FILLING THE YEAR END BUDGET GAP

posted by Laura McKee

In many ways, it has been an outstanding year for Arizona Public Media - but your support is needed to wrap up our fiscal year and secure our financial future.

We successfully concluded the celebration of 50 years of service to the community on KUAT-TV Channel 6 with many community events and even a "Stay Home Un-Gala" that generated much needed funding for our core broadcast activities. AZPM brought Ray Suarez, Garrison Keillor and Neal Conan to Tucson, enjoyed a day learning about Arizona National Parks in conjunction with Ken Burns's television series, hosted a local debate with two sitting United States Supreme Court justices, informed our audiences on several key voter propositions, and many other program services that upheld our mission of informing, inspiring and connecting our community by bringing people and ideas together.

On the radio side, KUAZ-AM/FM our flagship NPR station achieved its highest ever audience share in the Winter 2010 quarter and ranked as the number one news/talk station in Tucson, and the fourth overall in the important morning drive-time. The Diane Rehm Show helped boost morning listenership, and investments in our transmission technologies ensured that audiences would enjoy a crisp, clear signal.

Classical KUAT-FM celebrated its 35th anniversary on the air, and many supporters from the UA School of Music came to give their accolades to the quality of music and depth of announcer knowledge that the station provides. Two of AZPM's original productions were broadcast nationally on PBS (our second in two years in the PBS national program schedule), and we were recognized with 13 Emmy-Award nominations while bringing home eight awards. Our website was redesigned to foster ease-of-use and viewer feedback, and upgraded with PlayPBS - a service that allows audiences to view full-length PBS and AZPM programs wherever and whenever through their computers.

Yes, it's a lot to complete in one year - and one final step is to make sure that we reach our needed financial goal before June 30th to ensure that we have the resources to cover our projected costs. I encourage you to make YOUR contribution today.

Thank you in advance for your continued support.

Jack Gibson

THANKS FOR 35 CLASSIC YEARS KUAT-FM!

posted by Jack Gibson

Many of you have been listening to Classical KUAT-FM 90.5 for the 35 years that it’s been on the air, so I’d like to share some history that may entertain you and give you some idea of how far we’ve come. Arizona Public Media’s first radio station, KUAT-AM (now KUAZ-AM) began offering Classical music in October, 1968 and the station became a charter member of the newly-formed National Public Radio (NPR) system in 1971. At that time phone lines connected public radio stations throughout the country to the program production center in Washington, D.C.

On May 19, 1975, KUAT-FM 90.5 began broadcasting as Tucson's first non-commercial FM station (the first selection to be played was Aaron Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man). Warren Clark was the welcoming announcer, and the format was primarily classical music with cultural programming, news and public affairs. The broadcast day was 6 a.m. to 12 midnight, seven days a week, from a transmitter on the KUAT-TV tower at Mount Bigelow.

In the years since the station’s first sign-on, we’ve added translators (remote auxiliary transmitters) to reach more of Southern Arizona, won awards for programs, added many broadcast series featuring the world’s greatest classical music performances including the Metropolitan Opera (in 1977), embraced talent like Bill McGlaughlin (who now hosts Exploring Music and Saint Paul Sunday), shared hundreds of local community concerts, and expanded into the new digital age with online streaming, classical blogs from James Reel, and iPhone compatibility.

If you’re passionate about classical music, you will love KUAT-FM no matter where you listen – in your car, on your computer, or on any number of portable hand-held devices. It has been our privilege to keep classical music on the air for your enjoyment, from Southern Arizona to Shanghai.

VOLUNTEER APPRECIATION EVENT

posted by Jack Gibson

If you’re reading this, you’ve already experienced our re-vamped website. Our online and new media team does everything they can to keep Arizona Public Media as current as possible to make the website a resource for you to find exactly what you’re looking for quickly and easily. Some of our most popular pages – the schedules for TV and links to radio streams - are conveniently located in the upper right of the home page. You will also have the opportunity to comment on stories to make the site a platform for direct communication with AZPM and other web users. We look forward to your comments. If you have something to share regarding to the new site please contact us.

Another great feature is PlayPBS right in the top navigation of AZpublicmedia.org. Now your favorite PBS programs are only a few clicks away, and you can watch anytime right on your computer. By incorporating it directly on our site, it will also load and play programs much faster.

The Pew Research Center has released a major national study on trust in government, an update to the original study released in 1998. The new survey focused on the federal government, but includes questions about state and local governments as well as comparisons to other industrialized nations. NPR just completed a month-long report on the findings in “Trust in Government.” If you missed any segments, you can find them in this news story.

I’d also like to take a moment to thank more than one hundred AZPM volunteers who came to our recent Volunteer Appreciation event. Their tireless dedication to public media is inspiring. Volunteers participate in almost every department at AZPM, from the front office to marketing, and membership to underwriting. We simply could not function as effectively as we do without their support. If you’re interested in volunteering, please contact Bernadette Wilkinson, our Volunteer Coordinator.

And May also brings one of PBS’s most popular programs of the year: the National Memorial Day Concert broadcast live from the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol, Sunday, May 30th at 5:00 p.m. on PBS-HD Channel 6 with encore performances at 6:30 p.m. on the 30th, and on the 31st Memorial Day, at 3:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. And in an additional tribute to our Veterans, audiences in Southern Arizona will also get a sneak peek at AZPM’s latest documentary production, Unforgettable: The Korean War airing Monday, May 31st at 9 p.m. PBS will broadcast this Arizona Public Media original production nationally to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the war, on June 21at 10 p.m.

Thank you again for your continued support, and stay tuned!

Jack Gibson

PLAYPBS

posted by Jack Gibson

This month, we are pleased to offer you a first look at an exciting new online program delivery service that gives you, the viewer, the best from PBS and AZPM. It's called PlayPBS.

PlayPBS lets you catch up on program episodes you may have missed and watch many of your favorite, full-length shows free and on-demand. PlayPBS takes the user on a journey through the AZPM program library, potentially offering content unseen for years. Adding to our already diverse broadcast program offerings, PlayPBS offers viewers an opportunity to watch their favorite AZPM titles anytime and anywhere they have an internet connection.

Finally, one of the more powerful aspects of the system, the content sharing, can transport users around the globe on a voyage of content exploration. Today, whether in Miami or Milwaukee you can go the local PBS station’s website and search Arizona Illustrated and you will be connected in seconds to content produced in Tucson by AZPM. A great way to stay connected while traveling.

For children's programming, explore PBS KIDS GO!, with more than 250 hours of full-length episodes featuring favorites such as Arthur, Maya & Miguel and WordGirl.

PlayPBS can be found at PlayPBS (or http://playpbs.azpm.org).

iTunes

Our Classical radio programming is now available through the iTunes radio tuner! In fact, iTunes now features three streams of Classical KUAT-FM including our highest quality 192K stream (the only 192K stream available in the classical genre).

Bill Moyers

I want to publicly tip my hat to Bill Moyers, who will retire from our airwaves with the April 30th episode of the weekly series, Bill Moyers Journal.

Moyers has enriched the public airwaves with innumerable high-quality productions including Joseph Campbell and The Power of Myth, On Our Own Terms: Moyers on Dying and more recently Moyers on America and Bill Moyers on Faith and Reason. And, while Bill leaves the weekly program, our hope is that he will continue to develop special productions long into the future.

Production of Now on PBS also wraps up at month’s end. Coming in May on Fridays at 8:30 p.m. is a new current affairs series, Need to Know.

Thank you for tuning in — and thanks for your continued support of Arizona Public Media.

Jack Gibson

SUNSET OF THE 50TH CELEBRATION

posted by Jack Gibson

This month you will note that considerable airtime is devoted to our annual March TV fundraising campaign in which viewers pledge their financial support for KUAT. During these important fund drives, Arizona Public Media (AZPM) raises vital revenue that we use to directly fund our ongoing services to the public: to produce, acquire and broadcast the programs and series you love, and to create new productions, too.

This month also marks the sunset of KUAT’s 50th Anniversary celebration. On March 9, 1959 Channel 6 became the first public station in Arizona to commence operations. Last week we celebrated our 51st Anniversary, although 50th Anniversary community celebrations will continue through the remainder of the month.

In February, we concluded the second and final planned on-air membership drive on our radio stations KUAZ and KUAT. The final figures indicate that our overall radio goal was met with a growing amount of pledging occurring online.

So who tunes in for pledge programming? The answer may surprise you. What many people do not realize is that AZPM viewers and members who enjoy our regular broadcasts — ongoing series such as Morning Edition, All Things Considered and Car Talk on radio and Masterpiece, NOVA and the PBS NewsHour on television — also enjoy in the diverse offerings of our pledge broadcasts.

Curious and thoughtful people, our viewers and listeners clearly enjoy an assorted schedule of programs. Please keep in mind that pledge drives remain the most cost-effective method for encouraging viewers and listeners to join the thousands of families in our community who finance your program schedules.

If you are already a member, please accept my personal thanks for your continued support and I hope you will bear with us as we work this month, to encourage your neighbors to join us today.

PUTTING THE PUBLIC IN PUBLIC MEDIA

posted by Jack Gibson

One of the great things about public media is our ability to respond to community needs -- all while keeping you, our audiences, informed.

Last month in response to events in Haiti, Arizona Public Media (AZPM) kept you up to date with the latest breaking news. Reporter Robert Rappaport wrote of local efforts with his blog and news updates. Special programming like Hope for Haiti Now, brought you a live music performance by today’s top stars that raised millions for relief efforts on stations all across the country, including our PBS-HD Channel 6.

The President’s State of the Union was covered on all of AZPM’s platforms: radio, television, and online. PBS-HD broadcast President Obama’s first State of the Union address and the Republican response by newly inaugurated Virginia Gov. Robert F. McDonnell. At 9 p.m. PBS World Channel 27.3 (Cox 83 and Comcast 203) aired an encore broadcast of the address and response. The event was also available live online at the “Live Events” section of the On Demand video page, and NPR's coverage of the address included a one-hour nationwide call-in hosted by Neal Conan and NPR's political junkie, Ken Rudin.

Arizona Public Media also brought to Tucson a live national radio performance of Garrison Keillor’s, A Prairie Home Companion. More than 6,000 people crowded into the TCC’s Arena to see Garrison and the local Chicano band iMas, legend of the accordion Joel Guzmán, accomplished singer and picker Dave Rawlings, and singer-songwriter Andra Suchy, who were his special guests. Also featured were The Royal Academy of Radio Actors; Tim Russell, Sue Scott, and Fred Newman, The Guy's All-Star Shoe Band, and the latest News from Lake Wobegon. Sue Scott, the female voice on the show, is a University of Arizona alumnus and spent time before the show in a workshop with UA students from the Drama Department.

In February, we have a number of terrific specials on our television and radio stations including Faces of America, a new four-part series on Channel 6, with Skip Gates who you may remember from last years’ African American Lives I & II. And our radio winter pledge campaign is underway. I hope you will consider all that AZPM does for our community and become a member or renew your membership today. It is your support that gives AZPM the resources necessary to respond to our community.