One, Two, Three: BBC Radio's formation of intercluded stations, from the Marriott Report (1957) to the present.

In early 1957 Richard Marriott (Assistant Director, Radio) led a working party in his name that determined the future of domestic radio in the face of commercial television's launch (1955-62). He concluded that radio would survive through music. The full range of music must be broadcast, he decided, but the stations must be vertically distinguishable through the canonic promotion of discrete genres. In this way he developed strands for particular types of popular music (Light/Radio 1), 'sweet' music (Light/Radio 2) and light classical music (Music Programme/Radio 3). The opposition and tactics of music department staff and the Musicians' Union, together with unanticipated events such as the Pilkington Report (1962) and the pirate radio stations (1964-7), formed fractures in Marriott's strategies that remain periodically obtrusive – in particular the employment of orchestras and the provision of music through intercluded services. This paper inspects the history of canonic music provision on BBC radio, examining the consequences for the corporation of incremental digitalisation.