The BBC has turned its Young Musician contest from the classical equivalent of The X Factor into a sideshow, according to Julian Lloyd Webber, who said most viewers are unaware it still exists.
The competition, once shown on the BBC’s flagship channel where it drew millions of viewers, has been relegated to BBC Four - a channel “destined for the scrapheap”, Lloyd Webber said.
The cellist and founder of In Harmony, a Government-led music education programme for children, said the disappearance of classical music from primetime television will have a disastrous effect.
“I have always believed that access to music should be a birthright for every young person, not just those whose parents can afford to pay for expensive instruments and tuition.
“Yet not only is it quite probable that children will have little or no opportunity to take part in music at school, it’s also highly unlikely that a child might accidentally stumble upon a classical music performance on television. This is a tragedy,” Lloyd Webber writes in this week’s Radio Times.
“Did you know that the final of BBC Young Musician 2022 took place on 9 October and that it was won by an 18-year-old percussionist from Cambridgeshire named Jordan Ashman? Or, as was the case for nearly everyone else, did it pass you by?”
‘Blink and you’ll miss it’
When the competition was first broadcast in 1978 - under the name Young Musician of the Year - it attracted around 13 million viewers on BBC One, Lloyd Webber said.
“Now, blink and you’ll miss it. This year’s final was shown on BBC Four - a channel destined for the scrapheap - and got an average audience of 210,000. No prizes for guessing what will become of it soon then.
“Why has the BBC done this to its own competition?”
The contest switched from BBC One to BBC Two in the mid-1980s but in 2014 moved to BBC Four, which is now an archive channel except for occasional forays into live performance.
Lloyd Webber said that classical music had provided solace for people during lockdown but has “been completely sidelined from mainstream television, just at the time when it is needed more than ever”.
A BBC spokesperson said: “BBC Young Musician is an important and much-loved brand and we are fully committed to its future. BBC Four is the home of the best performance from across the UK every week and Young Musician has been on the channel since 2014.”
