WGBH Decimates Its Jazz Programming

WGBH is now taking an active role in moving jazz onto smaller and smaller radio signals. Steve Schwartz's Friday show is going off the air and Eric Jackson's weekday show is gone. The story is here. There is a fabric that constitutes the Boston-area jazz community and these shows, especially Jackson's daily show, were an important part of it. This is a bad blow for the local jazz community. 


Problem is, the effects of radio programming all have to be "quantified" into numbers and demographics. I had the same problem years ago, when I was a producer for a show called "Ready-To-go, a mostly live children's show on WNEV (now WHDH) TV Channel 7. The audience was there, but relatively expensive production (i.e., local, non syndicated) and an undesirable advertising demographic meant this well-loved show was axed.


Obviously, WGBH is pursuing a long-term goal of grabbing audience share from WBUR, which has had a lock on the local upscale-NPR news/public affairs audience for a long time. Taking this kind of action, for bottom line reasons (and what other reason could there be?) is ok, if you don't mind the acrid whiff of Bain Capital and Mitt Romney. 


There will be pushback. It remains to be seen if a critical mass of music partisans can have any influence on a local media outlet whose mission, over the last couple of years, has grown foggier and foggier.