It’s official: St. Louis’s KFUO-FM, that city’s commercial all-classical station, will be sold to a Christian broadcaster, pending FCC approval. The Lutheran Church Missouri Synod has agreed to sell the station to Gateway Creative Broadcasting for $18 million and interest.
This article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch collects the reactions of several disappointed members of the city’s arts community:
Fred Bronstein, president of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, a frequent partner of Classic99, called the sale “a tragic loss for the city and its wealth of cultural institutions.” On Tuesday afternoon, the orchestra sent an e-mail blast to nearly 20,000 people, suggesting that they contact the LCMS and the FCC with their opinions.
Other arts representatives spoke out against the sale.
“Most of our ticket sales come from Classic99,” said Alayne Smith, executive director of the Bach Society of St. Louis. “That will be a huge loss to us. It’s almost like there’s a death in the family.”
Said Linda Ryder, executive director of the St. Louis Chamber Chorus: “It’s a major blow to the arts community. This further damages our big-city status, just as if we were losing a sports team.”
As the newspaper also noted on a blog, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra has stepped up to mobilize its supporters against the sale. Way to go, SLSO!
The SLSO, along with many of its fans and friends in the local artistic community, believes the loss of KFUO-Classic 99 would diminish the cultural diversity of the St. Louis community. With the loss of KFUO, the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, one of the cultural jewels of the city, would lose a vital advocate. The sounds of classical music over the region’s airwaves would be silenced.
We suggest that you express your opinion on the pending sale of KFUO. You may contact the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod via their website or e-mail its Board of Directors: bod@lcms.org. Or you may reach the Synod by phone 1-888-THE-LCMS (843-5267). You may also contact the FCC via their website or e-mail fccinfo@fcc.gov.
It’s a shame to see another big city lose a classical station, and the secretive manner in which negotiations were pursued — over objections from church leaders, no less — certainly raises some questions. Unfortunately, it would be highly unusual for the FCC to deny the sale.
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The loss of the live broadcasts of the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra really hurts the classical radio community at large although the 48kbits/sec bit rate resulted in low quality sound. Still a number of word and US premieres takes place each year at The Saint Louis Symphony each year and the only people that will hear them now are in the hall.
The big problem that results with the loss of a local classical station is that organizations like the Saint Louis Symphony have no way to keep in touch with the community. In the long run this may result in reduced ticket sales.
The classical music listener is increasing going to have to learn how to access internet radio and support the station(s) they like. More internet radio reception products come out every month (wireless DSL or cable modem required) but you really do not need any extra equipment even if you have even an old computer with a DSL or cable modem line.
For good sounding stations you may want to consider a USB audio adaptor ($30) if you are connecting your computer up to your Hi Fi and the computer does not come with a good internal audio codec (a buzz or high background noise is a sign of trouble although you should check several stations to make sure it is not the station causing the problem). If you are using an internal codec driving a good Hi Fi make sure to go into the sound control panel and set the output to headphones.
With a good station stream and codec you will get at least FM quality. The new WUFT HD 2 is better than FM. Unfortunately drops in connections are common requiring some action on the listeners part to start things again. FM radio stays up 99.9% of the time.
I have no solution for the car. Inexpensive wireless internet connections receivable in a moving vehicle are still a way off.
Again the Internet radio solution is not optimum with the local connection of the hosts to the audience lost. The loss of jobs in the local community also always hurts. Still the loss of a classical station 10 years ago (in my case WFLN) was a huge blow to the listener with some us spending 4 figures on tuners, RF preamps, outdoor antennas and antenna rotator systems to facilitate bringing in a fringe station. Now the listener has an easy, if suboptimal, work around.
David Rich
Hi David,
> I have no solution for the car
Sprint offers unlimited Internet access for $15 a month, for certain phones. This plus a small FM transmitter/adapter allow me to listen to Classic 99 and other Internet audio feeds anywhere there’s Sprint coverage. It sounds better than straight FM radio.
Mike Janssen. Thank you for the excellent article. I think the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra should consider approaching the FCC for rights to this station. The deal broker at KFUO litterally gave the station away to Gateway Creative for $18M with no money down. A similar offer to the symphony would be an excellent contribution to the community. They symphony orchestra could run advertisements for its concerts and Friends organization and still sell advertising to tasteful businesses in St. Louis.
It’s not difficult to access other classical stations online. I am not what they call computer savvy, but I live in Oregon and stream my favorite station KDFC in San Francisco. Like Classical 99, KDFC is also home to a world class symphony and has knowledgeable DJs.