

[Dave2002]

On the whole, I don't object to repeats. Very few people can listen to Radio3 all the time, so it's easy to miss good broadcasts - and if they're very good they are worth hearing more than once.

Yes - I agree up to a point. I think it was a shame they changed the COTW repeat though. I liked it when they had the repeats the following week which gave more of a chance to hear at least one composer - could get up to 3 weeks (plus about an extra 10 hours) with iPlayer.

[doversoul1]

I think the point aeolium is making is that there are an awful lot of them, and many of them with fairly short intervals, in the case of TTN, often re-repeated. It looks to me (I am becoming thoroughly suspicious these days) that these repeats are not for the listeners’ pleasure but for their convenience.

Yes, I welcome any repeat of interesting early music concerts on TTN but all the same, something bothers me…

[ed.] aeolium has already said it.

[french frank]

The mixture of repeated programmes and repeated material is really not what radio should be about, though; certainly not in this quantity. Some one did an analysis a few years ago which showed how TtN which used to be one offs gradually became a pick and mix of the 2 hour sections - you not only got the repeated music but the identical links too.

All money-saving, but it's unfair that Radio 3 has to resort to this to such an extent just because the people who make the decisions only look at the audience size to measure 'value'.

[french frank]

Screenshot of the increase in TtN repeats up to 2010:

[teamsaint]

FF, Is that repeats of a 2 hour slot? Can't be the whole thing, surely?

And is the news not repeated?

Hourly and then for ever? Certainly feels that way.

[Dave2002]

Screenshot of the increase in TtN repeats up to 2010:

Not quite sure how you've done this, but if the chart shows the repeats of 2 hour slots, then that implies around 39 hours of repeats in June 2010, or about 5 days of 8 hour programming. Does that mean that the new programming was only about 2/7 of the total output that month?

Of course it might still have been interesting, and enjoyable, providing the repeats weren't totally obvious - i.e. chosen from the material from the previous 5 or more years, perhaps with a random spread algorithm.

Has it got worse in the last 3 years?

[Zucchini]

Surely there's hardly a person in Christendom who listens all through the night, every day. So provided that repeats are in different timebands and on different days, they will capture a new audience - if anyone's still awake...

[Bryn]

Regarding the matter of repeats ...

[Dave2002]

Surely there's hardly a person in Christendom who listens all through the night, every day. So provided that repeats are in different timebands and on different days, they will capture a new audience - if anyone's still awake...

That's not quite how its done. AFAIK the same programme of music is distributed throughout the EU each night though there is a wrap around. In some countries they might start an hour earlier/later, with a wrap round at the end. The commentary is in each national language though, in each country, and the programme name may be different e.g. Nocturne, Notturno etc.

The material is gathered from different broadcasting companies, and I believe that it is assembled together by the BBC, and presumably then sent out to individual national companies for the speech links to be inserted. However things may have changed in recent years.

[aeolium]

Screenshot of the increase in TtN repeats up to 2010

It would be interesting to see whether the situation had got even worse in the last 3 years, and also whether the period between one broadcast and its repeat had decreased.

Another point about whether repeats are worthwhile for people who had missed the broadcast first time round is that this value is reduced by the availability of programmes on the i-player, especially with plans to increase the 7-day availability to 30 days. So to have a repeat in linear broadcasting when the same programme is available on the i-player may be seen as unnecessary by some.