Share your knoweldge

At last month's PRPD conference in Baltimore, I learned about a unique online tool that allows users and media outlets to harness the power of their audiences to help facilitate sharing content with others around the globe. The website service http://www.universalsubtitles.org allows users to tag YouTube or Vimeo videos with subtitltes in other languages. This could be a great way for KPAC, or anyone in America, to share their content with non-English speakers around the globe.

If you know another language -- any language -- consider giving this a try. Learn more at the website (linked above), or give it a try with our test video, an interview with conductor Alondra de la Parra.

http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/5Y7shPW1qm2I/info/

Thanks for your help!

Nathan Cone

Under the Hood: PRPD 2011

Over 500 public radio program directors, producers, and managers recently convened in Baltimore, Maryland, for the annual Public Radio Program Director’s conference and workshop. Each year, there are lively discussions about best practices for stations, and about public radio’s future.

This year, there was a noticeable push-and-pull between the feeling that public radio needs to push itself into the 21st century, versus a recent study that shows the core audience has never been more loyal to the stations they love.

Jad Abumrad from Radio Lab opened the conference on an upbeat, inquisitive note, exploring the idea of change, asking: Why don’t we change? Maybe we talk about it too much. Psychologists have found that talking about change or talking about actions can create the illusion of progress. Speaking of illusions, maybe things are changing already, and we just don’t realize it. Sometimes you can only recognize change after it’s already happened.

There were breakout sessions on fundraising, offering stations tips on how long or short their on-air breaks should be, and what kind of messages resonate with listeners. A session on music digitization offered more than you could ever want to know about bitrates, and later a gentleman from Colorado Public Radio spoke about classical music and community engagement. One particularly good session on building better on-air breaks was very well written, and presented by Scott Williams of KJZZ/KBAQ in Phoenix. I look forward to sharing it with the KPAC and KSTX staff soon.

Other sessions focused on the tech side of radio, or rather public media. Increasingly, listeners are interacting with their stations in more ways than just on-air. Whether online, or through social media, clearly stations need to be where their audience is. There were presentations on utilizing Facebook and Twitter better to engage the audience, and Skip Pizzi of the National Association of Broadcasters deflated some of the sky-is-falling rhetoric about Internet radio killing the broadcast towers. Even at the clip Internet radio is growing, it will take many, many years for it to catch up to the number of persons that use traditional (terrestrial) radio.

The biggest information dump came during a presentation by Jacobs Media, detailing the findings of their 2011 Programming Survey. Over 40 News/Talk stations took part in the survey, the results of which which Paul Jacobs characterized in one sentence: “In general, the faithful are quite satisfied.” However, the average age of the survey respondents (the overwhelming percentage of which are already station supporters) is 54, and 87% of them are white.

The last session I attended on Friday before I had to head to my connecting train featured Jim DeRogatis and Greg Kot of the rock talk show, Sound Opinions. It’s a program I like. Although the talk was mostly about Triple-A stations, they did have some words of wisdom that apply to classical music: If you’re not bringing something special and meaningful to your on-air presentation, listeners would be just as well-off with a stack of their favorite CDs. Wise words.

What do you think? What are your hopes for the future of KPAC and Texas Public Radio? Leave your comments here on the blog, or send me some email. I’d love to hear from you.

--Nathan Cone, Director of Classical Programming

Under the Hood



Bridge over the Platte River. Photo by Nathan Cone.

Classical stations convene in Denver for annual PRPD Conference.

In September 2010, I attended the annual PRPD (Public Radio Program Directors) conference, held in Denver. Nearly 500 attendees from all over the country convened to discuss public radio’s future. The big topics at the conference included fostering an atmosphere of openness and inclusiveness within the public radio system to encourage diversity, and mobile technology’s role in the way people access public radio content.

Program Directors from several classical music stations gathered in a special session pre-conference, and one of the many breakout sessions at PRPD was about re-imagining the role of music services in public media.

Below are some of my notes and observations from the classical session:

Anya Grundmann of NPR Music noted the popularity of the still new NPR spinoff website. There were 70,000 page views last week. Chatting online during live performances has been a successful experiment. Similar to NPR.org, stations can partner with NPR Music through an API that will feed music content to their own sites, something KPAC hopes to be able to do in the not-too-distant future with our own web redesign. NPR Music is also interested in partnering with member stations for content creation, from performance audio/video to themed music streams, curated and hosted by member stations.

Frank Dominguez (WDAV) presented the “Concierto” service, a bilingual music program and stream similar to KPAC’s own Itinerarios program. KPBS picked it up for broadcast. Emphasis has been placed on conductors like Gustavo Dudamel, composers like Chavez or Ponce, and the fact that classical music isn’t just European or Anglo music, it’s your [=Latino audience’s] music. Dominguez says presenting bilingually for that brief program on WDAV represents an open door to the world of classical music for non-English speakers.
Also of interest to reaching a Latino audience, Classical South Florida has posted a lot of outdoor advertising—in Spanish—to reach Latino listeners. Their area is 50-50 Latino, and their audience registers 49% Latino, tracking similar to our own (46% of KPAC’s audience is Hispanic/Latino).

American Public Media debuted their “Classical Live” series of concerts. The idea is to look for the most interesting concerts happening in a particular month, and tell the story behind the concerts as well as hear the music. For example, Classical Live will broadcast Gustavo Dudamel’s opening concert with the LA Philharmonic on October 7 at 9pm Central; in January, the Nashville Symphony makes its post-flood return to the Schermerhorn Symphony Center; and also in January, the New World Symphony Hall in Miami is christened with the New World Symphony debut there. KPAC is excited to broadcast this live concert series.

There continued to be more discussion of ways classical stations can better engage their audiences and interact. Some stations have an Educational Outreach position on staff; other stations have dabbled with continuing education courses for adults in music appreciation. Young listeners enjoyed getting free station-branded hoodies or other swag from their public radio stations.

On the mobile tech front, some stations are beginning to develop station-branded apps for smart phones that do more than just play your station. WBUR allows listeners to suggest story ideas, donate through their phone, or access podcasts and more through their phone. What about for classical stations? Perhaps a mobile concert calendar with locations mapped out on your smart phone? All of these mobile apps and tech ideas take time to develop, and yes, money.

All in all, there was plenty of food for thought in Denver. But we’d like to know what *you* think. Comment on this blog post, or send your thoughts to me through email.

--Nathan Cone, Director of Classical Programming