It’s been while since I’ve had something worth commenting on. We all know the CBC is doing its best to alienate its core audience and piss all over its mandate to deliver culturally relevant and intellectual programming by providing pap so lame commercial stations won’t even play it. But here’s a little discussion an a recent Globe & Mail article that demonstrates just how ignorant and culturally retarded the “new CBC” is.
Radio 2 plans less weekday classical music
GUY DIXON
From Wednesday’s Globe and Mail
March 5, 2008 at 4:14 AM EST
For the final phase of its overhaul of Radio 2, the CBC plans to play less classical music weekday mornings and late afternoons and more pop, showcasing a wider variety of Canadian music and aiming to appeal to a broader audience.
That “wider variety” is mostly commercial music, but includes a lot of banjos and mandolins. I know, because you can’t get classical music on the radio on Saturday mornings anymore. Only tripe.
The last round of programming changes, which began a year ago, won’t occur until the Labour Day weekend. But CBC executives are making the plan public now as the music industry descends on Toronto for the annual Canadian Music Week conference and music festival (today through Saturday).
The new weekday morning show from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. will be a mix of much less classical and much more pop, leaning toward established musicians such as Joni Mitchell and Diana Krall, with around 50-per-cent Canadian content. There’s no decision yet on who the host will be.
So again, no more classical for your drive to work. Like classical? Tough…you get to listen to commercial pop radio, or public pop radio. And these artists aren’t “established” in the sense of being popular. Diana Krall might still be selling albums, but we’re in this weird zone where artists who haven’t sold an album in 20 years (Joni Mitchell, Murray McLaughlin, Ian Tamblin, etc.) are now being touted as “culturally relevant Canadian artists.” Just because an artist is no longer commercially viable doesn’t necessarily make them more artistic. Folk music just isn’t popular anymore…it happens. But I’ll be the bulk of the CBC’s classical listeners don’t care about these artists either. I have very little interest in the music of Neil Young.
Remember, Jian Gomeshi named Leonard Cohen and Glenn Gould as “Canadian composers.”
The midday show weekdays from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. will be entirely classical, playing both CDs and live performances, with around 40-per-cent Canadian content. But the drive-home afternoon show will be the biggest departure from current programming. That show from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. will ignore classical entirely and instead air a wide variety of genres from contemporary pop and world music to blues and roots, with an emphasis on newer songs and artists such as Feist and Serena Ryder.
So now you can listen to classical music only when you’re at work, ostensibly without access to a radio. And by the way, 40% Canadian content means only the performers have to be Canadian. So if they play nothing but the Canadian Brass performing Pachelbel’s Canon as four out of every ten daytime tracks, they would be within the Canadian content mandate. Note that the drive home for most people will be the same crap as the morning, but with more (ugh) blues and “roots” (WTF is roots anyway?…oh yeah…banjos and mandolins). So we’ve shifted from “culture” to “pop” to “hillbilly.” I guess the idea is to grab the lowest common denominator.
Remember…the CBC was founded and mandated to stem the tide of American anti-intellectualism in mass media by providing the Canadian public at large with a free and easy resource for edifying cultural music. It was NOT designed to appeal to the bottom rung of the ladder by giving the unwashed masses easy access to music they could already readily access themselves by tying a piece of string to a broom handle mounted on a wash basin.
And if those “newer artists” who are commercially viable and successful in their own right start pulling broadcast royalties away from classical artists, there’s going to be hell to pay. Again, these people don’t need the public broadcaster to sell their product. It’s the artists who need the support, not the mass market products.
In September, Radio 2 will also launch separate all-day all-classical, all-jazz and all-singer-songwriter stations on the Internet. Radio 3 will remain an Internet- and satellite-based service. However, one petitioner among a vocal group of listeners, musicians and composers who have criticized the overhaul argued yesterday that even an all-classical Web-based service wouldn’t rectify the fact that Radio 2’s on-air, non-classical programs are moving away from what had been the network’s core listeners.
This is fine, if I had internet radio in my car.
“One petitioner?” How about thousands of bitterly irate listeners who are incensed that the CBC has abandoned not only its core audience but its core mandate and reason for existing? No folks, we’re not just pissy. We’re pissed off. Put the pop on the commercial stations and leave public radio to its cultural objectives.
While acknowledging that change always meets opposition, Jennifer McGuire, executive director of radio, said that overall ratings haven’t dropped as significantly as anticipated, as some listeners tune out and new ones tune in. She also emphasized that only a tiny fraction - 0.8 per cent - of new Canadian songs get commercial radio play and that the Radio 2 changes will allow for much more Canadian music to be heard, from pop to experimental.
“change always meets opposition” is a very watery argument. We know that change meets opposition; but what the powers that be need to consider is what the reason for that opposition is. The fact that McGuire KNEW the ratings would drop suggests there is some intention towards killing the service on some level. Or do they expect to alienate their core audience? Right now, the CBC has very little to offer that is of interest as it is.
Wait…let’s read that again: “Jennifer McGuire…said that overall ratings haven’t dropped as significantly as anticipated…” Does anyone else find that statement suspicious at all? So, they were expecting their ratings to drop? It’s just plain weird. Oh…and the “Radio 2 changes will allow for much more Canadian music to be heard, from pop to experimental,” doesn’t wash either. All Canadian radio stations have a Canadian content mandate (it’s called CANCON…look it up), so the pop is covered. When they say “experimental,” they’re usually referring to independent electronic noise mixes, not concert music by CLC members. So the only way the CBC could be lacking in their presentation of Canadian content was if they weren’t playing enough music by Canadian composers, which has been our complaint since the beginning when they cancelled Two New Hours!
But, “people who like classical music can still find classical music on Radio 2. In fact, it is still the most represented single genre on the service,” McGuire said.
…provided you have access to a radio during working hours, don’t want to listen to classical on the drive to and from work, and can get internet radio service in your car or office. “Most represented?” Singly, perhaps…but how does total classical content rate compared to all other content…roots, blues, jazz, pop, techno, electronica, bad high school indie bands? This is not balanced programming…especially if we’re saddled with the reality that most of the non-classical programming is commercially viable pop fare that can easily find representation on commercial stations.
The strategy is simple: take a property that you want to phase out, but that you know will cause an uproar if you try. Make changes to “improve” it that you know will cause it to wane in popularity. Then use the lack of public interest as an excuse to phase it out without argument.
CBC — YOU SUCK.