janzen@sunfun.DEC (Thomas E. Janzen CSS GNG CWO 714 850-7849 SUNFUN::JANZEN) (08/23/84)
Hello A While back you people exchanged radio station information. I didn't see anything from Los Angeles, so here is a summary. In Los Angeles: KFAC-FM, KFAC-AM are the only commercial classical outlets in the market. (My B.A. is in Broadcasting.) I listened to them only between 13 and 17 years of age, while I was studying classical piano and playing Gershwin. KFAC-FM plays some philharmonic orhestra concerts and lots of records and programs. A fellow alumnus of mine does a lot of standard classical shows, but has fun on Saturday afternnoon playing a mix, with one off-the-wall each week. It might be Laurie Anderson, or some other avant-garde. Usually, KFAC NEVER plays really modern music. KFAC-AM has lighter classics like film scores and single movements of famous pieces, and more commercials. KUSC, (University of Southern California) is a public station in L.A. They are too conservative, but do average about 4-6 hours/ week modern music (music of the last ten years), usually by virtue of playing local concerts at USC (not a heavy contributor), California Institute of the Arts (Disney), UC San Diego, Olympic Arts festival, and occasional special programs of new music. KCSN (California State University, Northridge ); I was director of classical music there in '74. When I last looked they played classical music about 11AM-2PM Mon-Fri. Standard phonograph classics. An old pianist friend just started an interview-over-a-meal show with a classical artist, like the one KFAC has at lunchtime at the music center. KPFK L.A., a pacifica station like KPFA Berkeley, WBAI New York, KPFT Houston, and WPFW Washinton DC. Non-commercial, they play many different kinds of programs, the content of which is completely determined by the individual programmers. The "classical music" programs are noon to two Mon-Fri and new music at 6AM M-Fri and Tuesday with world-traveller and composer carl stone, Tuesday at 9:30 PM for two hours. This has been a seminar in new music for me, since he started in the mid 70's, although David Cloud ran a program, Zymurgy, in the early seventies that was similar, but based on records. In general, Carl gets live guests or brand new recordings. The guests play their brand new music in studio. For a while, Phil Mendelssohn ran Tesseract at midnight Friday, but he quit. Individuals determine the programming of KPFK to a large extent. KPCC (pasadena city college) used to play classics without any announcing! I can't here them down in costa mesa, 45mi south of L.A. -Tom janzen 2300 Fairview Road H-201 Costa Mesa, Ca 92626 Thu 23-Aug-1984 12:31 PDT
geoff@callan.UUCP (08/28/84)
I can't resist adding a friend's instructions on tuning to KFAC-FM: (1) Start in the middle of the dial. (2) Tune left (toward the public end) until you reach a station playing classical music. (3) You have now found KUSC. (4) Tune your radio right one station, to a station that is playing a commercial. (5) You have now found KFAC. As well as playing 20 minutes an hour of commercials (yes, that's right, 33%), KFAC has an annoying habit of playing extracts from works (and not just in educational contexts). I find this both frustrating and disrespectful of the composer (can you imagine hearing *only* the third movement of Tchaikowsky's 6th?). I have even heard them do things like play a piece of a movement, clumsily faded out when time runs out, or take a commercial break between movements. Thank god I never heard them run a commercial during the side flip in the last movement of the Mahler 2nd (not that they ever play Mahler). My friends and I call KFAC by a more disrespectful name, KF*C. Definitely the worst commercial classical station I have ever encountered. -- Geoff Kuenning Callan Data Systems ...!ihnp4!wlbr!callan!geoff