Some provocative letters in today's Guardian under the heading 'Radio 3 and the musical museum mindset'.
I couldn't possibly comment....
I couldn't possibly comment....
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I don't mind "innit" if it's spelt correctly: i'n'itOriginally posted by french frank View PostYeah? I can be cutting edge if I wanna, only I don't wanna
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... but it's not innit : it's inni* - with the asterisk representing a glo**al stop.Originally posted by Eine Alpensinfonie View PostComment
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"Radio 3 and the musical museum mindset" - letters to The Gruniad
..including pic of Clem 'n' Pet..
"Gone Chopin, Bach in a minuet."Comment
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"Truly popularising" Radio 3? Isn't that what it's been attempting in the past, with the Pet Shop Boys, the Ibiza Prom, even back to 'An Evening with Michael Ball'?Originally posted by kernelbogey View Post
As for 'commercialising' R1, R2 and 6 Music, and retaining Radio 4 and Radio 3 (as the multi-genre BBC Music Live station) that seems to have the potential for losing most of the BBC Radio audiences. Of course, there would an audience for Music Live - I guess about 2 million of them - people who just 'appreciate music' of every conceivable sort. But that isn't 'most people', and certainly not the 15m who tune in for the music and chat of Radio 2.
I'm all for introducing the new - but I haven't much time for people whose 'suggestions' are that there should be much less 'classical music'. Perhaps it's just that they're part of the majority who don't like it much - or haven't had a chance to listen to it but 'know what they don't like'?
That said, a hint that R3 could be a little more 'critical' sounds right - as in knowledgeably 'judgemental' - and a bit less of the fabulous, amazing, brilliant tosh.It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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'Fundamentally, though, it’s the station’s rootedly conservative ideology that hinders it from exciting audiences by any more imaginative means than apeing commercial radio stations via regular quizzes coupled with tedious round-the-clock “selling” of musical works as if they were brands of soap powder.'Originally posted by Radio64 View Post
Oof!It loved to happen. -- Marcus AureliusComment
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That same writer goes on to say:Originally posted by Thropplenoggin View Post
"Truly popularising Radio 3 would require the sort of attitude-shift called for by Nicholas Cook in his book Music: A Very Short Introduction – undermining the “musical museum” mindset by foregrounding the contemporary and representing the music of past centuries as not trapped in dead history but continuing, fluid, vital.
Presentations by current composers could do this, but no one move would better symbolise a new beginning than moving the wonderful Hear and Now programme from its graveyard slot of 10pm on Saturday and repeating it (rather than Composer of the Week) most weekdays."
That was indeed one of the requests that FoR3 left with the controller last month - a suggestion that came from this very forum whose views were amply represented
It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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Originally posted by french frank View PostThat same writer goes on to say:
"Truly popularising Radio 3 would require the sort of attitude-shift called for by Nicholas Cook in his book Music: A Very Short Introduction – undermining the “musical museum” mindset by foregrounding the contemporary and representing the music of past centuries as not trapped in dead history but continuing, fluid, vital.
Presentations by current composers could do this, but no one move would better symbolise a new beginning than moving the wonderful Hear and Now programme from its graveyard slot of 10pm on Saturday and repeating it (rather than Composer of the Week) most weekdays."
That was indeed one of the requests that FoR3 left with the controller last month - a suggestion that came from this very forum whose views were amply represented
If Breakfast's reduced waffle is anything to go by, things are improving and 'they' are listening. This morning we had a lovely segue of Cecil Day Lewis reading 'An Italian Visit' into Liszt's La Gondoliera. Unexpected and quite magical. 
It loved to happen. -- Marcus AureliusComment
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Originally posted by Thropplenoggin View Post If Breakfast's reduced waffle is anything to go by, things are improving and 'they' are listening. This morning we had a lovely segue of Cecil Day Lewis reading 'An Italian Visit' into Liszt's La Gondoliera. Unexpected and quite magical.
It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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... but Tim Rutherford-Johnson could:Originally posted by kernelbogey View Post
Who wants to listen to Radio 3, then?
On Friday, the Guardian‘s Charlotte Higgins wrote on the dilemma and plight of Radio 3 (After 70 years, Radio 3 needs a rethink. It’s time to unleash the composers), which she summed up as:
Radio 3 is faced with the Catch-22 of supporting a difficult artform with minority appeal, while trying to avoid charges of elitism and license fee profligacy. Yet it has repeatedly failed to answer this question, she argues, because it is approaching the debate from the wrong direction. Composers themselves, she says – particularly those under 50 – don’t think of Radio 3 as their natural home. They (and their music) might occasionally appear on the station, but they don’t tend to listen to it. And if composers – presumably the most clued-in, open-eared of all Radio 3’s target demographics – don’t listen, then why would anyone else?Should Radio 3 appeal to the many or the few? To what extent should it reach out to capture new audiences? What if that attempt is seen as a dereliction of its duty fearlessly to bring listeners the best, no matter how “difficult” it is?
Higgins’ article has prompted a number of letters to the paper, some of them printed here. I rather like one or two of the ideas suggested: moving Hear and Now out of the graveyard slot, for example, or greatly increasing the number of living composers featured in Composer of the Week. The suggestion of creating a new channel devoted to the broadcasting of live music of all types also strikes me as the kind of imaginative rethink that may be needed to get the BBC’s music broadcasting out of its R1, R2, R3, R6 boxes.
Not every response is quite so creative. One reader writes:
If we hand over Radio 3 to the composers, perhaps there should be a discrete programming time for them, as there is for jazz. If we have enough notice, we music lovers can then switch off and turn to our CD or vinyl collections for the duration.
Of course! What sort of classical music lover would have an interest in what the composers of today think about or enjoy or would like to share?
I don’t pretend to have the solution to the ails that Higgins identified in her original article, but I dare say this sort of thinking lies at the root of the problem.
[FONT=Comic Sans MS][I][B]Numquam Satis![/B][/I][/FONT]Comment
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To be really contentiousOriginally posted by ferneyhoughgeliebte View Post... but Tim Rutherford-Johnson could:
Who wants to listen to Radio 3, then?
On Friday, the Guardian‘s Charlotte Higgins wrote on the dilemma and plight of Radio 3 (After 70 years, Radio 3 needs a rethink. It’s time to unleash the composers), which she summed up as: Composers themselves, she says – particularly those under 50 – don’t think of Radio 3 as their natural home. They (and their music) might occasionally appear on the station, but they don’t tend to listen to it. And if composers – presumably the most clued-in, open-eared of all Radio 3’s target demographics – don’t listen, then why would anyone else? Why is it always assumed that if people don't want to listen to classical music, go to classical concerts, listen to Radio 3, the fault lies with classical music; the concert etiquette/audience; Radio 3 &c? Why presume that composers are 'the most clued-in, open-eared of all Radio 3’s target demographics'?
I just pose the questions
It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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I posted a link to the original article pages ago!Originally posted by ferneyhoughgeliebte View PostComment
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This and the "natural home" comment seem incoherent and meaningless to me.Originally posted by french frank View PostComment
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And I'm sure Tim Rutherford-Johnson was very grateful to you. What did you think of his response to it?Originally posted by jean View Post[FONT=Comic Sans MS][I][B]Numquam Satis![/B][/I][/FONT]Comment
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