I wrote a blog post in 2023 titled, Who Brought Classical Music into Your Life? I mentioned my mom, my high school piano teacher, and Don Dolloff, a legendary classical music radio announcer on WCNY-FM in Syracuse, NY, where I grew up.
Mr. Dolloff’s on-air style was engaging, entertaining, and educational. He enhanced my listening experience without ever getting in the way of it. His sense of balance was perfect – something I try to replicate in my work on BTPM Classical.
Last month, I received a message that Mr. Dolloff called me at BTPM. His daughter discovered my blog post online, shared it with him, and encouraged him to reach out to me.
It took me more than a week to summon the courage to call him back, but I’m glad I did. We had a nice, long chat. I learned that he is happily retired now and doing well. I was honored that he shared things with me about his personal life, like his education, military service, and children – things I would never have known from his on-air work. I especially enjoyed the “inside baseball” stories about his years at WCNY, particularly his story about interviewing composer Aaron Copland. Fascinating! We’ve planned to chat again sometime – and I really hope we do.
Public media has always been an important part of my life, long before I ever worked at BTPM. As a child growing up in a small, rural village in Central New York, public media showed me the world. I can still hum the opening music to my favorite children’s show, Zoom, which I watched in the 1970s on WCNY Channel 24, like Buffalo’s old Channel 17. Our 19” Zenith color TV didn’t have the greatest reception, but if I put a little tinfoil on the rabbit ears, I could watch Zoom, The Electric Company, and of course, Mr. Rogers.
As my interest in classical music grew, I turned to WCNY-FM, where I first became acquainted with Mr. Dolloff and some of the world’s greatest composers, Bach, Beethoven, Debussy, and my favorite name of all in music history, Karl Ditters von Dittersdorf – which Mr. Dolloff pronounced with aplomb.
It's hard for me to imagine what my life might have been like without public media growing up when and where I did. I’m grateful that society valued public media and made it available to children from all walks of life. In my case, we were not a wealthy family. We didn’t travel much or go to concerts or museums. We experienced these things through public media, and we did so safely, just as millions of children still do today.
