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What is the definition of relaxing music? It varies.
I remind myself of the "Medibank" advertisement where the talent was listening to heavy metal music as a way of relaxing.
It also reminds me of radio stations such as "beautiful music" stations 2CH, 3AK and 3MP. That format consisted of instrumental arrangements of popular cover songs occasionally to Latin-American rhythms from artists such as Enoch Light, Walter Wanderley or the lush string arrangements of Mantovani and "101 Strings". The typical catchcry is "....the place to relax...".
Similarly, in the 1980s, 2Day-FM was a laid-back format with artists such as Linda Rondstadt, James Taylor, Michael Franks, Frank Sinatra ("New York New York"), Diana Ross, Melissa Manchester or on rare occasions Don Burrows (RIP) and the occasional "classic hits" from Dion and the Belmonts, Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, Franki Valli and The Beatles. At one time in 1983, 2Day's news theme was the theme to "ET" by Johnny WIlliams.
In this article relaxing music is jazz-fusion and 'new age' is seen as a relaxing format.
It could be summed that there is no real definition of relaxing music, but the outstanding feature is that the relaxing format has to stick out against its competitors. That is the format has to be different.
At the same time, how long will the format endure? Peoples' listening tastes may well vary over time and a particular format may not last.
LA radio station KHJ 93 (AM), depicted in the movie "Once Upon A Time In Hollywood" was a real radio station, and its format, though not consisting of relaxing music was the most popular station in LA between 1965 to 1980. The market for this waned after 1980. It was alleged that FM was eroding an AM station's audience and hence its demise.
But methinks that if the format was good, then FM station proprietors would have adopted the KHJ format including those lush Johnny Mann Singers' station IDs. It obviously didn't. Think of 4KQ which was an AM station and as recently nearly topped the ratings.
So it is not necessarily the AM or FM or DAB+ bands that necessarily determine the popularity of the station. Rather it is the format itself and the presentation style that retains market share. Keep in mind that listeners' tastes may well change over time and what is popular today may not be popular tomorrow.
Again, for a radio station to 'stick out' against the AC format or Classic Hits formats or any format, you have to ask what is "relaxing". To illustrate, 2UE, 4BH, Magic 1278, 3MP and Smooth, are supposedly easy listening formats. Smooth is the market leader in Sydney, Otherwise, at least the Sydney-based stations would all have equal share of the easy listening market when clearly the ratings are not equal.
Thank you,
Anthony of nothing is static, Belfield in the land of the Wangal and Darug Peoples of the Eora Nation