Ominous News About WQXR in New York
There are oiminous stories about the possibility of the New York Times selling its radio station WQXR, the flagship of American classical radio stations. If this happens, it could be a devastating blow to classical music on the radio. This great station could either cease to exist or be bought by another organization, possibly leading to dumbed-down classical programming compromising its artistic integrity.
But this is hardly surprising given the current eeconomic crisis and the difficulties the Times is having of its own, similar to newspapers across the country. Unfortunately, many classical radio stations in America have gone under, and many of those which are still around offer less than great programming, often sticking to the most familiar warhorses,and playing just isolated movements from famous works. Let's hope that WQXR will not suffer this fate.
New York without WQXR would be as unthinkable as the city without such landmarks as the Empire State building, the Statue of Liberty or the Brooklyn bridge. In addition to playing recordings of a wide,wide classical repertoire, it offers live broadcasts of concerts from around the city and elsewhere, taped concerts by great symphony orchestras of Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and New York's own Philharmonic, Metropolitan Opera broadcasts, and much,much more.
WQXR's announcers are the most knowledgable and enthusiastic in the business, and don''t just tell you what's playing but offer stimulating and informative commentary. You can hear everything from familiar masterpieces by Bach, Handel, Beethoven, Mozart , Schubert, Brahms and Tchaikovsky etc, to to music by leading contemporary composers such as John Adams, Philip Glass, John Corigliano, William Bolcom and others. You can hear broadcasts of complete recordings on Saturdays when the Met broadcast season is over, and taped live performaces from the opera houses of Chicago, Houston and elsewhere.
For fans of the piano, the noted pianist and teacher David Dubal has a very interesting program on in which he compares performances of the same works by many different pianists, famous and obscure. Famous pianists, violinists and singers etc sometimes come to the station to be ionterviewed. And even if you don't live in the New York area, you can listen on the internet at WQXR.com, and see their playlist every day. We can't afford to lose the jewel in the crown of classical radio.