Marketing

There's a radio station here in Chicago called Jack FM, 104.3, that boasts as its motto: "We play anything." Note that they don't play "everything" - this isn't a statement of mobility between genres, or lack of format. Any sense of freedom that they may be trying to claim comes across as a lack of cohesion, vision, and unity in their programming. They almost appear to be saying they're not even responsible for what goes on the air.

Yesterday I read this article from the New York Times entitled "Saving Radio in the Satellite Era." The author argues that the failures of terrestrial radio's consolidations should not give us much hope for the proposed XM-Sirius merger, and furthermore, that the only answer to our consolidation problem is more legislation - the very thing that got us into the mess to begin with. His proposal is:

"Fortunately, there is a solution: Require every station that wants to add to its holdings to broadcast a minimum level of original, live and local material. This proposal is based on one of the most successful broadcast policies in American history. In the 1960s, when the F.C.C. opened the FM dial, AM stations rushed to acquire licenses — but then simulcast the same shows they were already playing. This was not what regulators had in mind, so they ruled that FM stations had to play original content on at least half of their programming hours. Because radio companies didn’t want to invest much in FM, they ceded control of their studios to young people and amateur broadcasters. The result was the advent of free-form music radio, with programs so fresh and compelling that listeners flocked to FM and stayed there — at least until corporate broadcasters standardized it, too."

Unless I'm mistaken, and maybe Mr. Ryshpan can chime in here, Canada has a similar law regarding percentage of Canadian music played over the airways. Due to the volume of American music the local region would have to be defined more closely than the entire country to have the desired effect, but I do think it could happen. That is, if I had an inkling of faith left in our legislative bodies to do something for the benefit of the general and artistic public rather than for the mega corporations.

Tangentially, I've been involved in some discussions regarding the marketing of this music we like to call jazz in the United States. For the purposes of this discussion we'll define that genre as broadly as possible, not taking into consideration the various genres, subgenres, and splintered factions that exist, at least in some peoples' minds.

The basic questions are: 1) How do we effectively market this music? 2) Specifically, how do we market this music to a younger generation so that it continues to enjoy support as the baby boomers and older generations make their transitions? 3) Is it really a question of marketing?

I'd be really interested to hear from the blogosphere what they think about these questions, either in the form of your own entries or in the comments here. I think it's a discussion worth having, and your ideas might actually make an impact in the way jazz marketing happens in Chicago, a city that boasts a vibrant scene with intermittent support from the general public.