NEW JAZZ STATION - GOODBYE TO THE SMOOTH, HELLO TO THE CLASSICS | FLY

Until a very few weeks ago the terms ‘jazz radio station’ or even ‘jazz and radio’ were sufficient to send many of the jazz community rushing for the Prozac. For decades, lovers of our artform have griped justifiably or not about the apparently small proportion of the BBC’s schedules devoted to jazz. And the tragic and swift disaster story that was Jazz FM — a station that despite its worthy beginnings was later responsible for both the attempted rape and (fortunately abortive) re-definition of the music — is one that no true jazz lover within the boundaries of the M25 will ever find it possible to forget or forgive.

And my guess is that over the next ten years we will see this new station transform every aspect of jazz in Britain for the better

While Jazz FM was foundering amid its own incompetence, Classic FM, in contrast — which began (unlike Jazz FM’s palatial home) in a couple of rooms above a gin manufacturer in North London — was achieving miracles of cultural adjustment. While Jazz FM was whistling Dixie, Classic FM listeners were starting to whistle Vivaldi. In a matter of a few short years, one-time Beatles fans and their offspring were talking fondly of ‘my classical music’ and voting composers three hundred years old to the top of the Classic FM charts, sending off for its stylish compilation CDs and buying its magazines.

Well, it’s going to happen to jazz now.

A few weeks ago, OFCOM (the regulator for radio) authorised eight new DAB stations with a recommendation that one such channel should cover jazz properly. DAB, just in case you haven’t heard yet, is Digital Audio Broadcasting; the medium which has been called the re-birth of radio. Pop into Curry’s, WH Smith’s or any of the other high street stores who are being over-run with requests for the neat little radio receivers that pick up DAB station and you’ll have access to hundreds of new bubbling radio channels answering just about every broadcasting need. Well, anyhow almost over night — Classic FM, under the aegis of its governing body GCap took up the jazz option.

All this means that Britain’s most successful independent radio operator will soon — and certainly by New Year’s Eve 2006 — be securely supporting jazz on radio twenty-four/seven. But you may well ask how do these previously classical cats define jazz? Will the definition, groaned one disillusioned columnist include all those terrifying re-definitions; ‘smooth jazz’, soul, blues; in short all the get-out clauses which reduced Jazz FM to an on-air mockery of its remit

The answer happily, or I’m inclined to say ecstatically, is no. The other day I was treated to lunch by Classic FM’s creative director Tim Lihoreau who, with Darren Henley, is responsible for the station’s output. Tim tells me that the programming day by day when general listenership is most required — will revolve securely around the classic canon of jazz discography from Ellington to Parker; from historic to present-day with an accent on the accessible. The best of Michael Parkinson’s output might provide a rough though by no means definitive parallel.

Specialist areas: classic New Orleans, avant-garde and others (in short the kind of music which stretches beyond the reasonable comprehension of the untrained ear) will be fully covered by informed presenter-led specialist programmes in the evening. The station is still so much in its formative stages that, at the time of writing, it has no name but it does have plans to begin producing label-led CDs, books about our music, and a magazine of its own.

If all of this sounds just a little too good to be true, my advice is ‘have faith and stay on board’. The hugely successful track-record of Classic FM bodes well for its jazz sister-ship. And my guess is that over the next ten years we will see this new station transform every aspect of jazz in Britain for the better. That phrase ‘extreme makeover’ comes to mind. So, shout brothers and sisters. After one hundred years jazz looks, at last, like taking its rightful and rooted place in our popular cultural landscape!

Yeah, that’s right - we’re in Cyprus where even the oldie members of the U3A have a Jazz Appreciation Group! Let’s hope that the new truly jazz station in the UK will be very up to the mark jazz-wise and not end up being ‘music to cut your throat by’! We’re hoping that the station will be available via webcast. Oh, we also sincerely hope that any dinner jazz will be what it purports to be: decent stuff that would add that little ‘something’ to good company and good food. not the melody-less stuff that used to be churned out by Ms. Ward on ‘Jazz FM’. Cheers.

From the Guardian:

“GCap Media will launch digital service thejazz on Christmas day as a sister service to Classic FM, the group revealed today.

“The new station, available on DAB digital radio, online at thejazz.com and on Sky Digital and NTL:Telewest, kicks off at 9am on December 25 and has set itself the task of making jazz music more accessible.”

I so agree about Jazz FM, in the case of the north it was even worse, with Jazz FM becoming Smooth FM, with mostly anodyne Soul musicand those 12 minute long safe sax solos - This station may be the final reason to ensure I get a DAB radio.

Official word on poor quality from Dab multiplex owners below:

Thanks for your mail regarding the new Jazz service. As you may be aware, test transmissions for the service have recently begun, which enables me to confirm that the station is broadcasting at 96kb/s mono (which was what PrimeTime originally launched at).

In order to accommodate the service, we have had to reduce the bitrate of two other services - so Core and Life are now both running at 80kb/s mono.

I remember with great clarity your perspective on stereo versus mono, and I’m sorry that you’ll therefore be disappointed about the changes made. However, we’ve estimated that approximately 70% of the DAB digital radios sold are effectively mono (either having just one speaker, or having such limited speaker separation that a stereo image just won’t be conveyed). Ultimately the only way that we could provide 8 audio services was to run the services in mono, and we think that listeners will appreciate the extra service, as jazz listeners have never had a service of that type available nationally.

I believe that theJazz is going to be available on digital TV, but at this stage I’m afraid that I don’t have any details of the channel number.
All the best

Dawn
———————————-
Sent: Friday November 2006 13:00
To: DigitalOne Information
Subject: New Jazz station

Hi There

In normal circumstances I would feel over the moon at the launch of such a station,however after reading so much speculation I am hoping that the station may launch on sky as well to enable stereo sound coverage.
I understand the 128kbit/s stereo used for primetime is no longer available due to space accomodated for mobile phones[I only spent £387.98 for CD sound!] so the jazz station will probably be 64kbit/s mono??? I have also read the likelihood that some other stations on Digital 1 will have the sound bit rates lowered to inferior quality due to the money being made on other media like mobile phones.

Can you put my mind at rest? Or confirm that sound will be sacrificed soon to even worse quality?

Early adopter of Dab & once met Dawn at Earls court demo for dab in its infancy

Neil Mclean

Classic FM has never been on Freeview due to ‘the costs associated with that platform’ - might it be a better idea to consider Freeview in preference to DAB?

OK so they’re not quite so portable, but a Freeview box is only £20-£25 now :)

However, it’s great to see a commitment to Jazz FM’s original remit from 10 years ago. No more daytime light and soul-less nonsense!

It’s just a shame to see that the much hyped digital radio is already running beyond its means! MPEG-1 layer 2 audio needs bandwidth and lots of it!

I hope this new station will become something approaching a wonderful internet station that I recently came across called AttentionSpan radio : http://www.attentionspanradio.net/index.php

this in my opinion is the best source of up to date jazz music anywhere. It specialises in todays artists, as opposed to "museum" jazz and thus is
an excellent promoter of todays jazz scene. This station is available on iTunes Radio as well as on the internet. The only other competitor is RadoioJazz, which does a good job promoting unknown jazz artists, but is less picky as to the artistic and stylistic originality of the music.

The guy running it is based in the USA, and appears to be doing it largely as a labour of love out of his own funds. It is such a great station - playing largely what could be considered modern post bop jazz/fusion music for the "musicians musician". He gets some pin money i believe from paypal subscriptions and some form of minor payments from radio365 or something ( which is the streaming vehicle for the station ).

For heavens sake we need a better outlet for jazz, since the debacle of jazzFM, and the lack of decent DAB/FM/satellite outlets promoting modern jazz.

Radio 2,3 spend far too much time on "Dead Mans Jazz" imo

I was so chuffed to find this station - it has two channels- one for fusion/funk and the other for post bop. The second channel really does serve the "cream" and challenging stuff - stuff pro jazz guys listen to- rather than just dinner or smooth crap.

Please do everything you can to promote this internet station - it deserves as wide a listenership as possible. I should add he plays UK musicians as well as the yanks.

PS - i have no connection with the station - i just want to see this music station survive and the musicians reach a wider audience - as im sure you do as well. Here is a namecheck of just a sample of the fine musicians i discovered via AttentionSpan :

dave gilmore
Bill Anschell J Piano
VOID ( perth fusion )
michael wolff
eliane elias
jean michel pilc
Frank Locrasto
Billy Childs
janice Borla
FRED HERSCH
Yves Nadeau
GARLICKS
craig handy sax
Herbie Thrust
Jonathan Kreisberg
nguyen le ?
Esbjorn Svenson Trio
Herbie Nichols ??
Minsarah > Florian Weber
The Bad Plus
JANE IRA BLOOM

Until thejazz becomes a so called radio station with presenters[Easter apparently]

You may as well pick your own jazz 24 hours a day if you listen online.

www.last.fm

www.mercora.com

sensational online music sites for free

Full station launch from April 6th with Mike Chadwick as first known signing

these quotes from Mikes website yesterday

Well they have finally done it! I’ve been hanging by the whim of the
programme director since the Gaurdian Media Group destroyed Jazz FM
and now its finally happened….. They have finally sacked me and I
officially do my last show on March 31st 2007. OK so this may seem
harsh and iof you want to complain I will list the main e-mail
contacts for you and I hope that you tell them how you feel. The
Programme controller at smooth fm is Steve Collins
steve.coll…@smoothfm.com The Managing director of Smooth FM is Roy
Bennett roy.benn…@smoothfm.com The Programme director for the
Gaurdian Media Group is John Simons john.sim…@gmgradio.com Now the
good news, I have been approached by the new digital national radio
station ‘the Jazz’ to work for them and I will be doing 2 weekend
shows (fri/sat times tbc) starting on the weekend after Easter so as
one door closes another better one opens. Check back for news on the
shows over the next few weeks. Please do let smooth know that you are
unhappy at me being taken off because they need to know what effect
their actions have on you because as listeners to their radio stations
they don’t care about you at all…believe me! Anyway forward onto
better days and of course lots and lots of great inspiring music!
Thank you for listening, I really appreciate it. Lots of Love Mike

It now reads today after management have obviously got on his back!

Better Days Ahead

Smooth FM have decided not to renew my contract and I broadcast my
last show for them on the 31st March 2007. If you would like to find
out why then the three main e-mail contacts you will need are:- The
Programme controller at smooth fm is Steve Collins
steve.coll…@smoothfm.com The Managing director of Smooth FM is Roy
Bennett roy.benn…@smoothfm.com The Programme director for the
Gaurdian Media Group is John Simons john.sim…@gmgradio.com Check
back for news about me and the new shows on a new station over the
next few weeks as I get further details. Anyway forward onto better
days and of course lots and lots of great inspiring music! Thank you
for listening, I really appreciate it. Mike

It now reads 24th March!

Smooth FM have decided not to renew my contract and I broadcast my last show for them on the 24th March 2007. If you would like to find out why then the three main e-mail contacts you will need are:- Check back for news about me and the new shows on a new station over the next few weeks as I get further details. Anyway forward onto better days and of course lots and lots of great inspiring music! Thank you for listening, I really appreciate it. Mike

What’s happened to smooth fm, my favourite station?
I tuned into 102.2 as usual and thought I’d mistuned when i heard the hideous, bland “musak” that emanated. I will certainly not be tuning in again.I was a long term, loyal listener.

Smooth FM has closed in London

It is now a format of oldies from last 5 decades in the form of Smooth Radio.
You can still hear Jazz on the station overnight with a new show from Tony Myatt on Smooth Nights Midnight-6am.

The Jazz launches on 6th April with 5 ex jazz fm presenters!

Monday-Friday
6am-10am Mark Forrest (voicetracked, one presumes, as he will remain as drivetime host on Classic FM)
10am-2pm Anthony Davis (of Capital Life breakfast fame)
2pm-6pm David Jensen
6pm-9pm Margherita Taylor
9pm-12am Helen Mayhew (Mike Chadwick’s Cutting Edge on Fridays)

Saturday
7am-11am Claire Anderson
11am-1pm Jamie Cullum (as a permanent presenter)
1pm-3pm theJazz Jury with Tim Lihoreau (reviews of new releases)
3pm-6pm Helen Mayhew (requests)
6pm-8pm Latin Party with Mike Chadwick
8pm-12am theJazz Party with Chris Philips (Choice FM presenter)

Sunday
7am-11am Claire Anderson
11am-1pm Legends of Jazz with Ramsey Lewis (which has just been dropped by Smooth FM)
1pm-3pm Jacqui Dankworth
3pm-5pm Digby Fairweather
5pm-6pm MyJazz with Helen Mayhew (interviews)
6pm-9pm Margherita Taylor
9pm-10pm The Courtney Pine Experience
10pm-12am Mainstem with Campbell Burnap (again, defecting to theJazz having just been dropped from Smooth FM)

If you are like me cheesed off that Thejazz does not feel it neccesary to provide an overnight presenter,well if you tune into nationally Smooth Radio ch 718 & Sky Channel 0128 or 102.2FM & Dab in London, you can listen to 6 hours of jazz with the legendary Tony Myatt who Gcap somehow let slip through their fingers! Midnight-6am weeknights

I liked Jazz FM and was very sorry when initially it was taken over by another radio station and then shut down. Jazz FM organised free open air jazz at St Christorpher’s place every summar and had some great artist/bands every Wednesday, bands like Osibisa played there almost every year. I had been going there for nearly 15 years when it all stopped. After some research I tracked down the new owners of Jazz FM (somewhere up north) who indicated that they would continue with this event. Of course this never happened. Will the new Jazz channel owners, Classic FM (?)organise something similar?