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10 + WATERLOO CHRONICLE + Wednesday, April 30, 2008 'I‘d great consternation in many quarters, the CBC has indicatâ€" ed that it will make further cuts to classical music programs on Radio In the resulting storm which has included protest groups on Facebook (Save Classical Music at the CBC), angry blog entries, and newspaper columns, not everyone is upset about the pending changes. Robin Wortman, the chair of the Aboriginal Music Celebration, has written that the changes will "open up Radio 2 to other diverse and rich genres of music, including aboriginal traditional and mixedâ€" art forms. It‘s time to make room to disâ€" cover and broadcast Canada‘s emerging and diverse musical richness." While this may sound good, and to all appearances Wortman‘s comments reflect the CBC‘s intenâ€" tion, I don‘t believe these ideas are workable. If CBC Radio 2 extends its proâ€" gramming in the manner suggestâ€" ed, the result will be quite preâ€" dictable: radio that no one listens to. The newer programs do not even cater to popular taste, not that taxâ€"funded programming always should. What we will hear is a nebulous melange which caters to every taste but appeals to none. Concerns over cuts to CBC Radio 2 I have thought about this matâ€" ter a great deal, and would like to offer a suggestion on what the mandate of CBC Radio 2, as a national radio service, should or could be. I would suggest that Radio 2 should strive for a high standard of excellence in the music played. The quality criteria I suggest is that the composition or the performâ€" ance selected should be recogâ€" nized at a worldâ€"class level. Music should not have borders. "World class" means music which is accepted as serious intellectual music worldâ€"wide. Such music was once called "classical music," but classical music long ago began to assume proportions much greater than that of the classical age. Conâ€" sider what has become of it. Whether one listens to comâ€" posers like Berio, Golijov, Takemitâ€" su and Lutoslawski or performers like Li Yundi, Valeri Gergiev, Gustaâ€" vo Dudamel and Measha Bruegâ€" gergosman, the borders of serious music have been extended to encompass every nation and every ethnicity. Would such an approach to music programming ignore Canaâ€" dian performers and composers? Definitely not, because so many of them participate on the world stage already, many of them with the promotion and assistance of CBC Radio 2. When worldâ€"class cellist, Yo yo Ma played in Waterloo recently, his ensemble did not simply play the music of dead white European men, although one of Franz Schuâ€" _ unnecessary changes is hasty and bert‘s sublime string quartets was we all know what haste makes. on the program. _ o0 O s Most of the concert featured the music of countries along the Silk Road, one of several musical subâ€" genres encompassed within Ma‘s wideâ€"ranging musical repertoire. The audience was invigorated by music from worldâ€"class comâ€" posers: Tsintsadze, Aliâ€"Zadeh, Solâ€" lima and Mansurian. Isn‘t it a travâ€" esty that the world‘s leading cellist comes to our country to play, and days later his type of music is axed from our national radio service? Beginning this fall, classical music programming will be further reduced to only five hours per day, and those hours will be restricted to classical favourites, which will certainly not include Silk Road music. What should be done with CBC Radio 2? First, stop the travesty, cancel the planned changes. . Second, CBC Radio 2 needs a board; the programming content policies of the network should be governed by academics, critics, performers and composers that know and understand music, not by philosophers of cultural theory. It has taken time to develop broadcasters with the calibre of Tom Allen, Jurgen Gothe, Eric Friesen, Danielle Charbonneau and Kâ€"W‘s own Howard Dyck. _ Third, changes should be made incrementally not wholesale. Audiences recognize that changes will occur in the natural course of events, but contriving l!l\)s).i&.mb‘\it'-\) $ ) . SÂ¥ 990 VÂ¥ Â¥ I Yhe editorial cartoon of April 16 was, I thought, a very misguidâ€" ed attempt at humour. s For a number of reasons, I felt 1 could ignore it, mostly because you are entitled to a mistake now and then. However, the editorial cartoon of April 23 appears to show a definâ€" ing trend in how your newspaper views a large segment of the popuâ€" lation of this great city, that is, "the university crowd." There is no disguising the conâ€" tempt this newspaper holds for a group of citizens that pour revenue and vibrancy into this place I call home. There will always be a minority of those students who make the wrong kind of news and help genâ€" erate ill will in the community. Why do you find it necessary to denigrate thousands of people who contribute to the growth of our city? The kind of negativity and bias that you casually toss about is regressive and pitiful. . _I would love to ignore your paper, but that will not solve the Editorial cartoons s unfairly target Council move university crowd curtails free speech Henry Slofstra Waterloo problem you seem to be trying to create. Following a lengthy stay in the Grand River Hospital, I find that Waterloo council has decided to take a direction that reduces free speech. I have been advised that before a taxpayer can speak to council, a letter has to be written to them outlining the subject. After paying my taxes for 35 years it is my opinion that this is one more direction councillors and the mayor are taking that reduces the possibility of public opinion in serving the community. Just to make it clear, I have no political bias other than stepping forward as a public volunteer to draw attention for the need of the council to think through areas that are going to compound the debt of $58 million the city faces in the The legal problems of RIM Park make it needed that every dollar council spends either increases the debt or makes property taxpayers pay a higher percentage of the debt. Now go publish something useâ€" 4e0s8\¢¥€1¢ Joe Hobin Waterloo Waterlioo