One nice thing about working at the radio station is that I get to do my own programming. We have a library of almost 11,000 CDs, and I’m always discovering works or performances that surprise and delight me. But there is a challenge inherent in programming, which is making sure the works I choose are “listen-able.”
I work weekends. In particular, I am very careful in choosing what to play at 7:00 on a Sunday morning. I want to catch your attention, to help get you moving you as you wake up and start your day. So I try to play pieces that will keep your interest. At the same time, I don’t want to blast you out of your bed with great crashes and cacophony so you slam the off button while you are cursing my name! (I save the bombastic pieces for closer to noontime.)
I am also interested in sharing my new discoveries with you, in the hopes that you will enjoy them as much as I do. I love some of the great newer works we have lurking in the music library. And I suspect I am relatively successful in what I share on the air, since (so far) I get only positive feedback from our listeners.
There is an individual at the station, however, who has a genuine bias against 20th and 21st century music. He often tells me I shouldn’t program “that stuff” because is it not “mass appeal.” What is most frustrating to me is that he doesn’t actually listen to the works he tells me to avoid. His bias is based on when the work was written, rather than the quality of the piece itself.
Not too long ago, he even said he didn’t want to have to take a music appreciation course just to listen to the radio. Well, who says you have to do that? You don’t need “lessons” to appreciate good music, whether it is Baroque or Modern. Do you need to know every minute detail of the rulebook to enjoy watching tennis or football? Do you have to understand every brushstroke in order to like (or dislike) Monet’s Water Lilies? Do you have to read the Cliff Notes for every book you’ve ever read, just to be sure you understand it? You like the piece, or you don’t. That should be enough.
After all, how do we determine what is truly “mass appeal?” Show me the studies, the research, to support the assertion that people prefer harpsichords over marimbas, and I’ll rework my programming accordingly. Too often, though, people who throw around terms like “mass appeal” and “average listener” are really just saying, “this is what I like, so make me happy.”
So, until I find the appropriate research, or have a chance to personally chat with all of our listeners to find out what each one of them likes, I have to rely on my own taste and judgment, and hope others will enjoy what I am sharing. Frankly, the best barometer for how successful I am comes from your feedback and the ratings. So I hope you listen to my program, at least occasionally. And I hope you like what I bring to you every weekend.
And if you don’t, well, let me know.
