Letters of Lament
Listeners Lambast Seattle's KCMU Over Decision to Axe New Music Programming

Last month we promised a more substantial look at Seattle radio station KCMU 90.3 FM's recent decision to cut another two hours of experimental programming. This transpired when Program Director Don Yates elected not to replace "Outer Limits" host James Wood after his departure, but rather to install another edition of the finely crafted but more mainstream "Expansions," a mostly groove-oriented show. In the Tentacle's opinion-one also widely held by Seattle creative music mavens and lovers of community radio-this move is one more step in the dumbing down of KCMU's programming, a process that began years ago with the much-decried and long since hashed-over "firings" of most of the station's volunteer DJs.

Many concerned listeners wrote to KCMU's Don Yates imploring him to keep an Outer Limits-style commitment to uncompromising late-twentieth century music. We think those exchanges speak volumes, which is why we reprint them here for your edification. Thanks to all who shared their KCMU correspondence with the Tentacle.

Our offer to Mr. Yates to address the issue in our pages was met with no response. Out of common courtesy, we've decided not to reprint his less-than-satisfactory responses to these letters, but we have attempted to give some indication of their nature. The first series of letters is from Seattle exploratory trumpeter Angelina Baldoz (Combustion Method, BOLT).

To the Program Director:
I'm writing in response to the disappearance of 'Outer Limits' from the station. I know nothing about the details of this event, and therefore I am not attempting to blame you or the station for the situation.

I do, however, feel very strongly about the lack of support for music which doesn't have a wide appeal. I understand the need to keep the money flowing enough to support the station. What I fail to understand is why it seems as if the philosophy is to make more money. I don't know much about how to run a radio station, but what I do know very well is how to educate myself with the programs that do exist. My experience over the years has been one of listening to various radio shows in the evenings and during the day, which years ago used to include KCMU, before the homogenizing of the daytime shows. (As mentioned above, I do understand the need to make money, and I know this homogenizing is how KCMU decided at that time to meet their share of financial responsibilities.)

More and more, though, I find myself turning to the Web and, more importantly, to my well-educated friends, for inspiration in discovering new music. Please forgive my lengthy but necessary diatribe. I would like to be specific in my definition of well-educated friends. I don't mean education in terms of how many credits they racked up in such and such institution, helpful as school may or may not be. I mean they are educated by being active in what inspires them. It is a blessing for me to be involved in a community of musicians with such a wide and deep knowledge of great music. It was a similar community of sorts that made KCMU what it was until a few years ago. This is what KCMU was founded upon: to create a center where people could go to learn more about the music around them and music that is thousands of miles away. KCMU would not be close to what it is today, if it existed at all, if not for these ideals. The education and resource that this "center" provides necessarily includes music and information that isn't "popular" in a market value system. When a concept, or in this case art, is least understood, it is because one is attempting to conceptualize its meaning. The most important moments of learning in my life have derived from a source or place I would've never consciously thought about pursuing.

I beg of you to reconsider your plan to dismiss these two hours dedicated to presenting music that isn't "popular."

Thank you for your time,
Angelina Baldoz

Yates responds by championing what he terms KCMU's wide range of "progressive" music programming, questioning whether he and Angelina agree on the definition of the term. Angelina replies:

Mr. Yates,
My question, though, is if you don't consider James Wood's musical choices "progressive," what do you consider them?
Angelina Baldoz

Yates replies that while Outer Limits was surely progressive, there's still plenty of experimental music on the station. He cites certain DJs and their programs. Angelina tries again.

Mr. Yates,
Yes, these are actually my favorite DJs, and the only specialty shows I seek out. I just wanted to voice my feelings about the type of experimental music featured on Outer Limits no longer having a specialty show and being relegated to some of Eric's [Eric Boyer, host of "The Jazz Theater"] show and a few cuts on Riz's or Pop Tart's shows. Let me state strongly that I very much love these DJs' shows and their wide variety of tastes. I just really appreciated having two hours dedicated to this experimental edge. What I'm wondering is if you plan to try another DJ who would play music from this edge and give them a show for two hours?
Angelina Baldoz

Yates replies that it's possible, though we've heard more recently from other sources that there are no plans at all to make this happen. On to letters from Tentacle Night Trawler Henry Hughes.

Dear Don,
I've just heard that a version of Expansions will replace Outer Limits on Sunday nights. I write to express my disappointment with that regrettable decision.

Week in and week out, Outer Limits was some of the best radio programming anywhere in the world. Its contribution to listeners hungry for distinctive, serious music-composed and performed by some of the treasures of our time-in a culture rife with bland, formulaic, corporate crap, simply cannot be overstated. I daresay hundreds of regular, loyal listeners, along with thousands of others who tuned in occasionally, came to depend upon the show for their fix of sonic arts presented by a true aficionado.

With your decision, you've taken that away. Poof. Gone. I'm a fan of Riz, plain and simple; he's another Seattle radio treasure, for sure. Masa and Nasir also produce good shows. But their work has nothing in common with the presentation of music by late-twentieth-century composers. Again: poof. Gone.

There are others in Seattle who can present that music with keen ears, skill, and care. If you need suggestions, I and others can make them. Please bring back two hours of new-music programming on any night before midnight. Many of us have come to expect shows of such substance and stature as Outer Limits. Please hold the line.
Sincerely,
Henry Hughes

P.S. Thanks for the other shows of adventurous music still airing on KCMU. Eric Boyer's Jazz Theater (along with many of his variety shows) gets special mention from me.

Yates replies that since Outer Limits was one of the least popular shows on KCMU, he made the decision to appeal to a broader audience instead. Henry writes back.

Dear Don,
In a discussion such as this, context and scale are extremely important. "Least popular" is exactly what one would expect a show like Outer Limits to be; as far as I could tell, it was conceived with the certainty that it would be so, especially on a station that focuses on music much closer to the middle of the road. There will always be a show that's the "least popular"; if it was okay for Outer Limits to be that show for six years or so, why is it suddenly not okay now?

I'm not so naive that I don't know you need a large audience to generate income, even on your self-styled "noncommercial community radio station." But you've gone along just fine with somewhat marginal specialty shows 'til now. What's changed?
Sincerely again,
Henry Hughes

Yates replies that since he gets very little feedback on Outer Limits from listeners, he's sure that more of them will appreciate his programming another show. On to letters from Peter Monaghan, the Earshot Jazz writer/editor and host of Outside Jazz on KBCS 91.3 FM.

Mr. Yates,
Word is already out (it does move quickly) that, due to a disagreement of some kind, James Wood and your station management have come to grief, and he has felt it necessary to offer his resignation.

I am presuming to write because I hope to encourage you to refuse his resignation, and to allow the dust to settle on whatever contention caused the rift, and-here is the main point-to keep his show on the air.

I presume you are aware of the extremely high regard in which James's show is held, in the Seattle region, among discerning listeners and supporters of expansive musical expression. As a seasoned traveler and devotee of radio, I can assure you that The Outer Limits is of the highest quality; it is as accomplished as any such show I have ever heard, anywhere in the world. KCMU has been commendable in including it among its offerings for several years. Certainly, it stands out immeasurably above most community-radio programming.

It seems that contentions constantly arise in community radio, and I know KCMU has had its share of them. I hope this is not the spark of a larger conflagration, but rather an opportunity for an airing of different programming philosophies. I have spoken with James often, and have always found his vision of radio to be clear, profoundly considered, and enlightened. In many discussions with other Seattle avant-garde musicians, music critics, and knowledgeable listeners, I have found that they share my high esteem for his achievement.

I'm not suggesting that I imagine that accommodating a vision such as his could always be smooth sailing (I do a show akin to his myself). But I am convinced that your station would be severely impoverished by its loss.
Peter Monaghan

Yates replies with comments on personnel matters that would not be appropriate even to paraphrase here. He also says he plans to continue jazz and experimental programming on Sunday nights. Peter's next correspondence with Yates comes after KCMU's decision to program another installment of Expansions on Sunday nights instead of sticking with a more adventurous lineup.

Mr. Yates,
For what it's worth, I thought I'd write to encourage you not to abandon informed progressive programming on KCMU, just because things came to a contentious end with Outer Limits. Your new Sunday lineup is very conservative, by comparison. I imagine I hear the but-no-one-listens rationale resounding around the administrative offices over there.

However, first, it's simply not true that no one listened to Phil's show. Many people did. They may have found very little else to recommend your station, and consequently been loath to send in money (I think many people, like me, will never again send money to the station as long as any administrators remain who acted so heinously during the strike of several years ago), but they were listening. Second, please believe that, in the long run, the station's achievement will be judged less by whether it is able to keep mid-level administrators in a career than by whether it provides something emancipatory for people who still retain the ability to think, and listen, independently and expansively. Alas, so much of public broadcasting fails miserably in that regard. It's perhaps best that truly fine shows like Outer Limits move on, because that exposes how far above the pack they have stood, and galvanizes people to demand that their publicly funded stations do more than plan their own measly-salaried comfort and security.
Sincerely,
Peter Monaghan

Yates responds by labeling Peter's musical agenda "narrow." He defends KCMU's everything-but-the-kitchen-sink style of programming, citing its appeal to the station's growing listenership.

Don,
Quite, my "narrow interests" and your proudly attracted mass audience are not the same, but then, I'm not a state-supported educational institution enjoying an extraordinary opportunity to serve the public something that is not commercially driven-but you are. If you have an educational rationale for just about anything you do over there, I'd love to hear it; I think the FCC should ask for a statement of it; and it might serve well, too, as a boilerplate defense for a whole new cadre of careerist public radio bureaucrats who mistake Popularity with A Mission. Heaven forbid that y'all might imagine that A Mission, too, might have an audience. The problem with saying expansive shows have no audience is that all you're saying is that your station primarily attracts people who aren't interested in expansive shows. Certainly your schedule reflects that, however much you all might flatter yourselves. Part of the modus operandi of the radio administrator with no mission, of course, is to claim that anyone who actually knows something about music or other programming is an elitist. That's too lame to bother arguing with. The real point, in fact the whole point, is this: Being able to rattle off a list of genres represented isn't the same as being able to boast of a roster full of informed DJs who know what the hell to do with the music of those genres, or how to escape the strictures of the genres.

But really, my letter was purely a gesture-we don't need to continue this dialog because nothing is going to change, or at least improve, in public radio as long as "popular" is a rationale. (The folks at The Mountain and The End surely are not yet fearful of your competition, and they could care less how much you emulate their commercial-drenched styles.) After all, the whole point of setting aside bandwidth for non-commercial radio was to spare us, somewhere on the dial, from the tyranny of commercial popularity, yet that is the new public radio mantra. (And its real motivation, I suspect after long observation, is simply to keep public-radio bureaucrats in jobs now that they're in mid-career, cushy in their minor fiefdoms, and pretty much unre-employable other than as factotums.) But, of course, your having a show like Outer Limits, at all, was purely an anomaly. As I recall, you were very willing, at the time it came on, to have just about anybody on the air, and we still are living the legacy of the Scabs, today.
Peter Monaghan