Missouri Classical Music News and Notes

The number of commercial classical stations in the US has dropped from 40 to 28 since 1998, according to this PlaybillArts story. Looking at the regional data on the Arbitron site, I notice a pattern: figures hold steady over time, then suddenly go down. For example, in the Mountain region, there's a drastic plunge from a share of 5.4 to 0.5 in 1999. In the Mid Atlantic region, the share held steady at around 1.9 until this year, when there was a decline. I doubt that these staggered drops are related to overall trends in classical listening. Rather, I'd guess that most of them could be correlated to abrupt closures of classical stations by profit-hungry conglomerates.