 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2007-01-23 17:27
Just when I thought all hope was lost........One of the Washington, DC area public radio stations, WETA-FM 90.9, has just switched to an ALL-CLASSICAL format, round-the-clock. Finally, our large metropolitan area has classical music on the radio again.
This time, I've put my money where my mouth is, and sent the station a substantial donation to help keep this music on the air.
I feel like a starving man who's been given his first meal in months!
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Author: Bill
Date: 2007-01-23 19:19
That's great! Amazing to think this particular city might have been without a source for this music. I'll have to tune in more often. (And I should donate!)
Bill.
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Author: J. J.
Date: 2007-01-23 20:00
Glad to see they've gone back. With the only remaining station, WGMS 104.1 becoming part of the Redskin owner Dan Snyder's xxxESPNRADIO, it probably seemed like the sensible move for the NPR station. Used to be that there were two classical stations in town, and if I had to choose one, I'd pick 90.9.
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Author: glin
Date: 2007-01-23 22:18
Be assured.... 90.9 will remind you to donate.....
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Author: John Stackpole
Date: 2007-01-24 00:13
Actually, WBJC (91.5) from Baltimore has been classical all along, and easily picked up in the DC area - even south of DC where I am.
But it is good that WETA (finally - about time!) came to their musical senses. They do have on full hour of news 7:00-8:00 pm - the audio of the TV news on Channel 26, Jim Lehrer.
Turns out Snyder didn't buy WGMS, couldn't agree on a price - they just decided to go "commercial pop". WGMS gave (!) WETA all of their classical CDs. All very cooperative.
My only concern, and I haven't found out yet, is that WETA may also drop Prairie Home Companion, a fearful loss if they do.
JDS
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2007-01-24 18:22
The swap between WGMS and WETA, with classical music returning to WETA, is a net gain for classical music lovers around here. For one thing, WGMS has a weak signal (I couldn't receive it in my home office in Falls Church), while WETA has the strongest signal in the region. Also, WGMS played an awful lot of single movements or even partial movements. WETA used to do that, too, but not as often. We'll probably be hearing complete performances more often now. I also think the public broadcasting stations branch out into less familiar music more than WGMS did. WGMS had a relentlessly "Top Forty" mentality. Even when WGMS played a new CD as a "pick of the week," it was usually a new recording of "safe," familiar music.
Apparently, WETA plans to hire some classical music announcers now fired from WGMS. I think WETA may feel it's important to hire Diana Hollander, who earned a great deal of empathy locally when WGMS arranged for her to broadcast out of her own home. It's difficult for her to go to the studio because she has severe epilepsy. Like most listeners, I've been rooting for her to succeed--but if WETA brings her in, I hope the station will persuade her to throttle back on the ooey-gooey, fake-chipper "Bubbles" (her nickname) in favor of a more dignified, low-key announcing style. Much as I want to see her and her employer set good examples for hiring the disabled, her aggressive cuteness turned me off so much that I developed an absolutely Pavlovian reflex of lunging for the "off" button every time she started that infernal gushing. She has a pleasant-sounding voice and I think she could be a wonderful announcer if she wouldn't try quite so pitifully hard.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: Phat Cat
Date: 2007-01-24 18:24
David:
I guess this means you'll be getting out the potato peelers.
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Author: David Spiegelthal ★2017
Date: 2007-01-24 19:22
Ear-spuds or not, I'm listening to streaming audio from WETA-FM on my computer as I write this. I fully agree with Lelia about Diana Hollander -- I'd like her to get the WETA gig too, but I was also turned off by her smarmy delivery on WGMS. It sure would be nice if they could get Dennis Owens to come back out of retirement, and let him speak his mind without the censorship he was subjected to during his last five years or so at WGMS (which, I believe, is what drove him to retire).
Sorry for all the local gossip, non-DC-area readers!
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Author: johnnymo0829
Date: 2007-01-24 19:43
this is why I went and got the x-m radio. it's great lots of classical, jazz everything. I find myself on the bluegrass station a lot because where in the nyc area can you hear bluegrass
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2007-01-25 12:17
One announcer I really want back on WETA is their former classical music dj, Judy Gruber, with her deep knowledge and her gravelly, no-nonsense voice. I'm afraid she may have retired, though, since I think she was only doing substitute gigs for the last few months before WETA changed to yakkety-yak format. She's my model for the ideal classical music dj.
Btw, according to this morning's Washington Post, some listeners who liked the yakkety-yak are shrieking in agony and demanding their donations back. Tough kishkas--they've got plenty of other options--but I wouldn't be surprised if eventually, WETA backs off from the all-classical format and goes to a mixture, picking up some talk programs that the other PBS stations don't take.
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: Ralph Katz
Date: 2007-01-27 19:50
For your sake and that of the rest of the DC area, I hope they don't change formats on you again.
We were similarly starving in the Detroit metro area until Detroit Public Television started up WRCJ in 1995, with on-air people orphaned when the 3rd set of new owners of all-classical WQRS re-formatted it as a rock station in 1997. Even though WRCJ is classical-by-day & jazz-by-night, it is great to have them here.
A close family member is in broadcasting , and it truly can be an amoral, dog-eat-dog business. He is addicted to it, but the longest he has held a job was 5 years, and then only by owning the company.
Good Luck!
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Author: clarinetist04
Date: 2007-01-28 01:46
Washington Post said this was going to happen in a Dec. 16 article. I'm glad it has finally come to fruition.
Phenomenal.
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Author: LarryBocaner ★2017
Date: 2007-01-28 16:48
I heard Judy Gruber on WETA yesterday morning, too. Apparently her extended layoff didn't improve her musical intelligence. She's as stupid and ignorant as always! A stint as PR person for the Washington Opera (pre-Domingo) seems to be about as deep as she ever got into classical music.
WETA's knowledgeable DJ's, Robert Aubrey Davis and Martin Goldsmith now work for XM satellite radio. Nevertheless I am restarting my membership contribution to the station -- their TV broadcast in HD of the Met's Magic Flute was worth the price of admission!
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Author: diz
Date: 2007-01-29 02:14
Is there a 24 / 7 national classical service in the U.S.?
Without music, the world would be grey, very grey.
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Author: Lelia Loban ★2017
Date: 2007-01-29 11:27
>>I heard Judy Gruber on WETA yesterday morning, too. Apparently her extended layoff didn't improve her musical intelligence. She's as stupid and ignorant as always! A stint as PR person for the Washington Opera (pre-Domingo) seems to be about as deep as she ever got into classical music.
>>
Can you back up this comment with any specific example of something Judy Gruber said that you consider "stupid and ignorant"?
Lelia
http://www.scoreexchange.com/profiles/Lelia_Loban
To hear the audio, click on the "Scorch Plug-In" box above the score.
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Author: LarryBocaner ★2017
Date: 2007-01-29 21:03
Sorry Lelia, I was driving in my car at the time -- not taking notes. I promise to monitor future broadcasts with an eye to documenting!
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Author: LarryBocaner ★2017
Date: 2007-04-02 00:59
Lelia, I promised to monitor Judy Gruber's "stupid and ignorant" on-air efforts at WETA; tonight in my car on the way home from a wake (!) I heard her announce on the completion of a Telemann Concerto for (obviously) (1-only) Trumpet, two oboes and strings as being played by the "Three Leuben Brothers". If she had been listening to the piece as it was played on the air it would have been clear that, even though there might be other works on the same CD that did involve the whole Leuben family, this piece didn't! I'm pretty sure that the other two brothers don't double on oboes.
This was only the first time I had caught her on the air since our January posting. I'll let you know about future gaffes if you want to provide me with your email address -- otherwise I don't wish to involve all you other nice people in such a parochial subject!
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Author: rgames
Date: 2007-04-02 02:33
I'm not a fan of the switch - for those of us south of DC, WETA was our only choice for NPR. Now we get no NPR - only the occasional, brief update. That's the reason there was an outcry when the format was changed.
The nation's capitol now has no public radio.... "From NPR in Washington" but not broadcast in Washington. A bit infuriating, to say the least.
I have plenty of options to listen to classical music but NONE for public radio.
rgames
____________________________
Richard G. Ames
Composer - Arranger - Producer
www.rgamesmusic.com
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