Controller, BBC Radio 3

[Ein Heldenleben]

We have to face the fact that money isn't available to provide a top quality arts/cultural station 24 hours a day. The BBC can justify giving more to Radio 2 (they have to pay top salaries to get the best presenters) and to Radio 4 (news gathering is extremely expensive). But no one can think why on earth a station that focuses on classical music and the arts would need as much money as they do - presenters are paid peanuts, the BBC library has already got all the old recordings it needs and you don't have to pay anything to composers who have been dead for 200 years … Obvious. Even Radio 1 needs more money than Radio 3.

It's the combination of cutting back on R3's funding together with trying to get more listeners which has been the absolute killer.

Not sure whether you are being ironic but : As a point of sad historic fact the cuts in news in the last ten years have been much greater than the cuts in Radio 3 . But news expanded vastly in the 80’s and 90’s whereas Radio 3 didn’t. The Radio 3 presenters are well paid , the producers and technical support much less well paid. Salaries have not kept pace with the private or indeed public sector. When I reached the “pinnacle” of my career I earned the same as the base entry point for a university professor - by the time I left my salary was about the same as a mid range senior lecturer. There are big costs that you skate over, studios , outsdie broadcasts , orchestras (the Beeb is by far the biggest employer of musicians in the country ) and performers fees . There’s also needle time - those old recordings aren’t free.

[JasonPalmer]

I am pretty happy with the radio 3 offering except I would like all the singing in English, even like the adverts promoting different programs.

[french frank]

Not sure whether you are being ironic

I was being ironic

Some of the arguments have definitely been put forward by the BBC - such as the need to pay R2 presenters (and sports presenters?) top salaries to attract the best: the best being the ones who have the greatest public appeal and therefore bring in audiences because people 'like the presenter'; and news gathering being inherently more expensive. I used to study the annual figures - and service licences under the BBC Trust were particularly useful - to see how as far as network radio was concerned Radio 3 dropped down the pecking order to become the network with the smallest budget (it had been Radio 1), and Radio 2, comparatively, was getting more and more. It's particularly valued by the BBC because it's "the nation's favourite radio station" with the biggest audience.

The use of the metric 'cost per listener' or 'cost per listener hour' (rather than how many millions does it get) seems to me to reek of knowing the cost of everything and the value of nothing. There seemed to be no idea of evaluating what Radio 3's remit entailed. Going back to my minidisc collection I have 50+ recordings of Drama on 3, including 10 Shakespeare plays. Such drama is hugely expensive to produce and I doubt Radio 3 has the budget to replicate that programme now. One-off documentaries, live outside broadcasts, rights payments, as you say, don't come cheap. By comparison, staff salaries play a smaller part in R3's budget than in R2's. It seems to me an inescapable conclusion that Radio 3 is less valued because it has a small - by comparison - audience. It's that, rather than the cost of the content, which sets the budget allowance vis-à-vis the other stations competing for diminishing funds.

[oddoneout]

I am pretty happy with the radio 3 offering except I would like all the singing in English, even like the adverts promoting different programs.

The arguments about English translations versus original language are ones I grew up with, although from a different perspective I think than yours. My mother really disliked having to sing the Bach passions in German for instance, arguing that it meant listeners couldn't fully appreciate the text - her faith was very important to her and such works were more than mere concerts. Interestingly singing the latin masses and the like didn't seem to be such an issue, perhaps because it's easier to learn what the words mean and how to pronounce them. Over many years of choral singing I have encountered both approaches and have also encountered some awful translations which not only don't bear much resemblance to the original they also mess with the music - rhythms, stresses,note patterns, climaxes don't line up properly, so worst of both worlds. Doggerel text (laughably so sometimes)and uncomfortable music.
It is a pity that R3 doesn't make better use of its online facilities to make translations available, for instance for the lunchtime recital that you were enjoying. As gurnemanz mentioned on another thread there was a live feed from Wigmore Hall with translations but it doesn't happen often that the stars align like that.
However I'm not an opera lover, where I can appreciate the arguments might be somewhat different.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I was being ironic

Some of the arguments have definitely been put forward by the BBC - such as the need to pay R2 presenters (and sports presenters?) top salaries to attract the best: the best being the ones who have the greatest public appeal and therefore bring in audiences because people 'like the presenter'; and news gathering being inherently more expensive. I used to study the annual figures - and service licences under the BBC Trust were particularly useful - to see how as far as network radio was concerned Radio 3 dropped down the pecking order to become the network with the smallest budget (it had been Radio 1), and Radio 2, comparatively, was getting more and more. It's particularly valued by the BBC because it's "the nation's favourite radio station" with the biggest audience.

The use of the metric 'cost per listener' or 'cost per listener hour' (rather than how many millions does it get) seems to me to reek of knowing the cost of everything and the value of nothing. There seemed to be no idea of evaluating what Radio 3's remit entailed. Going back to my minidisc collection I have 50+ recordings of Drama on 3, including 10 Shakespeare plays. Such drama is hugely expensive to produce and I doubt Radio 3 has the budget to replicate that programme now. One-off documentaries, live outside broadcasts, rights payments, as you say, don't come cheap. By comparison, staff salaries play a smaller part in R3's budget than in R2's. It seems to me an inescapable conclusion that Radio 3 is less valued because it has a small - by comparison - audience. It's that, rather than the cost of the content, which sets the budget allowance vis-à-vis the other stations competing for diminishing funds.

Cost per listener hour was a Birtist obsession - along with ,curiously enough, a dislike of pie charts . The former is , I understand , now out but the latter is permissible. Presenters throughout the BBC have had a substantial pay hike in the last few years partly because of the equal pay drive. Can’t say too much because I’m getting into areas that I have inside knowledge of. Suffice to say that some staff were rather surprised when the size of some salaries became public and I’m not talking about Gary Lineker . I would agree that Radio 3 has nothing like the priority R2 has now. Back in the 80’s R2 was a bit of a joke - now it’s thought to be a licence fee driver along with BBC 1 .
On the plus side Radio 3 is very very popular with a small number of people. Another bizarre factoid from the bran tub of memory - Classical music TV programmes used to get very high AI’s (audience appreciation) with the Vienna New Years Day concert getting onto the 90’s ( out of 100) : a stratospheric figure.

[french frank]

On the plus side Radio 3 is very very popular with a small number of people. Another bizarre factoid from the bran tub of memory - Classical music TV programmes used to get very high AI’s (audience appreciation) with the Vienna New Years Day concert getting onto the 90’s ( out of 100) : a stratospheric figure.

I have dipped in that same bran tub! I remember - I think it was the first time that the BBC had released AI scores for individual programmes - The New Year's Day concert topping the list. Where specialist material and a smaller number of listeners are involved the scores tend to be higher. AI is I think now a sort of BBC gold standard but there is still one factor missing: the index measures how individuals appreciated what they saw or heard, and ignores the size of the audience. So if this is, say, a regular radio programme the views of people who don't listen (because they think it's awful) are discounted because they aren't listeners. Almost by definition those who listen do so because they enjoy it.

I think that high AI scores give reassurance to the BBC and programme producers that they are delivering what listeners/viewers want; it doesn't address whether e.g. Piano Flow, Happy Harmonies, Tearjerker et al should be on Radio 3 in the first place. All that matters is whether they're attracting an appreciative audience.

[JasonPalmer]

Perhaps when radio 3 spend a lot on a drama tv and radio promotional adverts would drive people to listen ?

I remember once seeing an advert for radio 3 evening concerts before the 6pm BBC one news, as I don't get to see that news a lot these days I don't know if they still happen.

Frank has a valid point, things like the royal opera house get a big budget, I don't see why radio 3 and for that matter BBC four could not broadcast all their productions.

[Ein Heldenleben]

I have dipped in that same bran tub! I remember - I think it was the first time that the BBC had released AI scores for individual programmes - The New Year's Day concert topping the list. Where specialist material and a smaller number of listeners are involved the scores tend to be higher. AI is I think now a sort of BBC gold standard but there is still one factor missing: the index measures how individuals appreciated what they saw or heard, and ignores the size of the audience. So if this is, say, a regular radio programme the views of people who don't listen (because they think it's awful) are discounted because they aren't listeners. Almost by definition those who listen do so because they enjoy it.

I think that high AI scores give reassurance to the BBC and programme producers that they are delivering what listeners/viewers want; it doesn't address whether e.g. Piano Flow, Happy Harmonies, Tearjerker et al should be on Radio 3 in the first place. All that matters is whether they're attracting an appreciative audience.

Certainly when I was there AI’s were taken very seriously. I see no reason why they shouldn’t be made publicly available. I’ve always thought tHe BBC should be as open as possible about its processes because the public pay for us (I mean them) which is one of the reasons I joined this forum (the day after I left).

[french frank]

Certainly when I was there AI’s were taken very seriously.

If I remember, high AI scores were taken as a measurement of 'quality'.

[Ein Heldenleben]

If I remember, high AI scores were taken as a measurement of 'quality'.

They can be but they are more an indication of audience engagement which is important to programme makers. Most tv and radio is of a bland everyday nature . It is the programmes that stay with people that create loyalty to a channel. That’s the problem Netflix has - too many of their programmes are ok - nothing more. I wouldn’t mind betting that the AIs for Happy Valley for example are much higher than the average for Netflix dramas.

[JasonPalmer]

I found an article about the new controller via twitter from classical music website but can't seem to find a link to share but did some googling and found this spectator article about dumbing down on three so that the writer is listening to a french station instead.

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-dumbingdown-of-bbc-radio-3/

Edit .. found it..

The Long View | Pity the boss of Radio 3

https://www.classical-music.uk/opinion/article/the-long-view-pity-the-boss-of-radio-3

[french frank]

They can be but they are more an indication of audience engagement which is important to programme makers. Most tv and radio is of a bland everyday nature . It is the programmes that stay with people that create loyalty to a channel.

In other words, their AI metric of what constitutes 'quality' is what is of value to the BBC and programme makers for their own purposes. As an indication of 'quality', others might have alternative views. This is rather like R3 deciding that the 'value' of the original R3 messageboards was that content could be 'fed into' programmes, and live programmes were selected to comment on if the said content could be fed into them - as for Breakfast, Iain Burnside, In Tune. But not Choral Evensong, so that board was eventually dropped completely. All of which provoked the Peasants' Revolt.

[JasonPalmer]

Oooo what revolt was that then ?

[Ein Heldenleben]

In other words, their AI metric of what constitutes 'quality' is what is of value to the BBC and programme makers for their own purposes. As an indication of 'quality', others might have alternative views. This is rather like R3 deciding that the 'value' of the original R3 messageboards was that content could be 'fed into' programmes, and live programmes were selected to comment on if the said content could be fed into them - as for Breakfast, Iain Burnside, In Tune. But not Choral Evensong, so that board was eventually dropped completely. All of which provoked the Peasants' Revolt.

The actual reason that the BBC in general got rid of its message boards were threefold . They became more and more difficult to police and sapped expensive editorial effort. Secondly they became more trouble than they were worth as some people naively thought the messages being posted were in some way being endorsed by their presence on a BBC website.
And Thirdly because Facebook and other social media made them a bit of irrelevance. Twitter now provides an instant minute by minute gauge of audience opinion if you have the nerve to read it and if the programme is popular enough to get a tweet.
The specifics behind the R3 boards I know nothing about. They do have a value though in providing audience feedback which is actually fairly scant. It’s very difficult to find out what people think about programmes as very few people write in with praise or , as a proportion of the total audience , with complaint . There is a TV audience log which always used to make for interesting reading . I don’t know whether there’s a radio log. In general I found radio much more secretive about that sort of thing,
As I’ve said a high AI is not always an indicator of programme quality - it just an indicator of how much people enjoyed it. That’s not the same thing.

[french frank]

Oooo what revolt was that then ?

When the BBC got dictatorial about what listeners could and could not discuss on the BBC messageboards, posters upped sticks and created their own forums, including the FoR3 forum which was the precursor to this one. Then the BBC decided it couldn't afford to run forums which we amateurs did for next to nothing with volunteers, and they closed the whole lot down, saying they were providing R3 Facebook and Twitter instead which were much more what 'people wanted'. But in the end they were just BBC marketing tools, not for listeners.

Ein Heldenleben's points partially answered (and partially rebutted re Facebook and Twitter)