Transparency
Transparency is a term from musicology that audio engineering and media studies have adopted. In particular, transparency denotes the homogeneity of a musical work or a radio program.
Audibility of radio programs
Private radios
In media studies, the term is used in relation to radio . In Germany, transparency became a critical program criterion in 1984 with the approval of private broadcasters . The private broadcasters tried to subject the broadcast material, including moderation, news, etc., to a profile that guaranteed transparency. The reason for this was, in addition to the recognition value ( corporate identity ), the quota requirement : transparency seemed to guarantee to keep the listener hooked instead of scare them off with unexpected sounds or speeches and let them wander off to the competition. "The program should be able to be received continuously without any breaks being discernible."
The transparency was put into practice through the employment of certain moderators according to criteria of their temperament and dialect and through the formation of music pools. These pools were equipped by DJs and the editorial team in such a way that there were no noticeable peaks and that certain hits from the charts appeared regularly - were " rotated ". In the 1990s, computers also fine-tuned music selection, for example by automatically selecting faster tracks for the position after the news and adding them to the broadcast schedule. Verbal contributions were regarded as the fodder of the program, but also as breaks for transparency, i.e. as a switch-off criterion. That is why they had to be produced in a particularly “colorful” manner and were not allowed to exceed a certain length. In the 1980s, the standard length for private broadcasters was 3 minutes 30 seconds. According to the prevailing opinion, more “word” was not reasonable for the listener.
public service broadcasters
The public radio broadcasters initially hesitated in this development. The 3'30 regulation of the private sector was even rated as " cultural decay ". Transparency was seen as a means of “dumbing down the listener”. The discerning listener, it was argued, could not only cope with breaks in the program, he would even challenge them.
It was only in the 1990s that ARD and Deutschlandradio began to convert individual broadcasting channels to transparency as part of program structure reforms. At WDR, for example, they started with 1Live (1995), where from the start, for example, the news was read over a rhythmic bed of music and no more established music journalists brought their own records and CDs into the studio and presented them themselves.
In the meantime, almost all channels of public service programs have also been smoothed out as part of several structural reforms in order to make them more audible. The 3'30 rule is sometimes undercut by some ARD programs. The cultural programs with their relatively high proportion of words and the programs of “serious” music remained unaffected for a long time. In the meantime, however, these programs are also subjected to the criterion of transparency.
software
Private classical broadcasters have been using software to manage and play the digital music pool since the 1990s, and public broadcasters are now following suit. Until the turn of the millennium, the dominant program for this was RCS (Radio Computing Services) based on the DOS operating system , then Musicmaster . Basically, these programs try to find music tracks (but also jingles and trailers ) based on criteria such as
adapt to each other. A radio program, for example, can “pick up”, but should not change style with this barely noticeable acceleration, for example not leave the orchestral baroque . Alternatively, you can use the software to slowly migrate the music from the baroque to the Viennese classic over the course of an hour or two without the listener noticing. Every radio employee who enters music titles in the database has to tag them accordingly. Even if the software is primarily used to harmonize program areas, it can also "switch between different categories at the push of a button, for example to repeatedly move unused songs into active categories". Even the term “unused” in music implies that there is “used up” music, ie titles that have become boring due to repeated repetition - an undesirable side effect of transparency. Since around 2010, public-law classic waves have also been experimenting with these programs.
Audience rating
While some reformed pop waves received an increase in listeners, the rate for others collapsed . There are no reliable statistics that prove the transparency as a guarantee for the success of a radio program.
For many listeners, the transparency is even considered a deterrent, because it is perceived as "lulling" or radio as a mere accompanying program . In the USA this dissatisfaction led to numerous "Freeform Radio Stations" - a countermovement to the common format radio .
Internet radio
With the increasing spread of digital radio channels and above all Internet radio , the discussion about transparency is taking on a further dimension. Anyone who wants to listen to an audible program will find thousands of stations on the Internet with homogeneous music genres according to their taste and without moderation and timing, but also program offers that consciously create contrasts. In addition to the niche Internet channels with homogeneous music colors only interrupted by advertising and short presentations, models of algorithmic music streams have established themselves, above all Last.fm and Pandora . Both portals do not stream from DJs, i.e. human hands, but rather music selected by software. The user only gives the system a starting point, for example punk or Beethoven or downbeat , and is then supplied with music for hours that moves along this genre. Pandora calls this the Music Genome Project based on genetic mutation processes .
Music psychology
In music psychology , the term refers to the aural psychological penetration of musical structures, e.g. B. on the musical-analytical perception of the individual tone components or interval qualities of a chord, a cadence or a whole sentence structure .
Sound engineering
Audio content is considered to be “audible” in itself and in the context of others if it does not show any major fluctuations in loudness and frequency spectrum . Some of these fluctuations can be measured objectively or felt purely subjectively. An important process in music production is the mastering of several mixed music tracks into a homogeneous sounding album. Parameters such as the distribution of frequencies ( equalizer ) and compression play a central role here.
literature
- Bernd Enders: Studies on the transparency and intonation assessment of chords . Regensburg: Bosse, 1981. ISBN 3-7649-2235-4
- Martin Werle: Switched on or logged off? Interests of the audience in the German radio and television market . Wiesbaden: VS, Verlag für Sozialwissenschaft, 2008. ISBN 978-3-531-15792-4
Individual evidence
- ↑ Martin Werle: Switched on or logged off? 2008, p. 101.
- ^ From the press release by Musicmaster.
- ↑ WDR 3 is testing, for example, to let software take over the basic music selection for large broadcasting routes in the morning and afternoon programs. The reception of this technical innovation is twofold: the software saves staff and makes specialist staff unemployed; and it releases the music editor from his core task, which, however, is often an unpopular routine.