60 years of The Third Programme

Friday was the 60th anniversary of the Third Programme, or BBC Radio 3 as it is now called. There's a BBC site marking this, including a Radio Times from 1946. Last night's Between the Ears on Radio 3 (still available on the Radio Player for a few days) was "Three and a Third", a fantastic compilation of clips from the 60 years of the Third Programme and Radio 3. It was built around the time when one of the announcers, John Holstrom, had to cover 30 minutes of silence as a piano was hauled onto the stage for a performance of a Bartok piano concerto of the Royal Albert Hall for a Prom concert. The programme was also interspersed with many of the pauses, ums, errs and ahs that make up Radio 3.

Particarly interesting was the section of the programme on a new agreement that increased the amount of music that could be played (possibly in the 1960s? The Beatles were playing in the background, the programme used the device of popular music extracts to indicate the time period. Have the Spice Girls been broadcast on Radio 3 before?). It went from a limit of 28 hours to allowing 75 hours a week of broadcasting gramophone records. This puts current discussions on DRM, music rights and the Radio Player into perspective. Worrying about playing more than 28 hours of music per week sounds pretty ridiculous now so how will today's DRM and 7 day window restrictions on music downloads and streaming be viewed in another 60 years time?

"...why should there be any limitation at all?"

"...constant outpouring of music there will be some who are perhaps torn betwen delight at being able to hear fine works at almost any moment of the day and on the otherhand a fear that if music is to become a perpetual companion, if we are to live in an auditory decor as it were, then somehow our delight in it may grow less and music itself will be cheapened...I share this fear just a little myself"

Finally, the last quote from this programme was a very "BBC" announcer deeply apologising for having to remind listeners to pay their television license. Because if they don't there may be

"...ostracism in the supermarket"

"...the deepest shame when walking the dog".

Front Row on Friday also focussed on a long-forgotten aspect of the Third Programme. Every evening before programmes began at five minutes to six it would broadcast the note A (at 440 Hz, the international standard of musical pitch) for 4 minutes as a public service at the request of the British Standards Institute. At the time Dr Alexander of the engineering division said...

"Musicians, musical instrument makers and amateurs now have available in their own homes or workshops an easily accessible standard of pitch and no longer have to depend on tuning forks of often doubtful accuracy."

A quick search reveals that the International Standards Association conference in May 1939 held at Broadcasting House established the frequency of A in the treble clef ('concert pitch') at 440Hz, having previously varied between 435Hz and 442Hz.