Update April 1: Reader Tom has alerted me to the site for online petition to save the CBC Radio Orchestra. http://www.savecbcorchestra.com Please sign the petition and spread the word.
Another shocking news: The CBC Radio executives have just decreed that The CBC Radio Orchestra is to be dismantled as of November, 2008, on the heels of Cutting Classical Music Programs on Radio 2.
What a swift one-two punch!
Formed in 1938, mandated “to make engaging musical radio programs, commission and perform works by Canadian composers, showcase Canadian performers and conductors, and discover and expose Canadian excellence”, the orchestra has been a Canadian cultural and musical tradition for 70 years.
Click here for the news coverage in the Globe and Mail of March 27, 2008.
Click here for the Vancouver Sun article on Canada.com: CBC Kills Radio Orchestra
Click here for the article: The Day The Music Died in The McGill Daily.
Does the CBC management even have the right to do that? I thought this is a publicly-owned national radio station. A cultural and arts institution with 70 years of history can be chopped off the Canadian landscape by a few executives like a branch off an old tree in the backyard?
With this executive order, the CBC has finished off a piece of North American history, disbanding the last radio orchestra in the continent.
Again, I was alerted to this piece of appalling news by my teenaged son…talking about axing classical music to attract younger audiences. CBC has gravely miscalculated the musicality of our youth and done an utter disservice to them, depriving them of knowing and appreciating a heritage dating back to hundreds of years of human civilization.
To save Classical Music from being axed off the cultural tree, Click here for the Online Petition.
BTW, the Facebook Group ‘Save Classical Music on the CBC’ now has over 8,000 members…I’m not trying to stereotype, but would these not be some of the ‘younger audiences’ CBC is trying to woo?
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Ripple Effects 
Sign the petition at SaveCBCOrchestra.com. Forward the site to your friends. Post a comment, a rant, view contacts you can write.
http://www.savecbcorchestra.com
Tom
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Tom: Thanks for the heads-up on the petition site. Feel free to share my post links (This one and the previous post) to anyone who’s concerned about the demise of classical music and the CBC Radio Orchestra.
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