VPR Cuts Back Jazz

[Joseph_Gallant]

Back in June, when longtime VPR jazz host George Thomas announced his retirement, I speculated that the evening hours that had been devoted to jazz would be replaced with news/information programming, since the other 21 hours of VPR's weekday program schedule already consisted of that kind of programming.

After Thomas's retirement, VPR hired Reuben Jackson (a longtime jazz expert who now lives in the Burlington, Vermont area) to host a Friday-night jazz show, and continued jazz on the other weekday evenings.

While Jackson's jazz show continues, the former jazz slot on Mondays-through-Thursday have been converted to news/information programming, featuring (among others) "Tell Me More" from NPR and "Q" from CBC Radio One.

I am a bit surprised VPR kept jazz at all. I thought that Friday evenings would also have been converted to news/information programming.

But then again, while WGBH-89.7 eliminated jazz from evenings and overnights Monday-through-Thursday, it has kept evening and overnight jazz Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.

In both cases, I suspect these moves will only be short-term, and once the protests die down (especially in Boston), public radio news/information programming will take over the remaining jazz slots on both VPR and WGBH.

VPR press release: http://www.pitchengine.com/vermontpublicradio/vpr-adds-new-programs-to-weeknight-schedule .

 

[kc1ih]

“Q” is entertainment news/interviews, not hard news.

 

[Dusty Dale Brooks]

Sad to hear about that decision. Thanks to Ken Squier Vermont became a good jazz market. Out here in Seattle NPR affiliate KPLU still does very well with jazz and I for one feel blessed by that fact. But maybe it's just a matter of time.

 

[am_directional]

Back in October VPR started streaming Jazz 24 (a service from KPLU, I think). It's very well done!