Saturday morning success!

[LMcD]

Thanks for that, French Frank. (& for correcting Thrid - too much Burkiss Way).

To quote from Humphrey Carpenter's "The Envy of the World", p 48, 116, 294, 345 & 356.

Didn't the measurement method change late in 1995, thereby making comparisons difficult?

[AuntDaisy]

Didn't the measurement method change late in 1995, thereby making comparisons difficult?

You're probably right; but I suspect that comparisons are difficult full-stop.
Georgia Mann's "... you are listening for longer each week. Longer, in fact, than at any time in the station's history" came without any obvious supporting evidence.

Looking for R3/Third listening figures, I came across this article...

https://aneditions.com/2024/08/20/the-terminal-decline-of-radio-3-by-jon-elsby/

[vinteuil]

Looking for R3/Third listening figures, I came across this article...

https://aneditions.com/2024/08/20/the-terminal-decline-of-radio-3-by-jon-elsby/

... thanks for that artickle - as someone from the same cohort ( æt: lxxij ) of course I am in large agreement.

If 'radio 3' played lotsa Oasis and Taylor Swift and advertised that they were doing it I'm sure they wd get very good 'listening figures'. That is so not the point...


.

[Ein Heldenleben]

You're probably right; but I suspect that comparisons are difficult full-stop.
Georgia Mann's "... you are listening for longer each week. Longer, in fact, than at any time in the station's history" came without any obvious supporting evidence.

Looking for R3/Third listening figures, I came across this article...

https://aneditions.com/2024/08/20/the-terminal-decline-of-radio-3-by-jon-elsby/

That “listening for longer “ might well be true but it’s almost certainly not a result of the recent change of music policy or scheduling genius . Other factors might well be : More WFH, high numbers of the economically inactive and retired with time to listen . I am hearing less music per hour than in the 70’s to 2015 and more chat , trails and general clutter.

Jon Elsby article is definitive. It’s almost as if he’s been reading this forum !
Whenever fellow producers bragged about ratings (and I was no exception ) some one always said sagely let’s face it we’d get more viewers by showing public executions .

PS bragging about your ratings to the listener is very local radio.,..

[LMcD]

That “listening for longer “ might well be true but it’s almost certainly not a result of the recent change of music policy or scheduling genius . Other factors might well be : More WFH, high numbers of the economically inactive and retired with time to listen . I am hearing less music per hour than in the 70’s to 2015 and more chat , trails and general clutter.

Jon Elsby article is definitive. It’s almost as if he’s been reading this forum !
Whenever fellow producers bragged about ratings (and I was no exception ) some one always said sagely let’s face it we’d get more viewers by showing public executions .

PS bragging about your ratings to the listener is very local radio.,..

Significantly, the joyful news was first brought to my attention by Tom Service who hoped we wouldn't mind if 'we blow our own trumpet'.
With hindsight, I should perhaps have enclosed the title of this thread in speech marks.

[eighthobstruction]

....well we all know what Mr Gong Gong would have said to various parts of this thread....and I've just said it under my breath....

[Ein Heldenleben]

Significantly, the joyful news was first brought to my attention by Tom Service who hoped we wouldn't mind if 'we blow our own trumpet'.
With hindsight, I should perhaps have enclosed the title of this thread in speech marks.

They’ve all been told to I reckon. Of course in the interests of balance they should also report when the figures go down . It’s all so pathetic and needy and frankly un Radio 3 . Their job is to make excellent TV and Radio programmes , which by and large they do , and not pat themselves on the back . Deep down they all know that of course.

[french frank]

Didn't the measurement method change late in 1995, thereby making comparisons difficult?

Changes of various kinds have made direct comparisons impossible - eg. when Test Match Special was on R3. I would take a baseline at approx 2000. The major change was when Rajar started collecting data from a single 'representative' member of a household rather than from all the members of the same household. Many services increased their listening figures as a result. R3 was among those which showed a decrease. Apart from that, major schedule changes can - over two or three quarters - make a difference one way or the other.

The trick is to work out what the objective is. In the case of R3, in bald terms, it's cut costs, increase reach, hold on to listeners for as long as possible. In other words, do the same as every other station, commercial and BBC. Except that R4 will always get a big slice of the dosh because news gathering and speech programmes are expensive. Music broadcasting can be as cheap as you want it to be.

[french frank]

'a thoughtless, self-serving response which saves the respondent the trouble of actually attending to anything that has been said and seriously considering whether or not it is objectively warranted'

I've said this before to illustrate our pathetic naivety: the first time we worked diligently on a survey to produce a range of opinions from the old BBC messageboarders, we really did think we were being helpful. Publicly Radio 3 was politely non-committal, behind the scenes we were ridiculed and misrepresented. Mark Damazer's secondhand scoffing was discussed here a few weeks back. R3's 'original intellectual excellence and its steadfast commitment to the preservation and transmission of cultural knowledge' is not something which is even considered now, still less valued.

[Andrew Slater]

This is the bit from the Music Week article that worries me:

The classical, jazz and world music network has implemented schedule changes – including late night jazz programme Round Midnight with Soweto Kinch – with more to come early next year.

Presumably 'more' refers to schedule changes, rather than Soweto Kinch; I presume the changes will involve more removals as well as additions.

Edit: there is now a write-up on the BBC Media Centre (R3 in 3rd paragraph).

[french frank]

Edit: there is now a write-up on the BBC Media Centre (R3 in 3rd paragraph).

It says: "... the station’s new schedule, introduced from April, has seen significant year-on-year gains for Saturday Morning with Tom Service, Jools Holland’s new Earlier…, Breakfast, Essential Classics and In Tune."

Given that the reach was a touch above 2m last September,I can't see how how all five programmes could have made 'significant' gains. Well, they could possibly, but in that case may we know which programmes/slots have made significant losses?

Also, Rajar says: 'Please note that in accordance with the annual population update, in Q2 2024 the UK population (adults 15+) is estimated to have increased by 1.3 million adults to 57.6 million adults'. So the population rise is almost 2.3% and R3's increase y-o-y is 1.8%? Is that right?

[Andrew Slater]

So the population rise is almost 2.3% and R3's increase y-o-y is 1.8%? Is that right?

Yes.

R3 reach expressed as a percentage of population was 3.55% in Q3/2023 and 3.54% in Q3/2024, a slight decrease.

Also, hours per listener in the quarter before the changes, in Q1/2024, were 8.03, and in Q3/2024 were 8.08, an increase of 0.05 hours per listener, or 3 minutes....

Statistics ......

[Andrew Slater]

This is the bit from the Music Week article that worries me:



Presumably 'more' refers to schedule changes, rather than Soweto Kinch; I presume the changes will involve more removals as well as additions.

Edit: there is now a write-up on the BBC Media Centre (R3 in 3rd paragraph).

A little bird tells me that Drama on 3 on Sunday evenings is to be dropped in favour of an hour of brass bands and an hour of 20th Century Modernists from April.

[LMcD]

This is the bit from the Music Week article that worries me:



Presumably 'more' refers to schedule changes, rather than Soweto Kinch; I presume the changes will involve more removals as well as additions.

Edit: there is now a write-up on the BBC Media Centre (R3 in 3rd paragraph).

Nice picture of 'Action Man' Petroc (To be fair, I've really enjoyed each of his 5-day explorations of various parts of the UK).
If it's not a silly question - might the improved figures for Breakfast and Essential Classics be attributable, at least in part, to the fact that they're both longer than they used to be?

[Retune]

Edit: there is now a write-up on the BBC Media Centre (R3 in 3rd paragraph).

Lots of crowing about how much better the figures for BBC Sounds are in Q3 this year compared to the same time last year. I wonder what could possibly have brought that about? Oh, wait:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/help/questions/recent-changes-to-bbc-sounds/radio-changes

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/help/questions/recent-changes-to-bbc-sounds/changes-audio-ondemand