Debbie Wiseman talks utter guff about "classical music" on the Today programme.

[Bella Kemp]

Perhaps only slightly off-topic but because Today used always to enrage me at some point each morning, I now only listen to Radio 3 at this time whilst reading my book and sipping tea.

[Old Grumpy]

Perhaps only slightly off-topic but because Today used always to enrage me at some point each morning, I now only listen to Radio 3 at this time whilst reading my book and sipping tea.

Earl Grey, perhaps

[LHC]

The context of the piece was the controversy surrounding nominations for this year’s Grammy awards:

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/feb/20/how-is-this-classical-music-composers-fury-at-grammys-shortlist

The other interviewee in the Today programme, Nitin Sawhney, would not be drawn on providing a definition. So a lot of fuss about nothing really.

I didn’t hear the discussion, but the Today programme has previously been criticized for trying to generate controversy where there is none by setting up guests to argue from opposing positions (see this article by Graham Linehan about how he and Michael Billington were ‘ambushed’ by Today’s producers https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...graham-linehan)

I wonder if this was a similar case and Wiseman was encouraged by the producers to make a dogmatic distinction between classical and improvised music, so that it could then be refuted by Nitin Sawhney.

[RichardB]

I wonder if this was a similar case and Wiseman was encouraged by the producers to make a dogmatic distinction between classical and improvised music, so that it could then be refuted by Nitin Sawhney.

You may be right, but that just means that Ms Wiseman is happy to talk nonsense on the radio just to "generate controversy".

[LHC]

You may be right, but that just means that Ms Wiseman is happy to talk nonsense on the radio just to "generate controversy".

As per the Graham Linehan article, she won’t necessarily have been asked to generate controversy, but rather given a very different brief to that given to Nitin Sawhney. For example, she might have been asked to explain in very simple ‘layman’s’ terms the difference between a jazz improvisation and a piece of scored classical music.

Having said that, it was still her choice to say that improvisation has no place in classical music, when she should be well aware that it’s nonsense.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Having said that, it was still her choice to say that improvisation has no place in classical music, when she should be well aware that it’s nonsense.

I must remember to omit the cadenza if I play a concerto.

[oddoneout]

I must remember to omit the cadenza if I play a concerto.

Is a crescendo in a cadenza a credenza?

[kernelbogey]

...Today used always to enrage me at some point each morning, I now only listen to Radio 3 at this time....

I always think it's never been quite as good since Jack de Manio left.

[Bryn]

I always think it's never been quite as good since Jack de Manio left.

What time was that?

[Old Grumpy]

What time was that?

Ten past eight...

...no seriously:https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/...october/today/

[cloughie]

I always think it's never been quite as good since Jack de Manio left.

The Redhead / Timpson era was good!

[gradus]

I always think it's never been quite as good since Jack de Manio left.

Yes we're unlikely to hear Jack's like again on R4 eg when interviewing Nick Faldo's wife. The conversation went something like this :'Tell me do you have any rituals on days when he is playing a major tournament? Yes in the morning I always kiss his balls'. Sensing ambiguity Jack helpfully added, 'You mean of course his golf balls'.

[RichardB]

Sensing ambiguity Jack helpfully added, 'You mean of course his golf balls'.

Did she answer this highly impertinent question?

[Ein Heldenleben]

Yes we're unlikely to hear Jack's like again on R4 eg when interviewing Nick Faldo's wife. The conversation went something like this :'Tell me do you have any rituals on days when he is playing a major tournament? Yes in the morning I always kiss his balls'. Sensing ambiguity Jack helpfully added, 'You mean of course his golf balls'.

Although this is , only just , historically plausible Jack de Manio died just a year after Faldo won his first major so I’m not sure it was him. I heard it was Peter West the urbane golf and cricket commentator and another golfer . I think a lot of people have tried to track this clip down but it was perhaps on live telly and not recorded …
PS The Today programme in de Manio days was very much a popular magazine programme. It was Timpson and esp Brian Redhead who rebranded into a more aggressive , news agenda setting format. The aim was to get at least one line a day that news would pick up and the best way of doing that is tripping up a government figure…

[gradus]

My 'source' is Paul Vaughan whose entertaining and delightfully named autobiographies 'Something in Linoleum' and 'Exciting Times in the Accounts Department' will brighten almost any day.