feedback/andy kershaw

[Stig]

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Dear Feedback,

I'm writing to complain about Andy Kershaw's sacking by Radio One
controller Andy Parfitt. The attempt over the past few years to turn
Radio One into an entirely mainstream teenage audience driven pop
station is nearly complete, with one or two very token exceptions which
still display the station's true nature as a public service broadcaster.
The most notable exceptions being Andy Kershaw and John Peel, both of
whose programmes cater for a wider range of tastes and interests than
the entire rest of the output of Radio One put together. Mr Parfitt's
sacking of Kershaw means that an entire range of music from all around
the world is simply removed from view; Kershaw's dedicated and loyal
audience now has nowhere to turn for the sort of variety and eclecticism
Kershaw's programmes provided.

Parfitt's attempt to turn Radio One into a generic commercial-clone
station is exemplified by the decision to replace Andy Kershaw's weekly
two-hour after-midnight programme with one whose music content is
already covered by Gilles Peterson and others on the station. Parfitt
claims that Radio One is "already packed with different and diverse
shows". However if he had paid attention to the variety of music Andy
Kershaw was playing on his station, and to the legal obligation of the
BBC to cater for the varied tastes of all its listeners, he would have
realised that Kershaw was one of the few DJs on his station who actually
did do something a little different and a little diverse, playing music
from a whole range of countries and styles, and providing a variety of
choice not available anywhere else. Andy Parfitt has struck a major blow
against difference and diversity by axing Kershaw. 

Kershaw's programme was diametrically opposed to the standard Radio One
diet of market-research-based committee-written playlist programmes,
"personality" and celebrity DJ programmes, and programmes which limit
musical diversity in their narrow genre-specific music policies.
Parfitt's decision will help to kill Radio One. If this invidious policy
of limiting diversity and choice continues, the station will cease to be
identifiably different from any commercial station, Radio One will not
offer anything of value as a public service, and there will be no reason
for the government not to privatise the station. Since the BBC is the
only broadcaster which is in a position to offer an alternative to
commercial pop stations, they must not let mis-management of the kind
Parfitt has committed here kill Radio One.

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(cc: john peel, andy kershaw, andy parfitt)