Steve Schwartz says he only has access to:

>...dismal NPR station.  To be fair, it hasn't a large budget to buy CDs,
>but even so, it's cutting back in favor of chit-chat and repetitive news
>stories.  What's left behind is music in performances I've heard
>several times over.  Since I have an adequate collection myself - and
>furthermore one which ideally fits my likes and dislikes (coincidence?
>I don't think so) - I've given up listening to classical radio.

I reckon you'd agree that this is regrettable, no matter how broad one's
musical exposure or collection.  The chance for one to hear something new
by accident is simply cut off, aside from the huge implications for CM
gaining a broader audience.

 From where I sit -- having always had access to plenty of it in Peru,
England, Spain and Canada -- radio's the only real way to provide exposure
to CM for most people who don't live in musical households.  I mean
especially youngsters, of course:  aside from a record or two in my house
as a kid, radio was central to my musical education, and it continues to be
('though I now have a sizeable collection of what I like).  Music libraries
come second to radio, although live performances (re-)played on the radio
are irreplaceable as incentives to people new to CM.  Their absence would
be, IMO, especially regrettable.

This seems to leave only commercials and soundtracks as hooks for renewing
a CM audience in the US.  So how come there's so little outcry in the US,
even from the few?

Bert Bailey