PARIS
FIP
This station is government-funded, and has the best (popular music) programming I have ever heard. You are literally likely to hear a French blues singer (!) next to the "Catalogue Song" from Mozart's "Don Giovanni", next to a female singer covering a Hendrix track, next to Maurice Chevalier. I met the programmer in Paris, and he said that they set out to try to make sure the tracks sound good next to eachother.
Best moment:
FIP once started to play "Some Girls" by The Rolling Stones (from The Stone's 1978 album of the same name), and had to fade it out half way when someone realised the fast approach of a lyric malfunction.
www.radiofrance.fr/chaines/fip
NEW YORK
WKCR
WKCR is the college station of Columbia University. Focusses are on jazz and avant garde classical. And more ....
Best moment:
When the "Out To Lunch" [jazz] show played recordings by trumpeter Hot Lips Page made in an apartment on Fifth Avenue in 1940.
www.kwcr.org
LOS ANGELES
KLOS
Classic rock: they just played (last night, as I write) the whole of The Rolling Stone's "Steel Wheels" (every Sunday evening is album night). The evening DJ is the classic Jim Ladd, who has been on air since the late 1960s. His show is called "Free Form Radio", where , on Fridays at least, listeners can ring or email in and literally program the show. It is probably the best rock show in the world. And the taste of the listeners is excellent. Sunday mornings have the "Breakfast With The Beatles" show, which has also been running many years. It is a very clever show, with interesting selections from the Beatles as a group and from the solo Beatles. For example, a track written by Randy Newman was played from an early solo album of Ringo Starr: the lyrics were very funny and worth tuning in for alone, that day.
Best moment:
Just before the "pink" lunar eclipse in August 2007, Jim Ladd played Pink Floyd's "Dark Side Of The Moon" in its entirety, up to 1 am.
KUSC
KUSC is a great classical station at the University of Sourthern California. It rocks: they play mainstream works .... with no advertisements! They are 91.5 FM locally and at www.kusc.org.
Best moment:
Any, or when they played Sibelius' Symphony No 1/Atlanta Symphony; a very good "version".
KMZT
An excellent classical station that often plays less obvious but brilliant selections. Taste lives at KMZT. You learn a lot about classical pieces by listening to KMZT, given their trend of playing a broad range of the music.
Karl Haas "Adventures In Good Music" Public Radio
"Adventures In Good Music" is/was a daily radio show, rather than a particular radio station. The show ran from the late 1950s until recently, and was hosted (researched and presented) by pianist and broadcaster Karl Haas in, I think, New York. Similar to this site, Karl picked a daily topic (in classical music) to explore. Repeats of the show are still heard, by popular demand, on public radio in some parts of America, and in Australia and other countries. It was/is an incredible show, and Karl was very funny also. A valuable feature is that most recordings (because of the one hour show length, only single movements were played) were from Karl's own collection and were therefore the warmer-sounding LPs (not CDs). He also knew many of the world's famous performers, so that was a bonus. Karl often gave each show a punning title eg: "For Whom The Belles Toiled" was a program about sensuous arias (I thought it was going to be about supportive partners), and "Handel Bars" was a program about the writer of "The Messiah", Handel.
LONDON
BBC Radio 2
The mainstream popular music station. it sends its people around the world to make documentaries on eveything from "world music" (eg: Charlie Gillett, author of "The Sound Of The City", the famous history of rock and roll) to the story of jazz arranger Billy May (six weekly half hour shows). Many of BBC 3's programs are "Listen On Demand", so you can hear a program around the world on the intenet for a week after it is aired in the UK. The general rule is that documentaries and the resident specialty music shows (rock, folk, jazz, big band, reggae etc) are on every Monday through Thursday night, and on Saturday evenings.
A current example of a weekly program is Mark Lamarr's "Alternative Sixties", on every Wednesday at 10pm (half an hour: but you can fit in a lot of garage rock tracks in that time, and he speaks fast!). The BBC guide bills the program as "the coolest tracks from the 60s - soul, R'n'B, country, ska and original Britpop". This program used to be on Saturday evenings at 7pm, for an hour.
They always provide full playlists.
Best moment:
Any documentary, or maybe Jools Holland's Monday night show when he plays a classic piano jazz or R&B track.
BBC Radio 3
The great BBC classical station: it's like university - no commercials (as it is government-funded), and brilliant themed programs. One excellent program is "CD Masters", at 10am GMT each weekday morning. The two presenters between them choose classic versions of the music from the past: the play-lists are put up on the BBC 3 website. As with BBC 2, many of BBC 3's programs are "Listen On Demand", so you can hear them around the world on the internet for a week after they are aired in the UK.
Best moment:
When "CD Masters" played a 1930 recording of Beethoven's Leonore No 3 Overture conducted by Willem Mengelberg, which sounded so good I thought it was from the 1950s.
When I hear more examples to equal the above, I will mention them. As they say, (literally) stay tuned ....
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