We heard from some of our classical music fans this week, which we always enjoy. One called from Oberlin, Ohio where he listens to WHQR Classical’s stream. He’s a fan of the program “Exploring Music” which we broadcast Monday through Friday at 7 PM. This listener called to say “I really enjoy your station, and particularly appreciate the fact that you have a little bit higher bit rate on your stream fidelity. That makes quite a bit of difference on the classical side. Those of us who appreciate high quality sound thank you.” I find this comment interesting because we did not, in fact, increase the bit rate of our stream. What we did do was upgrade our streaming encoder, which is apparently working much better than the old one we were using. I’m glad to hear that our streaming audience can hear the difference.
By the way, Exploring Music has been hosted by the recently deceased Bill McLaughlin. His final pre-recorded shows will air the week of August 17, after which the host chair will be filled by Peter van de Graff. Bill was a long time favorite in the classical music world, and will be much missed.
We also got a very nice note from a listener who appreciates live classical performance. He wrote “just a quick note to thank you and your team for the
“Little Lunch Music” today. It was fabulous! I treated myself to an inexpensive haircut at the CFCC Barber Lab, and fantastic lunch at The Basics, ordered a book at Old Books on Front, and capped off my early afternoon downtown at WHQR - all within two blocks! Keep up the great work in our lovely community!” He’s referring to the concert we hosted at WHQR’s MC Erny Gallery of performances by talented students from the Vivace Music Foundation last Friday. It was a fantastic concert attended by a standing-room only audience. If you missed it, you can go to WHQR’s YouTube page to see a video of this exceptional performance.
A listener wrote to George Scheibner to express her appreciation and inquire about a song on Smooth Landing that evening. “Smooth Landings is a huge part of our life. Our son discovered it last year at his first year at UNCW. Originally from the Outer Banks, we now share our time between Burlington, VT and Sámara. Costa Rica. We listen 6 out of 7 evenings. Thank you for providing such a rich musical experience. Btw. Can you tell me the name of the Elvis Costello song you played on Friday night? I recognized his voice but not the song, it seemed somewhat different than my experience of him expected.
Thanks for all you do!” George let us know that the unusual song from Elvis Costello was actually a cover of the song “Days” by Ray Davies of the Kinks, found on the soundtrack album of the 1991 film “Until The End of the World” by Wim Wenders. Talk about deep cuts.
Another George Scheibner fan asked “I was wondering what the second to last song of Thursday (8/6)’s Smooth Landings show was? I think it was by a Patty something.” We told him it was Patty Larkin singing “The Road” from her album “Perishable Fruit.
Finally, this week we bid the fondest of farewells to reporter and host Kelly Kenoyer. After five great years at WHQR, she’s moving to Norfolk, VA to host Morning Edition for WHRO. We are sorry to see her go, but we’re confident we’ll all be hearing from her before long.
We love to hear from you. Please send us your questions, comments and criticisms. You can email us at feedback@whqr.org. You can also find us on Facebook, Instagram and Bluesky. Thanks for your feedback, and we look forward to hearing from you.