Not good this binning of Jazz World, a pretty decent Saturday night show broadcast for years by the aimable Linley Hamilton - but why cancel the modern mainstream show (which covers kind of new stuff even when it is very middle of the roaf) and keep the ultra niche dixie loving (!) Jazz Club show? Says a lot more about BBC Northern Ireland and Radio Ulster than the state of jazz!! But more broadly beware local radio jazz jocks everywhere and listeners - low hanging fruit https://www.marlbank.net/posts/jazz-...-jazz-coverage
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Francisco
Interesting to read your comments but I I seem recall that this is a thread that has come up before. Getting into jazz in the early 1980s, I found local radio a really good way of exploring the music , either through "Solent Swing" or "Jazz on Solent" which supplemented the national radio programmes I listened to such as Alan Dell, Humphrey Lyttelton , Big Band Secial and JRR. I had a real thirst for music back then and local radio was instrumental in broadening my taste in jazz. I have to say that I have not been aware of there being any jazz on Radio Solent for nearly 20 years. The last time was a programe produced in BBC Oxford which had an evening radio presenter with a co host whoplayed jazz on one night a week. The co presenter was really irritating but the programme was doomed from the start as the main presenter would criticise the music. Serious jazz on local radio probably ceased in the late 1980s in my area.
I feel it the fact there is no need for a jazz radio programme on a local level is all part of the cross-fire as the need for radio to be relevant relies on it becoming ever more mainstream. I only listen to Radio Solent for the sport these days as it is a non-starter if you expect to hear any jazz although I once heard Weather Report's "Birdland" on a 1970's evening show and even then the present, Alex Dyke, talked all over the track. During the day,the local presenters like Lou Hannan are so banal you do wonder what their reaction would be to playing any jazz. The BBC does not really want a "jazz audience" at local level and are keener to retain listening numbers as radio seems to be less and less relevant. No sure how many people who like jazz actually listen to terrestrial radio as their first port of call these days. It clearly has no place to play on a local broadcasting level and the local stations dumb down to chase an audience. It is also worth adding that the choice of music now played rarely strays further back than 1970s these days. Fans of C&W, folk, rock, reggae , brass bands, etc would, no doubt, feel equally agrieved about the homogenous nature of radio airplay.
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