ClassicFM.
Hard as it may be to believe but almost everywhere in Britain it is possible to receive two distinct classical music radio stations.
BBC Radio 3 [Wikipedia: Radio 3]is almost certainly the best classical music radio station in the world. Not only does the BBC provide classical music around the clock, but the organization supports and pays for and supports five symphony orchestras.
But, to be frank, Radio 3 is sometimes a bit preachy. It wants to make you like songs by Michael Tippet even when they sound like screeching.
ClassicFM is indescribably perfect to just have one, at any time, in the background, to make life more acceptable.
Of course classical music has a higher goal and rationale than that. But making life acceptable is no bad thing.
5 comments:
Radio Three is available even in the backwoods (frontwoods?) of Canada through the blessed Internet. So I can love Britain from afar.
"It wants to make you like songs by Michael Tippet even when they sound like screeching."
I suppose that's what they call 'cultural education for the masses.' Very funny stuff. I shall return :)
You stated that the BBC supports and pays for 5 symphony orchestras, which means that the British taxpayers are paying for it since anyone with a TV is taxed to support the BBC.
Here in J'Ville, we have Jones College radio that plays classical music. It's pretty good. NPR at night also plays some classical.
People do pay a licence fee if they possess a TV set, but then again people have voted for political parties that have supported taxes.
On the whole, the vast majority of British voters (i.e. all Labour, virtually all Liberal-Democrats and Nationalists, and a large proportion of Conservatives) support public spending and the taxation to pay for it. (I suppose the difference with the US is that American voters support public spending [if it is for *their* bridges, *their* schools, or *their* prescription drugs], but keep electing politicians who don't have the guts to levy the necessary taxes.)
The idea of necessity varies from person to person. My girlfriend keeps tellingme that we "need" cable television but I am very content just watching regular broadcast TV.
It's the same with taxes and government spending. I do not think that government funding is not necessary for broadcast television and radio. Even though I love BS and NPR (which gets 25% of its funding from the US government), I wuld like a day when they get no money at all from the government. The British people are, as you stated, in disagreement with me. It all depends on what is considered "necessary".
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