Controller, BBC Radio 3

[Ein Heldenleben]

Or, indeed, CD players!

Forty years ago it was rarely the players that misfired - I think they were top of the range bespoke technics. it was nearly always the CD. It was always worth checking the surface in case someone had combined pre- listening to the CD with canteen toast and jam. There was always something very disconcerting about not being able to see the start of the track as you can with Lps , audio tape and indeed film and video if it has a clock. I never liked that.
Another bizarre factoid the tracking weight of grams players was set very high - many times higher than one or two grams to stop the thing skipping on air. (It still happened)

[Old Grumpy]

Forty years ago it was rarely the players that misfired - I think they were top of the range bespoke technics. it was nearly always the CD. It was always worth checking the surface in case someone had combined pre- listening to the CD with canteen toast and jam. There was always something very disconcerting about not being able to see the start of the track as you can with Lps , audio tape and indeed film and video if it has a clock. I never liked that.
Another bizarre factoid the tracking weight of grams players was set very high - many times higher than one or two grams to stop the thing skipping on air. (It still happened)

Fascinating, thanks!


P.S. When's the memoir coming out - could be titled "Toast and Jam"!

[Ein Heldenleben]

Fascinating, thanks!


P.S. When's the memoir coming out - could be titled "Toast and Jam"!

This year will mark 43 years in the business- largely TV though . Unlike Harry I’ll keep my anecdotes to myself out of courtesy to colleagues and in the certain knowledge that no one outside the business would be in the slightest bit interested.
One thing I do remember as a trainee is that the Today programme always laid on free toast and jam. Quite a few of us would repair to pubs in Smithfield meat market after the Prog. I bet that doesn’t happen now.

[oddoneout]

Fascinating, thanks!


P.S. When's the memoir coming out - could be titled "Toast and Jam"!

Which reminds me - way off topic I know - it would seem that Yorkshire tea, following the success of their malty biscuit flavour tea have now brought out a toast and jam flavour one. I suppose then you wouldn't have the crumbs to deal with...

[Frances_iom]

My brief period with the BBC as a graduate apprentice was well over a half century ago - to gain experience we had a 6 week tour of various sites - during my stint at White City I was attached to the studio doing Top of the Pops - the heat + smell of so many hot bodies gyrating had to be believed but the real excitement was it went out live, one of the thick camera cables caught fire(briefly) I was delegated to to drag a new cable out, keeping out of camera shot, swop over the cables and drag the faulty cable back out of the way.

[Ein Heldenleben]

My brief period with the BBC as a graduate apprentice was well over a half century ago - to gain experience we had a 6 week tour of various sites - during my stint at White City I was attached to the studio doing Top of the Pops - the heat + smell of so many hot bodies gyrating had to be believed but the real excitement was it went out live, one of the thick camera cables caught fire(briefly) I was delegated to to drag a new cable out, keeping out of camera shot, swop over the cables and drag the faulty cable back out of the way.

Incredible. I once seriously annoyed a floor manager by setting fire to a map in the studio for a video effect. The fireman on standby to out it put then sprayed powdered ash all over the studio with his CO2 extinguisher- The look of outrage on the FM’s face still haunts me. ( oh there you go I’ve gone into Harryesque anecdotage) .

[HighlandDougie]

Incredible. I once seriously annoyed a floor manager by setting fire to a map in the studio for a video effect. The fireman on standby to out it put then sprayed powdered ash all over the studio with his CO2 extinguisher- The look of outrage on the FM’s face still haunts me. ( oh there you go I’ve gone into Harryesque anecdotage) .

To which the only response must surely be, "More, please!".

[Ein Heldenleben]

To which the only response must surely be, "More, please!".

Ok - on my very first operational outing as a trainee ..playing a tape into Newsbeat, a notoriously quickfire Prog , I pressed the rewind button on the tape machine rather than play - resulting in the yellow leader flicking round uselessly rather than a carefully crafted news clip hitting the air. That absolutely consummate broadcaster Frank Partridge picked up so quickly no one (outside the cubicle ) noticed . It was to be the start of a stellar career (outside radio that is ) …

[antongould]

I don't think that's a correct conclusion. 'Us ancients', streamers or not, aren't a problem for the Beeb: 'we' listen to the radio as well as streaming. The 'yoof' (your word) are abandoning radio, and that's the problem for the traditional networks which the BBC is trying to solve by putting on 'pop' (broad sense) singers &c as DJs, playing their kind of music, even on Radio 3.



A change they have succeeded with is getting (older) R3 listeners hooked on presenters. All/most of the shortcomings are forgiven if you like the presenter. I don't believe that, even in the days of Patricia Hughes (who? before my time), Tom Crowe, Cormac Rigby and the rest of them, listeners considered them central to the programmes. RW even started naming programmes after the presenter - Rob Cowan, Iain Burnside, Andy Kershaw: this was later dropped but the presenters remained the lure. But wasn't the article right - that these presenters are no sort of lure for a younger generation, no matter what the content? The obvious next trick is to introduce presenters who (hopefully) will appeal to younger people but who know little about classical music. Mentioning no names.

Perhaps there is hope for yoof yet Ms Alker mentioned this last week

https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20230113-gen-z-and-young-millennials-surprising-obsession

[Ein Heldenleben]

Perhaps there is hope for roof yet Ms Alker mentioned this last week


https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/...sing-obsession

If you consider gaming soundtracks classical music then I doubt if there has been a time in history when more under 21’s have listened to orchestral music than now.

[oddoneout]

Perhaps there is hope for roof yet Ms Alker mentioned this last week


https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/...sing-obsession

Can you put a ceiling on it?

Doesn't this just highlight, yet again, that it's not so much that "classical" music is difficult or irrelevant as that it doesn't get to as many places as it should? It's a bit like retail - it's no good having fantastic things in your shop, if it's tucked away out of sight or in a place people aren't happy to access you won't get customers. It's been the case for decades now that charismatic, energetic players can engage a new audience ; the rise of online platforms and social media makes that easier. However there is no way that I can see that that approach can be shoehorned into R3 output in an attempt to find a new/succession audience, and I think it is foolish, to say the least, to even try. By all means include some of the content (variety in performance styles is useful for all sorts of reasons, even if something doesn't appeal) but leave the delivery methods to those who know what they are doing and on the appropriate platforms. In an ideal world such visual listeners might find their way to R3 - but in its currently floundering form whether that would be more than a passing encounter is another matter.

[french frank]

Doesn't this just highlight, yet again, that it's not so much that "classical" music is difficult or irrelevant as that it doesn't get to as many places as it should? It's a bit like retail - it's no good having fantastic things in your shop, if it's tucked away out of sight or in a place people aren't happy to access you won't get customers.

I just feel very, very tired when I read this, because it was the message that 'we' (FoR3) were banging out to the BBC for 20 years. Yes, of course it was a great idea to get younger generations interested in classical music. But putting 'youth-oriented' mixes on Radio 3 was the last way that was likely to be successful. Moreover it was positively harmful in getting classical listeners to tune out of Radio 3.

[DracoM]

[JasonPalmer]

Obviously radio 3 needs to buy adverts on classic fm.

[Pulcinella]

Obviously radio 3 needs to buy adverts on classic fm.