I suggest that the new programming be added along with the existing. Then the listeners can compare. Reduce the existing program time slots to accomadate
The CBC's essential purpose is to provide for Canadians an alternative to the mediocre fare of commercial broadcasters. Why is CBC turning its back on that mandate and imitating the corporate media?
I hate these changes and feel completely disenfranchised. I want full news service on Radio 2 and classical music and serious discussion programmes restored.
I am actually not the biggest fan of classical music, but Tom Allen plays such good and interesting music every morning, with informative commentary that I look forward to waking up. You already ruined my evenings by canning After Hours and replacing it with the uneven Tonic (too much shlocky stuff), please don't ruin my mornings, too.
People have been listening to the CBC because it provides them something they cannot find anywhere else. Changing it in favour of more mainstream programming would make it pointless to listen to the CBC, as anyone who wants that sort of programming already has myriads of options for listening to it elsewhere. This is a grave mistake and will result in a great loss of core listeners rather than a gain of new listeners - not to mention, there will thereafter be no reason at all for someone like me to tune into the radio. By the way, I am 26. I don't know where someone might have gotten the impression that classical music has an age limit - perhaps from some other stations and media; the ones that pander to the lowest common denominator. I have come to expect better than that from the CBC and am sorely disappointed.
As a young person I heard the Met.Opera every Saturday; now it is no longer available.What a backward step that is. By the way, have you been to a classic concert lately? It is full of young people!!!!
The Canadian public is capable of and interested in enjoying programming that is much more challenging and different than the fluff that is already widely available. In a country the size of Canada (area vs population), this audience may not be profitable enough to justify an investment by the private sector, but the importance of responding to this audience, in terms of culture and country, cannot be underestimated. It is essential that the public sector assume this critical responsibility.
CBC's actions are equivalent to stripping a public museam of its Picasso's, Rembrandts and Michaelangelo's and replacing them with graffiti and Andy Warhol
The CBC brass has gone completely mad! The proposed changes in the fall follow the mindless changes already perpetrated. What happed to Danielle Charbonneau? What happened to Sunday Morning between 10 and 12? Now
Your survey of 2000 persons was woefully inadequate, hardly a significant cross section of the Canadian population. Reconsider, redo, and find out what listeners really expect of their national CBC.
Classical music has stood the test of time and appeals to all ages of listeners. There are plenty of options for listeners of easy listening and soft pop music. As a publicly funded station, dramatic changes to programming should be the result of
why make one more radio starion available for mental midgets? The public airwaves were not designed to compete with commercial stations. They are meant to provide a real alternative which is intelligent, creative, educational and musically literate. Although you claim to have conducted some polls before you made these drastic changes, you did not interview long time listeners for whom Radio is an oasis in a sea of mediocrity.
Radio 2 has been a refuge from mediocre programming and mediocre language. Surely part of the mandate is to raise the cultural level? If I want mediocre programming I can get it elsewhere.
If the CBC is allowed to get away with this, there will be no reason to even have the CBC.Radio 2 was set up to offer more intelligent programming, with Radio 1 providing pop music and popular programming. Please, CBC, keep it that way... with something for everybody.
CBC Radio 2 has been an major and important part of our lives. Please reconsider the proposed changes. Canada needs a place for the kind of programming you have supported in the past -- it has been the envy of my American friends, and a source of Canadian identity.
There must be hundreds of people who want to speak out against the changes but for various reasons cannot. CBC programmers, it seems, will run right over all of its faithful listeners without a backward glance. I came from the UK (and the BBC) in 1973 and found solace in many good programs on Canada’s public broadcaster. I learned about classical music from CBC, and I learned about the new country I had moved to. And guess what, my children have grown up and have turned into the CBC's new audience. So you see, there’s no need to cast off your long-time audience – just when you are needed the most to fill days with more hours of leisure in them. Sure, we can turn to the internet, but it’s hardly convenient and not everyone has embraced a computer. Make a few changes, why not, but what's with the wholesale tossing of popular and high quality programs?
I was concened when I heard many programs seeking listener response. I knew that some measuring of quantity was underway. Why cannot you stay with quality. You know what it is.
MORONS, the lot of them. They have now gotten on my ONE LAST NERVE. Fire them all and make them live in Calgary where there is no radio to replace Rad2. If I want interesting 'variety' I'll listen to CKUA with their longer CBC news casts and won't have to gag each time I hear 'everywhere music takes you' ...to hell. Even my 4 yr-old scoffs with derision at that pathetic attempt at coolness. It is to weep.
The dumbing down of radio 2 is tragic. I no longer listen in the evening at all. Apart from the opera on Saturday afternoon, there'll be no time when I'll be bothered to listen. My only regret is I can't listen to internet radio in the car. At least BBC3 remains an intelligent station. Damn shame about the CBC.
The CBC is abandoning its raison d'etre: to broaden our musical and cultural horizons, and bring the joy of classical music to listeners wherever in Canada they may live. This is a betrayal of loyal and devoted CBC listners.
It is the DUTY of a public broadcaster to provide material not available in commercial radio!
The CBC should not try to compete with commercial radio stations The dumbing down of Radio 2 must cease and I wholeheartedly agree with and supportMargaret Logan's statement
