If you could control Radio 3...

[pastoralguy]

I fear that many young people today do not even know that classical music exists, so rarely is it placed in their way, thanks to the dumbing-down of the media and education.

I’ve been working night shift in a care home outside Edinburgh since since I took early retirement from the NHS at 55. (I’d probably be dead from stress had I not).

We had a female resident who had Radio3 on 24/7 and, for me, it was always a delight to go into her room to attend to her since I knew there would be music playing. However, what I found curious was the response on my young colleagues to the music playing inasmuch as there was absolutely NO response at all. It had absolutely no effect on them at any level. These are ‘young people’ ages late teens to early/mid 20s. I never asked their opinion on what they were listening to, probably since I was scared of what I might hear in response.

It was usually ‘standard’ classics such as the Mozart clarinet concerto or a Beethoven piano concerto, nothing to frighten the horses as it were. It was simply background noise and could have just easily been any genre of music.

[cloughie]

I fear that many young people today do not even know that classical music exists, so rarely is it placed in their way, thanks to the dumbing-down of the media and education.

…and that BBC removing any pop music from before 1970 from daytime schedules on Radio 2 and local radio removes a chunk of the history of music!

[Andrew]

I'd like to return Radio 3 to the "Third Programme", complete with programming that starts at 7am on weekdays, 8am on Sundays and has programmes such as "Overture" and "Morning Concert", followed by "This Week's Composer" and very little back-chat from the presenters! Any danger of finding a Patricia Hughes soundalike?

But I suspect I won't have my way......

[Ein Heldenleben]

A point RichardB made a while back on this thread was the inadequate funding for the arts, and that applies to R3 which, according to the latest BBC Annual Report and Accounts, now gets significantly less for its Content spend than some years back. That's not less 'in real terms' when inflation is taken into consideration, it's actually fewer millions, in spite of inflation. That applies also to Radio 4, but Radio 4 gets the biggest shareout of BBC network radio stations' funding and Radio 3 gets the least.

Documentaries are very expensive, CD-based, presenter-led programmes are the cheap junk food of broadcasting. But as we know, many people like junk food.

Docs aren’t that expensive really either on radio or TV - they’ve come down considerably in cost over the years with multi-skilling . The really expensive genres are TV drama, and sports inc rights costs.

[gurnemanz]

I fear that many young people today do not even know that classical music exists, so rarely is it placed in their way, thanks to the dumbing-down of the media and education.

A lot of classical music does impinge on mass/popular culture though ads, film soundtrack, computer games, even TV sig tunes as with Prokofiev and The Apprentice and football's Nessun Dorma and such like.

Similarly, pop music necessarily impinges on my life even though I haven't listened to it seriously since about 1969. However, to me, referring to "the dumbing down of the media and education" misses the mark. I was a teacher all my professional life. Not many of us in education saw our role that way.

[french frank]

Docs aren’t that expensive really either on radio or TV - they’ve come down considerably in cost over the years with multi-skilling .

I don't know how recent your information is, but the commissioning briefs I've seen quote guideline figures for indie companies tendering for the briefs and - as far as the music and arts documentary features programmes of 45-60 minutes were concerned - the one-offs were much more expensive than the schedule programmes that are on daily and are several hours longer. RW told me that Discovering Music was dropped because it was so expensive.

The really expensive genres are TV drama, and sports inc rights costs.

I was only thinking of radio programmes but even there drama is probably the most expensive genre for Radio 3, hour for hour.; but there aren't that many hours of it. News gathering is also expensive which is why I assume Radio 4 has such a big budget compared with the music stations.

[cloughie]

A lot of classical music does impinge on mass/popular culture though ads, film soundtrack, computer games, even TV sig tunes as with Prokofiev and The Apprentice and football's Nessun Dorma and such like.

Similarly, pop music necessarily impinges on my life even though I haven't listened to it seriously since about 1969. However, to me, referring to "the dumbing down of the media and education" misses the mark. I was a teacher all my professional life. Not many of us in education saw our role that way.

Yes but I wonder what percentage of Apprentice candidates know what the piece of music is?

Pop music impinges on our lives - I would say it invades and pollutes our lives.

[Opinionated Knowall]

Don't know where else to post this, but Alan Davey has just announced he is standing down next year.

[french frank]

Don't know where else to post this, but Alan Davey has just announced he is standing down next year.

Probabaly here. We can get our applications in:

https://radiotoday.co.uk/2022/09/alan-davey-to-step-down-as-controller-of-bbc-radio-3/

May be taking slightly early retirement to cultiver his jardin. Announcement needs some studying. Thanks for posting , Knowall

[french frank]

I missed this titbit from Stormin' Norman last May:

https://slippedisc.com/2022/05/blow-to-classical-as-bbc-boss-is-demoted/

My guess is that Norm would have been gloating a bit over this, even if he presents it as a blow to classical music

[CallMePaul]

I'd like to return Radio 3 to the "Third Programme", complete with programming that starts at 7am on weekdays, 8am on Sundays and has programmes such as "Overture" and "Morning Concert", followed by "This Week's Composer" and very little back-chat from the presenters! Any danger of finding a Patricia Hughes soundalike?

But I suspect I won't have my way......

Remember that the Third Programme of old was not wall-to-wall classical music as many contributors to this post seem to want. There was intellectual discussion (more broadly based and less PC than Free Thinking), more drama, poetry and other general arts output. Bringing back some of this would be very welcome.

[Bryn]

Remember that the Third Programme of old was not wall-to-wall classical music as many contributors to this post seem to want. There was intellectual discussion (more broadly based and less PC than Free Thinking), more drama, petry and other general arts output. Bringing back some of this would be very welcome.

Not forgetting the cricket.

[french frank]

Not forgetting the cricket.

That was before the days of Radio 5 Live and Sports Extra. Anyhow, since we aren't, any of us, going to be the new controller, what do we want his/her priorities to be and what changes do we want to see?

For me, classical music treated in more depth (with Discovering Music back), and not completely banished from the later evening schedule.

An end to newest 'alternative', bring in the younger listeners, music shows like Piano Flow, Happy Harmonies and whatever other notions they've thought up.

Seasons of classic world theatre and a rethink (I haven't yet rethought) of the arts/speech output.

An end to 'chat' from presenters.

An extra £10m for content.

[Maclintick]

Don't know where else to post this, but Alan Davey has just announced he is standing down next year.

Will anyone notice, I wonder ?

[french frank]

Will anyone notice, I wonder ?

First controller for 35 years not to have also served as controller/director of the Proms.