As I've mentioned a time or two before, I like classical music. More specifically, I'm very fond of Renaissance music, but I listen to (and sing) music of many periods.
Here in the Boston area, there isn't a lot of classical music on the air, though we have more than many areas. There's WGBH, the public radio station, which has classical music during the day and jazz in the evening and overnight, with major chunks of news in the morning and afternoon drive times, and other programming sprinkled around, especially on weekends. WHRB, the Harvard station, programs classical from 1pm to 10pm. And the final commercial classical station (and only one with 24-hour-a-day classical programming), WCRB, has been slipping for years: in the last year they started playing movements from symphonies rather than the whole thing, and about half their programming was pulled from the 1700s—with some pretty obscure and mediocre composers from those eras...
Still, you could count on WCRB for reasonably tuneful background music while you were driving, so when public radio got too talky on boring subjects, it was a decent backup plan. But WCRB has just been purchased, and by WGBH. We're going to have less classical music available...and that's too bad.
However, it's probably the best we could hope for. WCRB will be commercial-free classical music (though with the usual sponsors and station announcements and all the rest), 24 hours a day. They'll still have the HD radio channel. And the quality of selection is likely to be better—broader and more adventurous, with a wider variety of performers. There may even be more live music, with the extra time to fill; they'll certainly bring in more recorded-in-concert programming.
It's just going to be odd to turn to WGBH and hear little or no classical music once they've rejiggered their lineups; it's clear that they're going to expand the jazz and other programming there, while moving (relegating?) the classical programming they used to have to the new station. I'll be spending much less time on that station, and more on WCRB. Once the new schedules take hold, I expect I'll be switching their order on my car stereo, with WCRB in second, and WGBH in third.
I do think I ought to look into getting a new receiver for home, one that can get high-def FM radio, so I can tune in these new channels in order to get more musical choices. It'd be a shame to rely entirely on CDs; there are always new composers and performers to discover and enjoy. And I have to tell you, I'm not going to miss WCRB playing Christmas music from the day after Thanksgiving through December 25th. (It's practically the only time they play vocal music all year. Yeesh.)
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No music is currently playing here, which may be why so few nominations arrived in the Top Comments mailbox, breaking the recent upward trend. A mere two emails appeared in our gmail address before the 9:30pm Eastern Time deadline; the address of said mailbox for top comments submissions is:
TopComments AT gmail DOT com
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Any Kossack can send great comments to our address. Be sure to include the direct link to a comment—the URL—which is available from that comment's date/time; we need that to find your choice. Please always include your Daily Kos user name in the body of your message, so we can credit you properly: both link and username are important. If you also include a writeup, we are able to include that, too, though we reserve the right to edit if necessary; should you only provide the link, then you have to take whatever writeup we create...and we can be excessively creative. Not today, though...
From CornSyrupAwareness:
This one by XajaX made me LOL...
From Dump Terry McAuliffe:
In the front-page diary Blue Dog Jim Cooper defines "leadership", Hesiod does his best Paul Simon impression to describe the health-care fiasco on Capitol Hill.
From sardonyx (tonight's diarist):
In Devilstower's brief reminder of Katie Couric's salary vs. those of NPR's morning and evening shows, or even vs. Billy Mays's take, gchaucer goes in depth on the relative merits of what Mays and Couric present.
xaxnar gets real about the trigger.
From another diary entirely, Mogolori isn't being real at all regarding triggers, yet starts a fun thread.
In today's excellent Morning Feature: Dots into Stories (The Information Fairy) by NCrissieB, DBunn writes an interesting comment entitled Dots into images.
For our final feature in tonight's diary, we have today's top mojo using my revision of the cskendrick-devised mojo-to-Excel process.
First, Top Mojo excluding Cheers and Jeers, search-identifiable tip jars, and first diary comments:
1) In what respect, Charlie? by voracious — 215
2) America II: Teabagger Boogaloo by Robobagpiper — 165
3) And Cheers for Senator Feingold by MinistryOfTruth — 150
4) Maybe, but... by Richard Cranium — 121
5) How would it look for her to run after ruining by henry porter — 113
6) Sequels always suck. by high bitrate — 105
7) I've been seeing a lot of flags like this..... by djtyg — 103
8) I think she left her job ... by Meteor Blades — 100
9) Tipp'd for the actual truth. by slinkerwink — 94
10) Rahm Needs to Put Pressure by JekyllnHyde — 88
11) Let me fix something for Chuck by TruthOfAngels — 86
12) They're making a serious mistake by slinkerwink — 84
13) wake me up when Rahm says by h bridges — 83
14) bob your headline implies by deepsouthdoug — 80
15) Rahm Emanuel is a DLC Democrat. by inclusiveheart — 78
16) Fuck you Rahm! by brooklynbadboy — 73
17) I sure am glad Republicans hate SOCIALISM... by Thomas Paine Redux — 69
18) Sheah...you're so, like, literal... by grannyhelen — 69
19) Did you know what Rahm said? by LaFeminista — 68
20) Regal isn't Cory's strong suit by mlharges — 66
21) Government is not the problem, Republicans are by freelunch — 65
22) For comparison, here is William Black's proposal: by NBBooks — 64
23) This is a big Aryan Nations thing. by high bitrate — 64
24) Hi, I'm a Jew! by Maimonides — 63
25) Cory being all regal by mlharges — 63
26) Great diary IRITI by leftynyc — 63
27) Thanks, and here's a pic for your sig by otto — 62
28) Tee hee by leftynyc — 62
29) to her health... by mikeconwell — 62
30) you, sir or madam, are nothing but ... by Tuffie — 62
Top Mojo with No Exclusions:
1) You go, girl! by henry porter — 624
2) Tip Jar by wmholt — 359
3) the truth will set you free by clammyc — 358
4) Tip Jar by AnonObamaAid — 354
5) Tip Jar by MsSpentyouth — 318
6) Tips for the 4th Amendment by MinistryOfTruth — 298
7) Tip Jar by buhdydharma — 236
8) Tip Jar by slinkerwink — 232
9) Tip Jar by Nada Lemming — 232
10) In what respect, Charlie? by voracious — 215
11) Tip Jar by bobswern — 199
12) Tip Jar by juliewolf — 194
13) Tip Jar by skisb — 184
14) Tip Jar by AndrewMC — 170
15) America II: Teabagger Boogaloo by Robobagpiper — 165
16) Tip Jar by Bob Sackamento — 158
17) Tip Jar by math4barack — 154
18) And Cheers for Senator Feingold by MinistryOfTruth — 150
19) Tip Jar by Old Redneck — 141
20) Maybe, but... by Richard Cranium — 121
21) Tip jar by it really is that important — 120
22) How would it look for her to run after ruining by henry porter — 113
23) Sequels always suck. by high bitrate — 105
24) I've been seeing a lot of flags like this..... by djtyg — 103
25) I think she left her job ... by Meteor Blades — 100
26) Tip Jar by Hill Jill — 100
27) Tipp'd for the actual truth. by slinkerwink — 94
28) C&J from MN!!!! by jetskreemr — 92
29) Rahm Needs to Put Pressure by JekyllnHyde — 88
30) Let me fix something for Chuck by TruthOfAngels — 86
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