Do you know what a pop-up studio is?

Well if you can get down to the Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank of the Thames before Sunday you can see one in action. Radio 3 has built such a studio next to the Riverside café on the first floor.

It can be put up in a few hours, is made of perspex and is sound-proof, although much of the network’s musical output is transmitted from the area just outside it. When I visited the café the Gypsy Orchestra of Budapest were in full flow, watched over by a grinning Sean Rafferty.

Most presenters love performing in front of audiences rather than being confined in a lonely windowless studio and Sean had his own fan club in the front row of the audience, knitting furiously. Were they making pullovers for him or, like Madam Desfarges in Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, waiting for an execution, or at least a cock-up?

When I was there, there weren’t any that I could see. Everyone was very relaxed and enjoying themselves hugely.

Of course Radio 3 says its reason for having a pop up studio there is to get closer to its audience and to hear what they have to say about the station and its output.

I tried to find out if that was what was really happening. Here is our Feedback report

I went to the South Bank shortly after Roger Wright, the Controller of Radio 3 and also Director of the Proms had announced he was leaving the Corporation to run the Aldeburgh Festival. My namesake has been Controller for the last 15 years and for the last 7 years has run the Proms as well.

It requires a unique combination of talents, and extraordinary stamina, to do both. Mr Wright never missed a prom and was always back at the Royal Albert Hall early the following morning, as well as keeping an eye and ear on Radio 3 during the day. Of course, after 15 hour days he took taxis home, for which he was roundly criticised by some newspapers. They, of course, are much more scrupulous about expenses.

The two jobs have not always been combined. I can remember when a former Controller and a former Proms Director were not on speaking terms and hardly cooperated. This was extremely counter-productive, and also unpleasant for those who had to work for two quarrelling masters.

I do hope the BBC can find a person qualified to take on both jobs. The Corporation will undoubtedly miss Roger Wright. Although some Feedback listeners were very critical of what they saw as Radio 3’s dumbing down during his tenure, he was always prepared to come onto Feedback and face the flack, and he was always extremely courteous, even under fire. He has many fans.

ROGER BOLTON

PS Just a reminder that the Editor of Today, Jamie Angus, is soon to come onto Feedback. Do let me know what you would like me to ask him.

Roger Bolton presents Feedback on Radio 4.

Listen to this week's Feedback

Last week I was in the lavatories of St George’s Church in Bristol when I came upon something really impressive. (Don’t worry it is safe to read on). It was a sign above the air dryer which said –“Please do not use when a concert is taking place”.

I was impressed because there was a considerable amount of stone flooring between the loos and the concert hall, and it would require superhuman hearing to detect the low hum of the dryer.

Perhaps superb hearing is what most Radio 3 listeners have, or else they have particularly sophisticated listening equipment.

Even from the outside, St George’s is an impressive building. Built in the 1830s just up from the Cathedral, and at the heart of Georgian Bristol, it claims to be one of the best musical venues in the country. It is certainly one of the most beautiful.

I was there to produce a feature for this week’s Feedback about what Radio 3 provides for the listener at home during the intervals of live concerts.

Audience members at St George’s popped out to the lavatories, now free to use the dryers, and picked up their drinks from the bars in the crypt, happy to chat to friends about what they thought of the concert so far. (The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment had been playing Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No 4 and Cantata No 161. “Komm, du süße Todesstunde”, as part of the Bristol Baroque Festival of Music.) The Bristol audience had plenty to do but what about the audience listening at home or in the car?

On this particular evening there was to be an interval discussion in situ about Bach, featuring the concert’s conductor, John Butt, and the former Controller of Radio 3, Nicholas Kenyon. I talked to some of those involved about the features.

Many listeners told us they remember with great pleasure the interval talks given for many years by the composer Anthony Hopkins. I met the 90 year old last week and I am delighted to say that he is very well, extremely lucid, and that he got married recently. Perhaps there is more music to come.

By the way the Controller of Radio 4 will be coming on Feedback in a couple of weeks to answer your questions – so please let me have some!

Roger Bolton

 

•Listen to this week's Feedback

•Get in touch with the programme, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback website

•Read all of Roger's Feedback blog posts

Some of the cast from Radio 4's production of the epic Life and Fate

To be honest I had never heard of it, but ex-controller Mark Damazer insists that it is one of the greatest 20th century novels, and he commissioned dramas and documentaries about it before he left for a new life at an Oxford college.

Even so are such blockbuster radio events worth it?

That's one of the issues we looked at this week, and I had hoped it would give me the opportunity of meeting two of the stars, not Kenneth Branagh and David Tennant, but Janet Suzman and Greta Scacchi. But I was disappointed.

Also this week we report on the latest outbreak of discontent among some Radio 3 listeners who think "their" network is using too many gimmicks in the attempt to attract new listeners.

"Don't alienate the ones you already have", is their message to the Controller of Radio 3, Roger Wright.

He is coming onto Feedback in a few weeks so do let me know what you think about the changes he has just made to his schedule.

Meanwhile here is the Feedback feature on Life and Fate.

Roger Bolton presents Feedback

• Life and Fate on Radio 4
• Listen again to this week's Feedback, produced by Karen Pirie, get in touch with the programme, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Read all of Roger's Feedback blog posts.
• Feedback is on Twitter. Follow @BBCR4Feedback.

Feedback sent me to St Leonard's Church in Shoreditch in east London this week.

I wouldn't call it the most glamorous of locations.

It lies just outside the old walls of the City, and had the surrounding area been badly blitzed not much of architectural value would have been lost.

The historical associations are however dazzling. This is the site of the first theatre built in England since the Romans departed. A second soon followed, and William Shakespeare played in and wrote for at least one of them before departing for the South Bank.

One of his best friends and colleagues, Richard Burbage, lies in the graveyard as does the man fellow playwright Ben Jonson ran through with his sword during a fight in nearby Hoxton Square, now achingly fashionable, but then an open place where feuds were settled.

Jonson escaped the noose "by benefit of clergy".

St Leonard's itself was rebuilt by the architect George Dance the Elder between 1736 and 1740 and though some plaster is peeling off the walls it is a wonderful space, ideal for performing Purcell's semi-opera King Arthur.

Which is why a Radio 3 outside broadcasting vehicle was parked outside on the road to Hackney.

The network was transmitting the concert as part of Radio 3 Live in Concert, which, in what is described as "an unprecedented venture", is carrying live broadcasts from across the UK every weekday.

I was accompanied by Feedback listener Chris Newman, a passionate Radio 3 fan and we met the director Robert Hollingworth and also the Radio 3 Live in Concert's Edward Blakeman.

Next week on Feedback we will be discussing whether Children's radio has any future at the BBC.

Or put it another way, if Chris Evans can get 30,000 children to write short stories for Radio 2, what's the problem?

Please let me know what you think. Leave a comment on the blog or get in touch via the Feedback web site.

Roger Bolton is presenter of Feedback

• Read Edward Blakeman's post on the Radio 3 blog about Radio 3 Live in Concert
• The picture of St Leonard's was taken by Gordon Joly and is used under this license.
• Listen again to this week's Feedback, produced by Karen Pirie, get in touch with Feedback, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Feedback is on Twitter. Follow @BBCR4Feedback.

Editor's note: this week's Feedback focused on the English language, on Royal visits to Ambridge an on the conclusion of the BBC Trust's review of Radio 4 - SB.

There are many incidental pleasures to be derived from the latest BBC Trust Review, a copy of which is now available on its website.

For example, on page 48 it publishes a useful table which shows the cost per listener hour (CPLH) for BBC network radio stations. That isn't the same of course as how much each station costs, and obviously the more listeners there are the cheaper the cost per listener hour.

Still I was intrigued to see that Radio 3 costs over ten times as much CPLH as Radio 1, and around 5 times as much as Radio 4. Surprisingly, (to me anyway), Radio 5 live costs only a little less than twice as much CPLH as Radio 4. The station which has the lowest cost per listener hour is, unsurprisingly, the most popular, Radio 2.

Mind you don't get carried away with the idea that Radio 3 is massively expensive. It still only costs 6.3 pence CPLH.

The Trust, whose proud boast is that it is dedicated to "getting the best out of the BBC for licence fee-payers", published its latest review on Tuesday 8th February, after what it said was a 12-week public consultation.

It considered the overall performance of Radios 3, 4 and 7, had some pungent things to say about what it called the failure of BBC radio's strategy for children, and also backed the management's proposals for accessing past radio programmes.

The press reaction was, shall we say, mixed. I probably don't have to tell you which newspaper published the following headlines over critical articles.

"Oh no! Don't let the dumb down-brigade ruin Radio 4. Its the last bastion of civilised, aspirational broadcasting."

And the Daily Mail also said:

"Radio 4 has 10 million loyal listeners. So what does the BBC think of them? Too many are white, southern, and elderly".

The Trust's review is far more subtle and intelligent than that and addresses real issues that matter to you. It is worth an hour of any BBC listener's time. Shortly after the review's publication I talked to the Trust member who led it, David Liddiment.

He spent most of his TV life working for Granada television in Manchester so is particularly sensitive to the views of those outside the south east. The first excerpt from our Feedback interview is about the Trust's backing of BBC management's desire to widen Radio 4's appeal:

In a second, and shorter extract, David Liddiment talks about the failure of children's radio to a attract significant numbers of children:

In next week's Feedback I'll be in Manchester to explore further the BBC's plans to move more programme departments out of London, in particular to nearby Salford. Will listeners notice the difference and do you care where your programmes come from? Do let me know what you think.

Roger Bolton is presenter of Feedback

• Listen again to this week's Feedback, produced by Karen Pirie, get in touch with Feedback, find out how to join the listener panel or subscribe to the podcast on the Feedback web page.
• Feedback is on Twitter. Follow @BBCR4Feedback.
• The review of service licences for Radio 3, Radio 4 and 5 live as well as reports relating to archives and children's output are on the BBC Trust's web site.
• Radio 4 Controller Gwyneth Williams blogged about the service licence review earlier this week and, on last week's Feedback, Roger spoke to David Liddiment from the Trust about their recommendations.

And Smoke Fairies:

Yours truly was present for a magical collision of Radio 3 interactive head (and Proms producer) Roland Taylor and Radio 4 newsreader Kathy Clugston in Studio 70A this week. They had, naturally, brought their Ukuleles and they played Ode to Joy - the centrepiece of the big Ukulele Prom that Roland is producing - down the line for a Radio Ulster arts programme. Then I recorded Kathy and Roland's impromptu verse and chorus from Norwegian Wood. Here's the audio and here they are in action:

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Very musical place, Radio 4.

I've produced a few Proms in my time at the BBC but, for me, this year's line up is a bit different: Stan Tracey, the Michael Nyman Band and, because I begged to be allowed to produce it, Prom 45 with the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. I can't wait. When I was told I'd been given Prom 45 I smiled for about 2 days. Then, on the way home, it occurred to me that it might be a great opportunity, as Interactive Editor for the Proms, to get the audience involved. I emailed Ellara Wakely (Learning Manager, BBC Proms) and Roger Wright asking both if we could have a 'bring your ukulele to the Prom and play along' moment. They said yes. The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain said yes. My team said yes. I said yes!

Read the rest of this post and leave comments on the Radio 3 blog...

Steve Bowbrick is editor of the Radio 4 blog