The time has come

—After well over 40 years of membership with WXXI-FM, the classical-music public radio-station out of Rochester…
Yr Fthfl Srvnt has decided to move on.
I found an online classical music alternative during another of their dreaded fund-drives.
“454–6300! Your gift will be doubled!”
Whither Bach? Whither Beethoven, et al?
My clock-radio remains tuned to WXXI, but as soon as I get up I switch it off, and fire up this ‘pyooter aimed at https://www.yourclassical.org.
I got there roundabout, but quickly noticed the lack of program promos, and “this segment brought to you by Velmex of East Bloomfield” (????), etc.
I realized WXXI had become a radio station: Copeland, Ravel, and Stravinsky instead of some droning rapper — at least Little-Richard could hold of tune.
But promo after promo after promo.
My long-ago switch to WXXI came with my last rock ’n’ roll album by Def Leppard (“too loud”).
That’s eons ago. And I gave all those albums away. All vinyl. Had they ever caught fire, the smoke woulda blotted out the sun.
classical.org’s stream claims it’s “radio,” but it’s not over-the-air.
It comes via my Internet cable, and I stream it along with a railroad webcam out of Cresson, PA. (I’m a railfan.)
I can’t stream two video-feeds at the same time. Cresson disappears, perhaps crowded out by YouTube’s Horseshoe-Curve webcam, which might be prioritizing itself over Cresson.
Sometimes I could run both video streams at once, but not when the gamers are on up the street, around supper-time, or if it’s raining = they can’t buzz the pastures with their two-stroke ATVs.
My time with WXXI goes back to when WXXI-FM switched over to classical music in 1975. A local for-profit classical music station switched formats.
I switched maybe a year or two later.
I always was a classical-music geek. That preference was stoked by Houghton College, my Alma Mater, where Johann Sebastian Bach sat at the right-hand of Jesus.
After college I accumulated a vast stash of rock ’n’ roll albums: Led Zeppelin, Cream, Hendrix, plus Beatles and the Stones.
But with Def Leppard I lost interest.
I found myself returning to what I liked most: Bach.
I remember driving across Kansas with Copeland’s “Billy-the-Kid” wafting through my head.
I’m still not sure about “yourclassical.org.” I’ll miss my daily dose of “Hilda-of-Binghamton” (Hildegard von Bingen); plus Stravinsky, et al; which I haven’t heard much on classical.org.
But too many promos, plus an entire Saturday afternoon lost to screaming overweight blondes jumping 250 feet off castle parapets into roiling ocean below, hand-in-hand with yowling lust-crazed tenors.
Murders, stabbings, shootings! Do normal people sing at each other?
No hawking for money yet on “yourclassical.org.” (Fingers crossed.)
And sadly at classical.org I don’t get local content. Nor do I get “Exploring-Music,” a replay of Carl Hass’ “Adventures in Good Music,” which got me into Ravel, Debussy, and Vivaldi.
“1812 overture” began my preference for classical-music. But Bach at Houghton left 1812 in the dust.
Houghton also had a fabulous pipe-organ essentially aimed at Bach; 3,153 pipes, the Mighty Holtkamp.
“They let that pipe-organ fall into disrepair, and they ain’t gettin’ another red cent!”
And so WXXI-FM recedes into my filmy past.
It was just background music.