OVER the AERIAL WIRELESS NEWS FROM FAR AND NEAR.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 198, 22 August 1930, Page 15

OVER the AERIAL WIRELESS NEWS FROM FAR AND NEAR.

A special programme by the Municipal Band to-morrow night will bring Auckland's Music Week to a conclusion. His many friends in Auckland will be able to hear Canon Percival James on relay from St. Paul's pro-Cathedral, Wellington, on Sunday evening. Auckland Orphans' Club Orchestra provided another treat on Wednesday night. They have the gift of maintaining a good musical standard and appealing to a wide public at the same time. Surely there are none who would be dissatisfied with Wednesday's bright instrumental items The orchestra has truly played itself into the hearts of listeners. May it soon appear again. Apropos of the splendid service rendered by wireless telegraphy in the recent disaster to the Tahiti, it is recalled that it is now just over 30 years since wireless was first experimented with at sea. Quite a long while after that came the Ulimaroa, still running in her original trade, with the first aerial to be seen regularly alongside New Zealand wharves. There are quite a number of first appearances on next week's local programmes. On Sunday night Miss Myra Monk, well-known on the Auckland concert platform, will have her initial experience before the studio microphone. The Birkenhead Municipal Band, under Mr. J. T. Lighton, and Mr. S. Hislop, bass-baritone, are the newcomers for Wednesday, and on Friday Mr. Peter Baxter, a young English baritone, will be heard for the first time.

"Television will be definitely in our theatres in 1933." This is the prophecy of several prominent American experts. Colour is lent to the assertion by the publication of plans for- a huge theatre to be equipped for the presentation by television of ineidents as they are actually happening miles away. The theatre is to be built on Manhattan Island.

"Wireless has made half England awake and aware. How far beyond our present imaginations its influence will reach we can hardly tell, but it is no exaggeration to say that already there is no one alive—be he ploughman or professor —who is so wise that he can afford to neglect its voices." —Extract from one of a series of articles on "What is Right with England," in the London "Spectator."

The ship-to-shore system of Tadiotelephonv now available on the Atlantic had a s'plendid advertisement recently when a passenger aboard the Homeric carried on a long conversation with an official of the 833.C., and gave a vivid description of life afloat on a transAtlantic liner. The conversation was put on the air, and listeners noted that the voice of the speaker at sea was as clear and distinct as that of his interrogator ashore. The broadcast provided quite a good "stunt."

PBIME MINISTER TO SPEAK Ere he departs from Wellington on Sunday evening, the Hon. George Forbes will be tendered an official farewell, at which the Mayor of "V\< ellington, and the leaders of the two other parties in the House will deliver addresses. These speeches, and the reply of the Prime Minister, will be broadcast through 2YA. Maybe they will be put on the land lines also for the other stations, as was the procedure in Australia. MUSIC WEEK AND KADIO. While lovers of music in their many hundreds have attended Town Hall concerts this week, far larger audiences have enjoyed the special "Music "Week" programmes broadcast by IYA. The station has arisen well to the occasion, and its programmes have not been overburdened with the severely classical. This, though a delight to those musically educated, misses in a general appeal which should be the main aim of such a week as is now closing. The contributions by the Municipal Choir, Municipal Band, Orphans' Orchestra and IYA choir have formed excellent foundations for good programmes, and it is safe to assert that Music Week, on the air, has fully achieved its part in the general scheme. Radio licenses during the past two months in the Auckland district have been mounting consistently—a sufficiently convincing proof that appreciation of music over the air continues to grow, steadily and solidly. Those who have enjoyed this week's programmes, and wish to make comparisons, will be able to do so, for on August 30 Australia will Inaugurate a Music Week, and the Sydney stations promise specially attractive fare for listeners. Mechanical music, so frequently condemned, has won its way into a place where actual brass and reeds once reigned undisputed. In America to-day the military band is being replaced by a" motor truck from which gramophone records are passed through an amplifier, the truck preceding a body of marching troops at a slow pace. America is certainly going one better in the process of producing a mechanical army, but where will the real glamour of a military procession come in, without that delight of both old and young, the glittering, inspiring band? Imagine the thrill of marching to "Tipperary" blasting cut from an amplifier!

(By "PHONOS.")

Tuesday night from IYA nest week will be devoted chiefly to the muchheralded spelling bee. Those who do not relish this as entertainment will find a cheerful programme from 2YA, where "The Eight O'Cloek Revue" will be broadcast. If you have a good set. are keen on cricket, and sit up till the small hours to follow the progress of a test match, don't also have a telephone. The "night before" is enjoyabLe, but the '"morning after" is a continued series of telephone rings, and a supplying of details which become less expansive with repetition. "Radio" writes a caustic criticism of the programmes at IYA, and suggests that "fifty-fifty" jazz items should be given. He also suggests the further use of records. It may be pointed out, however, that the regulations do not permit of more than 25 per cent of evening programmes being provided from records, and that many listeners in believe that too much jazz is already provided. The difficulties of the programme organisers in providing new talent must be recognised. The programme organisers have over three hundred programmes a month to arrange, and it will be conceded that this is no light task. IYA suffers from the disability that its programmes are really finalised in choice at Christchurch, and by decree from head office, are moulded on definite lines for each night of the week. The system has its advantages and most marked disadvantages. Our local tenors and

sopranos do not deserve the harsh opprobrium which "Radio" heaps upon them.

FROM SYDNEY NEXT WEEK. Sunday, 2FC. —From 8.30, concert programme, with items by the State Theatre Orchestra; 2BL, 10.10, Senia Chostiakoff, Russian tenor, and other artists in studio programme. Monday, 2FC. —9.30, further light entertainment from Ashfield; 2BL, 10.00, wrestling bout from the Stadium. Tuesday, 2FC. —Dance night, with items by John. Mitchell, tenor, and Maurice and Witt, comedians; 2BL, 9.30, a night of trench and Scandinavian music. Wednesday, 2FC. —Trinity Grammar School concert; 2BL, 9.30, variety programme from the studio. Thursday, 2FC.—Concert relayed from Newcastle; 2BL, repeat presentation of "The Broken Wing," from the Little Theatre. Friday, 2FC.—9.30, professional Musicians' Orchestra, and contributing artists, with topical dialogue by Mr. and Mrs. Citizen. Following, a relay of Collingwood Band through 3LO; 2BL, 9.30, the Dee Why Choral Society's concert.

IS~EED FOR UNITY.

In last week's notes this subject was broached. In further discussing the subject, these points may be stressed. Individually, listeners probably feel that a service is provided, no large organisation representing them agitates itself over-the said service, and so there is no option but to take what fate —or the Broadcasting Company —provides in the way of news and entertainment over the air. Listeners, as a body, have drifted into a state of apathy. Time has now passed when a large proportion of them were enthusiastic amateur constructors, full of enthusiasm over a new hobby, and evincing a keen community spirit over circuits and lay-outs. It was this spirit which produced radio societies all over the Dominion. Many still remain, but they are for the most part small circles of short-wave transmitters and youthful constructors and experimenters. What is needed at the present juncture is an all-embracing body of listeners with the single goal of improved broadcasting throughout the Dominion. Auckland set one example of partial achievement in this line, when, during troublous times, it called into being a listeners' league. This body achieved much in arousing public interest, and then languished, mainly because, alone, it could make little further progress. But the time is drawing near when a federation of listeners' leagues will be able to exercise an undoubted influence upon the future of New Zealand broadcasting. The existing agreement between State and Broadcasting Company will have run its course not long after the present Parliament completes its term, and "its broadcasting policy" may be-

come a plank of any political party's platform. Here the united representations of listeners can achieve much —if the listeners themselves are united ere it is too late to take concerted action. The essential is some galvanising spirit who will awaken listeners to prospects and possibilities. May he soon appear in our radio firmament.