Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you got till it's gone?

Two weeks ago, I walked out of Birmingham's New Street station on to Hill Street. I found a man in a Judas Priest t-shirt, completely lost; no idea where to go. He hadn't been to Birmingham for a while. I set him on his way, walking with him down Hill Street. As he headed off, he told me that he used to be able to navigate in Birmingham by the music venues. And, irony of ironies, we were outside the Crown on Hill Street. 

Late in the day, there's been a bit of noise about the Crown. Pretty much the last of our traditional city centre rock venues, it's been sold for redevelopment. The Crown shut its doors for the last time on Sunday 22nd June 2014. 

The Desolation Of Smug: The BBC in the Midlands

I love the BBC. I really do. But it’s hard sometimes. 

Gilded London palace...          Abandoned Midlands halls

I’m a big BBC fan. I see and hear inspiring stuff on the Beeb. More often than not, I give up in boredom, despair or disbelief watching and listening to anyone else. I use the BBC website every day. I respect Reithian principles. 

And I don’t side with those who want rid of the BBC; I disagree with beeb-haters. Last week, the Daily Mail cheerily relayed commercial radio's monotonously regular gripe that, as Radio 1 and 2 beats them hands down for listeners, those stations should be shut down, hobbled or sold, because... it's just not fair, and, besides, it means they're not making enough money. Hey, I thought it was all about competition, right? So, go compete, commercial radio. Get listeners, don't bitch about moving the goalposts. You could try putting more profit back into output for a start.

So I hope I’ve made this crystal clear. I believe in the Beeb, and I support them. 

But, and it’s a big but, this is an organisation that really does not make itself easy to love.

The Hare and Hounds - the threat is BACK

UPDATE: This story has not died down. There's been huge response to this post, and a lot of fresh coverage in local media (BBC WM, the Birmingham Post, Birmingham Mail (with a terrific comment from John Mostyn, which you can also read here), Phil Parkin via Chamberlain Files, along with much Tweeting and Facebookery). There is a huge groundswell of protest against this. And as yet, no statement or explanation has emerged from Birmingham City Council to explain why they suddenly reversed their previous decision.

Birmingham City Council Planning Committee mysteriously and unilaterally reverses its decision to protect the Hare and Hounds. And they say there's no appeal.

Yesterday, I and hundreds of others who had voiced concerns to Birmingham City Council's Planning and Regeneration office, got emails saying the Planning Officer has reversed the council’s decision to oppose a property development right next to the Hare and Hounds venue. 

The Hare and Hounds: Keep On Running!

Towards the end of 2012, the Hare and Hounds came under threat, again. The problem was, once again, property developers planning to run up flats right next to a cherished music venue. 

People rallied round. Gaffer Adam Regan was interviewed, petitions signed, and on Thursday 21st December BCC Planning Committee voted to OPPOSE the planning application. But this post, written while the venue was under threat, is well worth re-visiting.

The Hare and Hounds is a great little music venue in boho King’s Heath. Two upstairs rooms, good PA, decent staging, staff who know what they’re doing, a great booking policy with a strong local bias, and drinks at pub prices. It’s been around as a music venue longer than most of us have been on this planet. When I was a baby rock DJ on BRMB, in the 70s (gulp), the Hare was a fixture on the gig guides I read out at the time; it was going long before then. I have been to more gigs at the Hare than any other venue in Birmingham. 

Now it could be compromised. It is essential that the Hare keeps on running. We need our venues, especially those that take a sympathetic view of new talent. Especially those that aren't part of some soul-less corporate chain. A music scene as good as ours needs the right platforms, and the Hare is definitely one of those. Whether you live in King's Heath, or indeed anywhere this blog reaches, you can help. 

Re-Thinking Regional Media? Judging by the latest radio and circulation figures, that might just be a very good idea.

Old regional media: deckchairs, Titanic. New regional media: Um - we'll get back to you.

Oops. Anyone got any ideas?

Thursday 25th October was interesting. Three things happened, all of which should be - but aren’t - connected.  

The first was the monthly gathering for the Birmingham Music Network, which I couldn’t attend, because I was at the second event. This was Re-thinking Regional Media, a debate on futures for, er, Regional Media. 

It was a good and informative day: a variety of opinions, but not a lot of cold hard facts, were laid out and chewed over. I was there as a discussion facilitator: to steer discussions with a break-out group, in the hope of pulling out some definitive and positive conclusions. I’m afraid we didn’t get too far; nor did any of the other groups.  

Thursday also saw the release of the latest clutch of audience research figures for radio, which you can dig into at the excellent Media UK site. Taken together, these are shockingly bad for local radio in the region, pretty much across the board. I’ll go into details later.

These three things just don’t connect up. They should. And that’s the tragedy.

The background 
Partly, the terrible fact that local media – newspapers, tv and radio in the West Midlands – is now a burnt-out wasteland. Again and again, talk was of lost impact, falling circulation, and declining revenues. Truth be told, I met more people who used to be in radio, who used to be journalists or in local telly, than people who are still employed in these industries.  

Bright spots? not a whole lot. There is the will to see things improve, which is good, but not surprising, given the make up of the conference. There was the acknowledgement of new tech tools and analytics, especially from the estimable Matt Locke of Storythings; I lapped that up. Several inventive bloggers attended, and lots of independent video types were there, with brave and complex ideas, representing the remnants of the once vibrant television industry in the region.   

How did we get here?  
I'll cite three factors.

First: institutionally, Birmingham and the West Midlands have been outflanked and outmanoeuvred by the competition. To be blunt, Manchester has played a blinder, for well over a decade; Birmingham has done exactly the opposite. So now we have Media City in Manchester, and the BBC preparing to exit the Mailbox. For a number of reasons, the civic and business infrastructure and the decision makers that could and should have kept jobs and work in Brum simply didn't step up to the plate, most noticeably and wastefully at the BBC. Job losses across the sector must be in excess of 1000 since 2000.

Secondly: the web has simply led people away from existing media; no big surprise there. We don't use radio to find hot new music anymore (apart from, maybe, some users of 6music), and that's a tragedy. Radio especially, but Television and Print too have increasingly retreated from any form of real engagement with their markets, obsessing with 'brands' and ‘efficiencies’, with programming avoiding risk and offering an increasingly depressing uniformity

Thirdly, 'local' has simply become a dirty word, especially from a metropolitan perspective. Given the default thinking in London about creativity north of Watford, that's hardly a surprise. Ironically, production technology has helped radio cut costs; but it has  helped bands and video makers much more. It has ushered in a wonderful explosion in local music and video production, which has been almost completely ignored.

Many speakers at the debate reminded me of how much people at contemporary media industries, especially radio, are in denial. It was ironically amusing to hear an ex-employee of Global Radio claim that its local stations (Capital Birmingham and Heart West Midlands) were at an all-time high in the region, when a quick look at Media UK’s figures for those stations (here and here), released that same day, shows that they are both at all-time lows. 

It was galling to hear from Stuart Taylor, the very impressive ex-chairman of Guardian Media Group Radio (owners of Smooth, who have in turn sold out to Global), that he expects even more consolidation at radio to allow it to to survive. And it was very frustrating to note that Orion Media, owners of Free, have again recorded disappointing figures, at a time when I and many others had been hoping for some sign of a local media fightback against national brands. The fact is that no local or quasi-local radio service has shown an increase this quarter. The best that can be said is that some stations are holding their own… and none of these are market leaders.

The decline of 20th century media
Marc Reeves from RJF public affairs, an ex-editor or the Birmingham Post, gave a sad but  perceptive overview of the decline at traditional media. He was particularly interesting on the abilities of old-school local media to reach out and relate to its audiences. And that, quite possibly, is the key.

Any media organisation lives or dies by its ability to build trust and credibility, and hopefully be liked by its audience. As social media gurus constantly tell us, it’s the way you connect to your audience that matters. It’s particularly interesting to see that the most traditional forms of radio continue to prosper at network level at the BBC. I put this down to exactly those key factors: trust and credibility - the ability to acknowledge, reach out and touch an audience.

That leads me back to Marc’s point. I feel, and I eventually said this towards the end of the debate, that the relentless retreat from localism, driven and justified by business priorities, has left Brand Radio increasingly unable to connect to its audiences. Listeners in turn continue to leave in favour of things they can relate to. If the programming strategy of Brand Radio was to compete effectively with the BBC channels, it has comprehensively failed. As Matt Deegan points out, Xfm is now trounced by 6 music. Elsewhere, Radio 2 continues blithely on its way as the 800lb gorilla in the radio room that nothing will dislodge… until, this being the BBC, it shoots itself in the foot, of its own volition.

A way forward?

So let’s come back to local media. Media needs content. It feeds on it. Local media might do well to stop obsessing about heavily researched and safely acceptable content to the exclusion of all else. Local relevance, played right, gives a competitive usp. If – on whatever platform emerges in the next few years – local media succeeds in reinventing itself with attractive, credible multi-stranded content, it won’t be by relying on playing, or talking about, the exact same stuff everyone else plays and talks about. 

The big 21st century difference, in my view, is that the new platforms might well be local, but now they have a global reach. That’s what could make new and creative services, local, specialised or otherwise, stand out, and more significantly, pay their way. Brilliant thinking comes for free. Brilliant individual content that could be exclusive to a station, that reflects and is of the market the station serves, is out there for the taking. You just need a bit of editorial judgment, which is becoming an elusive commodity in our industries. 

Last week I wrote about Magic Garden studios, where Gavin Monaghan had recorded a session with local band Jaws. It was done for Radio 1 - no local take-up here. Take note, local boys: Radio 1 is out there, looking for exciting stuff in your own back yard. That said, there is absolutely no reason why Radios 1, 1xtra, 2 and 6 could not be beaten to the punch, every single time, by local stations. That would be a start… but only the the start of a five year or longer battle to claw back market share for local media.   

This probably won’t happen. What’s far more likely is that yet more new operations will emerge, probably online, probably very tech-savvy in new and creative ways, to nibble away at the traditional audience, crumb by crumb. I wouldn’t mind seeing that happen one little bit. In fact I’d be happy to help.

I mentioned the Birmingham Music Network at the start of this post. It’s ironic that this gathering of musicians and music business boosters also took place on the same day as the regional media debate. These are two worlds that need each other. They could be very good for each other. But they ignore each other. If they, somehow, found a way to work with each other, we might see some interesting changes. 

Links:
Media UK; see also James Cridland's and Matt Deegan's blogs
Re-thinking Regional Media
Campaign for Regional Broadcasting Midlands is an online petition to try to save those local jobs that are left at the BBC

The Folk Ensemble - a Birmingham talent factory.

 Scoot up a flight of stairs in one of central   Birmingham’s least appealing 70s concrete   piles, duck down a passageway, head   through reception, left, right, big space,   down more stairs, hang another left down a   long corridor with music on all sides, follow   the noise, follow the noise, follow the NOISE  as it grows, and… bang! 

 I’m in the New Lecture Hall, in the midst of an   unholy and magnificent racket. It’s absolutely   thrilling. 

There are, maybe, 45 young musicians in the room. It’s hot. In the middle, Joe Broughton of Urban Folk Quartet fame is exuberantly taking them through their paces. They rock. Hang on, there's three-quarters of UFQ in the room. And a big fat brass section, fiddles, woodwind, melodicas, cajon and percussion, proper electric bass. Way in the back, a tiny elegant harpist, dwarfed by her instrument, is dancing like a maniac while she plays. They’re all dancing, Joe included. You'll know exactly when you listen.

Damn. I wish my classes were as good as this. 

For this is a class. We’re in Birmingham Conservatoire, and I’m looking at the musical unit that has spun dozens of fantastic committed musicians out into the Birmingham music scene and beyond: Joe Broughton’s Conservatoire Folk Ensemble. Past members are now gracing The Old Dance School, the Destroyers, and TG Collective. Others closely associated include Simon Harris, Ruth Angell and Sid Peacock, and many more. Teaching staff such as Joe and Percy Pursglove are also heavily involved.

It’s rehearsal time. The Folk Ensemble were preparing for the Birmingham’s Olympic Torch shindig in Cannon Hill Park, which took place this weekend... although you won't find any sign of them - or, disgracefully, any other local performers, apart from Soweto Kinch and the CBSO, who were way down the bill - on the Birmingham 2012 page. A new number was commissioned for the event. As the choirs and other musical collaborators aren’t here today, I’m only getting a partial picture of how it will eventually sound. It’s still great. I’d hate to be the band that has to follow them on stage.

I didn’t expect to see UFQ members working with the Folk Ensemble. 

"Well, this is a different one-off show. We’ve just come off our annual spring tour, but as it’s the end of the academic year, some people have left. So Tom Chapman’s back to help – and yes, that was Paloma Trigas you saw playing there. Some people are raring to go; some are in it for the first time."

So the song for the Olympics…? 

"Birmingham City Council has commissioned it. There’s other choirs coming – who I haven’t met yet, so I don’t know how that’s going to go. I sent them the music!"

It’s a tight schedule. On Tuesday, Joe was due to meet with a group of djembe players, on Wednesday it was the turn of the choirs. This was to be followed by a dress rehearsal on Thursday, and a performance at the Adrian Boult Hall on Friday. As torch day neared, the whole troupe went out to play at several different venues across the weekend, to wrap up the year for the ensemble.

Is this going to be recorded when you do it live, after all the work you’ve put in? 

"I hope so… But I have no idea. They’ll have the facilities to do it, but that’s not my area." 

Well, one bit has been recorded, bootleg style, by me. It’s from the Ensemble’s own repertoire - and Joe has kindly allowed me to put it up in this post, as long as I make it crystal clear that this is a recording of a rehearsal. It’s not perfect, and the brass outweighs the strings. But it’s enough to give you a little taste. I think it’s a brilliant listen: it makes me want to shed forty-something years and pick up a sax or a clarinet all over again.

Fiddle Castro - CFE

A few posts back, I wrote about Mendi Singh, and his generous and deep involvement in all types of music making in the region.  I suggested, not for the first time, that there is a collaborative vibe to much of the region’s music which is enriching the city. This is driven by generosity of spirit, and a genuine musical curiosity on the part of dozens, hundreds maybe, of creative souls.

Joe’s work with the Folk Ensemble, over the past 14 years, is also key. If you wonder why there is so much adventurous jazz, folk and world music coming out of one of the UK’s most industrial cities, follow those musicians’ careers back. A staggering number of them came out of the Conservatoire.

I’ve said this before, too: this musicianship is a priceless cultural resource in our city. It’s never been better, richer, braver, more cross-cultural and more welcoming, in almost all genres. And it’s time we recognised it, at all levels, and gave it a more prominent place in the city’s creative landscape. 

We can design all the computer games we want, and that's fine, because it creates jobs and wealth...but unless they are works of towering creative genius as well as snappy pieces of tech, they won't enrich our cultural life. 

If we want to commemorate past glories, we can stick as many blue plaques up, and lay as many walk of fame stars down, as there is time and space… but all that celebrates yesterday. We also need to celebrate, right now, the vital groundwork going on, in the city and beyond.

I’d love to see the powers that be recognise this. It has been shown, time and time again, that where creativity flourishes and is cherished, jobs can follow. Check this link from the US. There's also, if you have the energy to plough through it,  a dry as dust report from 2011 from The Department of Culture. There's some local stuff too - I was going to post a link to an impressive local government study from earlier this year, 'Destination Birmingham', but it appears to have been expunged from all the websites I had hoped to find it on.  

Simply put: right now, powers that be, is the time to do something. The creative sector - according to ex-head of the Arts Council Christopher Frayling - accounts for between 8 to 9 percent of our national GDP... which, says Frayling, is a couple percentage points less that our vastly discredited financial sector. We take our creative sector for granted... and we let the financial sector walk all over our economy while trousering obscene amounts of our tax money. 

Central to our creative and media sectors, especially in the West Midlands, is the astonishing diversity and creativity of our musicians. Right now, there’s a new generation of great musicians building the region's creative and cultural reputation up all over again. And I’ve just seen some of the next batch. It's time to acknowledge this. 

Links:
Joe Broughton
Folk Ensemble

Much ADO about the city and its musicians. And a significant first birthday.

Two events on two successive Thursdays, both significant and promising in their own ways. Last Thursday, the admirable Birmingham Music Network, which runs on a budget of nanopennies, providing a very useful platform to meet and talk about all things musical in the city, hosted a discussion/debate at Creative Networks in Millennium Point. The discussion was about Birmingham City Council’s sudden discovery that, hey, there is music being made in the city, and that, with a bit of luck this music thingy might, er, generate a bit of money. You didn't hear about that either? Wow. Funny, that.

I was on the platform in my capacity as local media and music industry dinosaur, along with the sagacious Dr Paul Long from BCU, local video maker Anthony Hughes, and the brilliant Abi Seabrook from Lady Georgiana. Abi and moderator Andy Derrick were the only full-time music professionals.