Radio music for mood

I realise that being able to see precisely the scene being scored, or hear the emotions being conveyed helps selecting music for visuals, but radio broadcasting should not suffer by failing to recognise what NOT to play.

Would Bernard Hermann have written the shower-scene stabbing music from Psycho as the title music for I Love Lucy?

Radio has the benefit of designing programme blocks to suit a particular style. In these, the music is chosen with a specific, or hypothetical, audience in mind. Listener survey data gives a good indicator of the kind of people attracted to different kinds of programmes at various times, their socio-economic profile, and their general psychographics.

If this is coupled with a sound (no pun intended) gut feeling and showmanship, the right music can work for that audience. Where some formats come to grief is when they try to be all things to all people. It won’t always work.

My belief is that unless a clear style of music format is envisaged, it is better not to attempt too radical a shift between individual items of content, so that the listener can settle in to a particular genre, and not have to hunt down other stations for listening satisfaction. That is, unless the station is deliberately promoting a time zone as unpredictable in music style, so that vast change becomes the norm, in which case it may be a very successful arrangement.

Unfortunately, my preferred classic music station does not follow this format deliberately. I suspect it often runs playlists without prescription, or the feeling of showmanship which guards against playing the wrong thing at the right time. On the other hand (or ear), there are times when the presentation is just brilliant, with a rich consistent style, which makes my listening a pure joy.

If I had a thorough prescription for effective music programming, I would have tried to take that path in my early days in radio. And made a fortune from it! 

I didn’t, and elected drama, then later news and current affairs, and advertising as my passion. It worked well for me, yet at times leaves me critical now of the medium in which I cut my teeth. Fangs very much to it.