Station
executives base their formats as much on the evolving function of radio
as on musical concerns. Many people, they claim, listen only when in cars,
and others leave a radio on as background music in the office. Choosing
a specific program and listening to it from beginning to end— “foreground
listening,” as those in the business call it—is rare, and
near-universal wisdom in the field holds that to demand concentrated attention
is to risk alienating listeners.
Oddly, though, these same people who are said to listen without intention
seem to care a great deal about their classical stations. Any change in
format provokes angry protests and letters to the editor. Such outbursts,
station executives argue, say more about demographics than about musical
taste.
The loyalty classical-music lovers show to their stations, executives
suggest, may be little different from that displayed by followers of political
talk-show hosts or on-the-air psychologists. The station becomes an emblem
of the listener’s identity, and the identity of classical-radio
listeners is distinctive. They are well educated, wealthy, and, above
all, older than other listening groups. The audience for Performance
Today, for example, averages about 50: not ancient but a decade older
than the one that tunes in to All Things Considered, also on
NPR. No wonder station managers often describe their approaches to programming
with words suited to a retirement community.
In recent conversations with station director and music programmers, two
buzzwords kept recurring: “shelter” and “gateway.”
Suzanne White, the general manager of KBPS here in Portland, said that
her listeners, 52 years old on average, were seeking a “haven of
sanity”; Mark Kausch, the manager of music programming for Public
Radio International, the main syndicator of classical programming in the
country, said that listeners wanted a “warm blanket.” When
the radio blares with the political bile of Rush Limbaugh, the adolescent
stunts of Don Imus and Howard Stern, and the quick psycho-logical fixes
of Dr. Laura Schlessinger, let alone pop music aimed at 12-year-olds and
golden-oldies from the ’80s for aging Gen-X-ers, a peaceful harbor
of classical music certainly has its attractions for people over, say,
45, and the more peaceful the better.
But first you have to get listeners into the safety zone. The term “gateway”
stems from the notion that as people get older, there is less radio programming
addressed to them, so they may drift toward a classical station. This
is the fringe audience. These listeners will stay, it is said, only if
they are made to feel welcome.
“You can’t be snooty” several station directors insisted,
as if repeating a mantra. Mr. Child, of WNYC, formerly the municipal station
in New York but now run by a foundation, demands that announcers be “smart
and sassy and know their stuff,” and not to be didactic, he said.
“You don’t have to announce the key and opus number when you
play Beethoven’s Fifth.” Mr. Child proudly noted that WNYC’s
900,000 listeners were, on average, eight years younger than the audience
for its lone remaining commercial rival, WQXR, which is owned by the New
York Times.
next page
|