Dear reader,

If you like, print out this blog-letter – with any of your own comments or changes – and mail it over your signature to Mr. Shobe. Please send a copy to this blog address below.

July 21, 2021

Mr. Michael Shobe
Program Director, WQXR
160 Varick Street
New York, NY 10013

Dear Mr. Shobe,

WQXR is to be congratulated and supported as the only classical music radio station in New York City. To spend a day, or even a few hours, absorbed in your programming, offers the chance to enjoy a terrific variety of the major works in the repertory. Other selections, though perhaps not masterpieces, help to round out the richness of our musical heritage.

Your programming also helps to develop new listeners, those who are learning to follow the progress of the music, and to devote the kind of attention crucial to the development of a true love of classical music – especially in an era that no longer fosters an early study of music at home.

So it is too bad that your promotional material urges us to listen to WQXR while performing household tasks or during other distracting activity – that we play WQXR as background to a myriad of daily responsibilities.

Another major impediment to the development of attentive listening is your use of highlighted fragments of climactic musical moments as background in your program promotion. A triumphal fortissimo of a Pavarotti aria, a sweeping Wagner denouement, or a heart-stirring close of a Uchida Beethoven piano concerto – bits and pieces that come and go while the announcer expounds the virtues of WQXR, destroy whatever progress the novice listener may be making in learning to concentrate on an unfolding musical story.

Developing a habit of attention takes time. Relegating fragments of music to a sales pitch defeats the good will of the new listener and ultimately destroys the growing ability to focus on the music, and to discover its power.

Sincerely,

Allan Miller
194 Riverside Drive
New York, NY 10025