Saul Levine back to classical music

[LKellerIII]

The great ego has spoken again. You are so out of it. You are really not an expert on everything in radio or music but you want us to think you are.

Excuse me, but the facts are fairly clear that the audience for classical is overwhelmingly 55+.

Taking San Francisco and KDFC, a non-Holiday book from last year showed 75% of the listening cume to be by persons over 55, and in AQH the figure approached 85%. Nearly half the cume is, in fact, over 65.

If the usage of smart phones by demographic cell is examined, the lower incidences are in the higher demos... of course, this could be said of nearly any new, high technology device.

I may not be an expert on classical music stations, having owned only one of them and having managed only one other, but I can make statements based on verifiable facts.

In this case, the fact is that spreading the usage of a classical music stream appreciably via smart phone apps or access is not likely to create much momentum for the operation given the age and limited smart phone use of the target listener.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that most Classical listeners are old, and most older people don't have smartphones (or know how to use them)

I will take exception to that remark. I'm "55+" (by 4 years). I own a smart-phone and know how to use it. It was reallllly simple to figure out, and I have difficulty with Ikea instructions. Anybody who can't figure out a smart phone must have a sub-100 IQ or early-onset Alzheimer's. Most of my friends are in my "age cohort" - many of them in their early to late 60s. They made the switch to smart phones the same time younger people did, they've all had multiple computers in their homes for years, along with i-pods, and i-pads. They'll probably be first in line to buy any other new "i" that Apple develops.

All of these devices are easier to use than programming a VCR was in the 80s, okay?

Having said all that - not many of them listen to Classical music. Classic rock - yes.

 

[travisl5678]

I made that comment with my dad in mind, he's 45, avoids the internet at all costs, and has a company issued Blackberry that he only uses to make phone calls.

 

[DoctorWu]

If anything, the last two posts simply illustrate that you can't paint an entire generation with the same brush.

-- Doc

 

[LKellerIII]

I made that comment with my dad in mind, he's 45, avoids the internet at all costs, and has a company issued Blackberry that he only uses to make phone calls.

Any implied insult toward your dad was unintentional, but I think he's probably in the minority - especially for a 45 year old. I certainly didn't grow up with a computer, but started using one at a job in 1990 (I was 38) - bought my first PC in 94. I don't think I could survive without the internet.

I do have one friend I can think of who doesn't have a smart phone - she doesn't even program her contacts into the cell phone she has - looks up numbers the old fashioned way on her Rollodex. But she is a PC and internet user. I guess some people have techno-phobia to one extent or another.

 

[radioguy39nj]

I made that comment with my dad in mind, he's 45, avoids the internet at all costs, and has a company issued Blackberry that he only uses to make phone calls.

Any implied insult toward your dad was unintentional, but I think he's probably in the minority - especially for a 45 year old. I certainly didn't grow up with a computer, but started using one at a job in 1990 (I was 38) - bought my first PC in 94. I don't think I could survive without the internet.

I do have one friend I can think of who doesn't have a smart phone - she doesn't even program her contacts into the cell phone she has - looks up numbers the old fashioned way on her Rollodex. But she is a PC and internet user. I guess some people have techno-phobia to one extent or another.

We're the exact age Lkeller! I've never been averse to new gadgets. We've been on the cusp of so many over the years! I don't yet have a smartphone, but I do have a cell phone! Don't have HDTV yet! I'll get there eventually! And I was late in coming to PC's also, around 1995 at work, but now I couldn't live without one!

BTW, I like classical music and when I'm in the mood for it, I go to Sirius/XM's Symphony Hall.

 

[michael hagerty]

I just turned 55 and have been an early adopter all my life. Still, I'm not that much ahead of most of my contemporaries. I think the generalities about classical music and technophobia might be more applicable to 70+ than to 55+.

 

[travisl5678]

All the people on here are into radio though, so I think all of us would know how to stream radio off our smartphones

 

[nmoore6676]

I just turned 55 and have been an early adopter all my life. Still, I'm not that much ahead of most of my contemporaries. I think the generalities about classical music and technophobia might be more applicable to 70+ than to 55+.

I am now pushing 70, hard, with only two more years to still say that I'm in my sixties and I have always been technical. ham radio, CB radio. computers beginning with the Commodores and early Apples. I stream radio a lot because I find what I want that way, like Classic Country and Good Time Oldies. But even so I can hear streaming artifacts in the audio so classical would not be a genre I would seek out on the internet. I did listen to retro 1260 after I moved to Iowa from LA but not K-Mozart.

I am not a smart phone fan however and I don't think I ever will be. I can envision a time when the charges for the data received will make it too costly, especially for older persons on fixed incomes. Of course new policies coming to hard wired internet may soon do that for streaming audio and video content as well.