Online Radio Station Considering Program Dedicated to Classical Percussion Music

PINELLAS COUNTY, FL – Stephen P. Brown is on a mission: He wants to take classical music and spread it to the masses.

The Pinellas County conductor and composer started his crusade earlier this year when he launched Classic Pinellas Radio online. Inspired by the successful Classic FM radio station in the United Kingdom, Brown exposes classical music to “normal people” in short snippets.

“I was thrilled when a commercial classical music station started to provide an alternative to the high-brow elitism of the BBC’s Radio 3,” he said. “Classic FM helped millions rediscover classical music and I’ve been hoping someone would do the same in the U.S.A., but it hadn’t happened yet.”

Brown is no stranger to the classic music scene. The internationally acclaimed musician has spent 35 years performing around the world, is a two-time Global Music Awards winner and is a New York Times best-selling author.

Locally, Brown is the conductor of the Richey Community Orchestra and Chorus and the director of the Dunedin Concert Band.

With his online radio station, Brown has encouraged listeners to attend live concerts with friends in the Tampa Bay area. His station also has attracted listeners as far away as Australia and Germany.

Pre-recorded programs on Classic Pinellas Radio include Stephen’s Hall of Fame Concerts, Soothing Classics with Stephen, Classics for Choirs with host John DiPietro and orchestral movie music.

Long-term plans for the station include building listenership enough to warrant charging for commercials, partnering with other media, and eventually broadcasting through the airwaves on an FM bandwidth.

Brown is considering cutting down the program Classic Showtunes from two hours to one in order to launch a one-hour program dedicated to percussion music. Brown started multiple percussion ensembles throughout the United Kingdom and U.S. East Coast since the 1980s and is eager to share the percussion repertoire now available.

He has already sourced material from the McCormick Percussion Group, Les Percussions de Strasbourg, the London Symphony Orchestra, New Jersey Percussion Ensembles and pioneer Evelyn Glennie, who is a friend of Brown’s.

In order for the program to launch, Brown needs a volunteer host. The ideal host would be a specialist willing to record short introductory voice tracks about the music being played as well as several brief station tags. The recordings can be made at home using decent quality equipment and mailed to the station’s administrator.

If the percussion program is successful, the plan is for the host to submit recorded interviews with classical percussionists from all over the world and recommend repertoire to broadcast.

The station’s Concert Band Spectacular is also in need of a host.

People interested in the host positions can e-mail Brown directly at questions@classicpinellas.com.

For more information, visit ClassicPinellas.com.

Image via Shutterstock

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