Goodbye J to Z - time springs forward

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Tuesday's episode ramped up the musical interest a notch, IMV. I like Soweto's calm measured presentation. A different voice from the ebullient voice of Jazz Now, which didn't click with me.
It's very early days, but if he can continue as he has started, I might become enthusiastic..

Agree about Soweto, he's the best thing about it. The content is not for me. It's as if you had a program about football, and it was actually fashion, footballer's wives and property development. Then they chuck in an old clip of George Best for "authenticity"and a nod to the remit.. Last night's Max Roach track and the previous night's Charlie Rouse fulfilling this role.

Maybe it's the production companies. I get the feeling that people making "jazz programs" are not that keen on jazz. Or maybe this is all that is left of the tattered idiom. BUT France Musique is SO much better, it's a "mystery"!

[Old Grumpy]

Maybe it's the production companies. I get the feeling that people making "jazz programs" are not that keen on jazz. Or maybe this is all that is left of the tattered idiom.

Interesting you should say that, BN - I was reading about the company responsible for the production of Round Midnight only yesterday: https://www.foldedwing.co.uk/about

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

Interesting you should say that, BN - I was reading about the company responsible for the production of Round Midnight only yesterday: https://www.foldedwing.co.uk/about

Thanks for that! Yes it does make more sense after reading their interests and backgrounds. So that's how it's going to be "going forwards" as we say. Obviously I'm just going backwards.

[Old Grumpy]

Thanks for that! Yes it does make more sense after reading their interests and backgrounds. So that's how it's going to be "going forwards" as we say. Obviously I'm just going backwards.

[Tenor Freak]

I am giving it a go, and will do so for a while. I like Soweto as a presenter, even if he is an Aston Villa supporter, and he's got the knowledge and legitimacy in this music that counts. Do I like all the music played? No; if I was listening to a random hour of Radio 2 there's bound to be a few songs in there I wouldn't like. It would be easier to sit at home and spin my old Blue Notes but I want to hear contemporary music. Last night's show was good with Norma and Max in fine form. The Shabaka piece sounded like new age noodling to me but some of the other music was at least mildly interesting.

[eighthobstruction]

....I agree with IanT....codswallop in general....you only have to listen to the first track (which I am guessing was some sort of 'best of'' affair)....it wouldn't have' disturbed you at all as musack for the super-market shop....thin gravy/ E number slop... - I remember comments and discussion on the old BBC bored 20 years ago along the same lines....a great disappointment....arzzzzzzz

....Product....

[Nick Armstrong]

I have to say that I find the presenters JJ and JF to be unbearable. I can just about abide KlG…

… I completely agree (save that I’m not too sure about KlG). Gave up on JtoZ soon after it started, not least due to the presenting style.

Devoted weekly listener to JRR though, where Alyn S shows you don’t have to affect a hip, gushing manner to present jazz on the radio.

Haven’t yet listened to Soweto Kinch, but must do so.

[Nick Armstrong]

....I agree with IanT....codswallop in general....you only have to listen to the first track (which I am guessing was some sort of 'best of'' affair)....it wouldn't have' disturbed you at all as musack for the super-market shop....thin gravy/ E number slop... - I remember comments and discussion on the old BBC bored 20 years ago along the same lines....a great disappointment....arzzzzzzz

....Product....

[Jazzrook]

Not sure why it’s necessary for BBC radio jazz programmes to be encumbered with ‘production companies’.
Humph(‘The Best of Jazz’) & Charles Fox(‘Jazz Today) did pretty well without them.
Soweto is fine as the presenter of ‘’Round Midnight’ but most of the stuff played seemed lightweight and soporific and failed to hit the spot with me. Very disappointing.

JR

[Old Grumpy]

Soweto is fine as the presenter of ‘’Round Midnight’ but most of the stuff played seemed lightweight and soporific...

JR

...perhaps the clue is in the title of the programme

[Quarky]

Well, it's doing something for me. Strode Rode reaffirmed my faith in Sonny Rollins.after many years absence. The opening few bars demonstrated his overpowering sense of rhythm and speed to the beat. He's playing something while other musicians are just thinking about it.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Not sure why it’s necessary for BBC radio jazz programmes to be encumbered with ‘production companies’.
Humph(‘The Best of Jazz’) & Charles Fox(‘Jazz Today) did pretty well without them.
Soweto is fine as the presenter of ‘’Round Midnight’ but most of the stuff played seemed lightweight and soporific and failed to hit the spot with me. Very disappointing.

JR

No but Humph (and I think Charles) did have the benefit in-house producers like Keith Stewart - a very talented and hard working man. These days a lot of the shows are produced by independent production companies because somebody , somewhere has worked out it’s cheaper that way, maybe it is maybe it isn’t ..

Completely agree re the music in Round Midnight or at least the 30 mins I heard last night. So much of it is easy listening jazz - two chord modal stuff with a female vocalist noodling over the top. Very little improvisation . God it must be boring being the pianist. Compared to playing all the changes in a clock blues…tedious.

[hmvman]

No but Humph (and I think Charles) did have the benefit in-house producers like Keith Stewart - a very talented and hard working man. These days a lot of the shows are produced by independent production companies because somebody , somewhere has worked out it’s cheaper that way, maybe it is maybe it isn’t ..

Wasn't it the Thatcher government that required the Beeb to put out a percentage of production to independent companies?

From what I've heard so far I don't think this new programme is for me - a jazz rookie - either. It just sounds like musak, pleasant enough but I got tired of it quite quickly. I'd really like a programme that explains what's going on in a jazz piece so I can better understand the structure and appreciate the improvisation. I listen to JRR reasonably regularly and enjoy the range of styles but quite often I don't really understand what's going on and clearly the programme is for aficionados who do know.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Wasn't it the Thatcher government that required the Beeb to put out a percentage of production to independent companies?

From what I've heard so far I don't think this new programme is for me - a jazz rookie - either. It just sounds like musak, pleasant enough but I got tired of it quite quickly. I'd really like a programme that explains what's going on in a jazz piece so I can better understand the structure and appreciate the improvisation. I listen to JRR reasonably regularly and enjoy the range of styles but quite often I don't really understand what's going on and clearly the programme is for aficionados who do know.

Interesting question . The answer is yes as far as TV is concerned . C4 was set up with virtually all its programmes done by indies . Then the BBC followed suit with about 25 percent the initial target .. There is and was a legally enforceable quota monitored by OFCOM.
Putting radio programmes out to indies was something done voluntarily by the Beeb under the DG ship of I think John Birt.
I could write a massive thesis about whether in-house is cheaper (I doubt it) of better (possibly) but I don’t want to bore people . The irony is that because independent production companies can be very profitable (largely through foreign sales , advertising and sponsor funding , book and product tie ins) broadcasters like ITV have been hoovering them up. There are fewer and fewer true indies every year.

None of this applies to Radio where I’m guessing the pickings for an indie are fairly thin.

[Tenor Freak]

Wasn't it the Thatcher government that required the Beeb to put out a percentage of production to independent companies?

From what I've heard so far I don't think this new programme is for me - a jazz rookie - either. It just sounds like musak, pleasant enough but I got tired of it quite quickly. I'd really like a programme that explains what's going on in a jazz piece so I can better understand the structure and appreciate the improvisation. I listen to JRR reasonably regularly and enjoy the range of styles but quite often I don't really understand what's going on and clearly the programme is for aficionados who do know.

Yes. Going all wobbly with a bunch of harps strumming whole-tone scales for a moment, think back on the John Birt era (do we really have to?). According to the Wiki article on Birt here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Birt,_Baron_Birt :

As Director-General, Birt was tasked with securing the BBC's future at a time of rapid technical, cultural and economic changes in world broadcasting.^[7] In seven years, Birt restructured and modernised the corporation which he wanted to make "the best managed public sector organisation".^[5] Birt imposed a policy of radical change to deliver efficiency savings. In April 1993 he introduced Producer Choice, giving programme makers the power to buy services from outside the BBC. This theoretically reduced the cost to licence-payers of the BBC's historic resource base. Faced with high rental fees from the BBC's record library, producers found it cheaper to buy records from local record shops. In-house facilities were closed or stood idle, allegedly as a result of Birt's "creative accounting" methods.

So a bit later than Thatcher but part of a pattern of systematic attacks on the BBC by subjecting it to rigged competition where it probably could produce the programmes cheaper and more effectively than any outside production company. But that was the point. I am fairly sure that towards the end Humph's show was an outside production but I have not found evidence of that from the BBC Genome site or elsewhere. It's shocking to realise that Humph's last show on Radio 2 was 17 March 2008. And although he was a barrel of laughs on Radio 4, on his own show he always took this music seriously but never was patronising. Jazz Today ended in January 1988 so Charles Fox was already out of the game when this all happened.

I have never worked for the BBC so I'm not in a position to give any details but there are some here who have and could add more detail.