GROWING DEMAND

Radio Record, Volume I, Issue 48, 15 June 1928, Page 3

GROWING DEMAND

BROADCASTING EXPERIENCE IN AMERICA

ONE of the greatest and most popular broadcasting organisations in ‘America is the National Broadcasting Company, and the chairman of its Committee on Music, Dr. Walter Danrosch, submitted the following most interesting report to a recent meeting of the company's advisory committee: a fl TAKE pleasure in reporting great progress regarding the quality of the music that is now broadcast by the National Broadcasting Company. Without any friction, the bad has given place to the better, the better to the good, and in some cases, the good to the best. This is due partly to a natural instinct which is found among all people, but also greatly to the evident desire on the part of your officials to encourage such instincts. "rPHIS upward trend has manifested itself not only in the sustaining | programmes which are carried on by the National Broadcasting Company, many of which have shown a very high artistic standard, but also in the. eommercially sponsored programmes, | the music of which ranged from the classics to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, down to the present day, comprising important selections from operas and symphonies, piano and violin concertos, besides many of the world’s best songs and stringed quartets, "ocr programmes could not be offered if the public did not eagerly accept them, and while no doubt there are still millions dwelling in the lower depth and darkness of uccepting mere rhythmic noise as a substitute for music, there are now millions who, thanks to the radio, have learned something of the inner significance and emotional power of music as a language.

"PHERE seems to be an extraordinary eagerness among our people to know more, and I have made some interesting experiments along this line during my RCA hour, in which I haye made short explanatory comments in an endeavour to give my listeners a background against which to put their own preceptions of what they hear. Occasionally I have played a number. without telling them what it is, but asking them to write to me what emotional impression it made on them, and you would be amazed at the quality of the many letters I have received in response, both from men and women, and the seriousness with which the matter was treated by them. Incidentally, we still receive about a thousand letters a week from eager listeners. "ZT PERSONALLY have derived an ! immense pleasure from the new opportunities that the radio has giyenme. At a time of life when I assumed that my public work was, if not finished, at least but a repetition of what I had done in former years, the radio has suddenly enabled me enormously to widen my sphere of activLities, and especially in our latest experiments, to get astounding results, opening up still further possibilities, Thanks to the generosity and close sympathy of our officials, o2 which I ‘annot speak too feelingly, 1 was pertimitted to dig the first shovelful of earth for the foundations of your great "University of the Aix." "FT BROADCAST three of my children’s and young people's concerts as an experiment. The first one, on one of our RGA Saturday nights, was designed for teachers, educational bodies, and parents, the seeond for children in the grammar schools, and

schools and colleges, on two consecutive Ividay mornings. "TN hundreds of schools all over the country this announcement spread like wildfire. ‘Che children assembled either in their own auditoriums, or in great public halls loaned for the purpose. Radios were either loaned by the local radio sales agents, local merchants, or other publie-spirited — citizens. With that remarkable adaptability which seems to be characteristic of our people, the whole thing arranged itself naturally. The regular schedules of the school were willingly interrupted by the teachers. In such cities at Kansas City, Indianapolis. and many others, all the sehool children and faculty "listened in," and what particularly gladdened my heart, were the resp: ises rc.cived from the rural districts. These children perhaps are most in need of what an appreciation of music can give them. and if I could bring the "little red schoolhouse" all over the country within the sphere of our activities, I should consider it the crowning arch of our building. For two weeks, appreciative letters from pupils, teachers, and parents poured in by the thousands every day, and this makes me optimistic regarding the possibilitic. of our being able to carry out a regularly organised series of such concerts next year. If seems to me that wheresthere is such an evident desire on the part of the people of this country, their patriotism and well-known generosity towards anything tending to raise the standard of our race, will find-a way to enable us to carry through our plans."