Yesterday was my birthday. The big five-O. Now that my life is 1/3 over, I think it is time to embrace modern times – and I was very happy to receive a gift of an MP3 player.

This was an item I’ve been looking for. I have resisted an iPod because I’m not a huge fan of sticking plugs in my ears and listening to music – I have CD players in my car, office and around the home so why would I need something to play MP3’s? Well, I discovered a device called a T.sonic 610, manufactured by a company called Transcend. In addition to playing back MP3’s, the device also records FM radio. I’ve always wanted an easy way to record my own radio show so that I can listen back and critique myself. (I’m a harsh critic!!)

You would be surprised at how difficult it is to find a device that can record radio – it seems the record labels are so worried about “free” downloading of music that they have put the kybosh on manufacturers adding the feature. Luckily, a few companies resist.

The T.sonic is really cool. After playing with the device and seeing all that it could do, I realized that I could start downloading audio from the Internet – podcasts. A podcast is nothing more than an MP3 file, so I started looking for MP3 files to download.

There is one site that I really want to recommend. Since 1994, Mike Regenstreif has hosted Folk Roots/Folk Branches on CKUT-FM in Montreal. The program can be heard live on Thursday mornings from 9 to 11am Eastern Time, but you can download programs from the archive (click here) and listen back at your convenience. CKUT can also be heard in northern New York, northern Vermont and parts of eastern Ontario as well as their Internet stream and archives.

Mike is talented writer and has covered the folk music scene since the 1970’s , notably as a contributor to the Montreal Gazette and Sing Out! magazine. Mike’s knowledge and talent for choosing songs is evident in his radio broadcasts. I throughly enjoyed his selection of songs on this week’s Woody Guthrie 95th birthday celebration program. ( Incidently, I will be rebroadcasting the “Bound For Glory” recreation on Sunday July 22 on WFDU-FM. Featuring narration from Tom Chapin and musical contributions from artists like Bethany & Rufus, Greg Greenway, Joe Jencks, Rick Nestler, Amy Carol Webb, David Massengill, Hope Machine, Karen Mal, Danny Schmidt, Danny Bakan, Red Molly and others. Tune in at 3pm on www.wfdu.fm )
As the name of his radio suggests, Mike explores a diverse selection of music on his program. Starting with the roots ane extending toward the branches, Mike covers some great music that shows why folk music can reach so many people. Mike features some intelligent and entertaining interviews in his radio program, and also offers us an insight on the vibrant music scene in Canada. Mike doesn’t limit himself to Canadian music – you will hear many of the artists that we share on WFDU as well.
(At left is a photo of Mike in the studio with singer-songwriter Eleni Mandell, a recent guest on Folk Roots / Folk Branches)

I highly recommend a visit to Mike’s website – http://www.ckutfolk.com/ and be sure to spend some time in his show archives. Programs are kept online for several weeks, and I guarantee you will like what you hear.

By the way, the headline of this article is “Great Music and Great Radio Available on the Internet (at least for now)…” The “at least for now” part is due to what has been transpiring in Congress over the past few days. As many of you may be aware, the payment of royalties for web broadcasting of songs has been an issue for sometime now. With the advent of the Internet, record companies and publishers realized that music played on the Internet was a source of revenue. While broadcasting rates have long been determined (reasonable rates set decades ago), the new territory of the Internet opened up opportunities. A group called the Sound Exchange became the “bounty hunter” for the music industry and sought to collect their fees. The Copyright Royalty Board, made up of a group of federal judges, set rates for web casters earlier this year – due to take effect this Sunday. While small web casters argue that a percentage of their revenue should be considered as compensation for “web play”, the Copyright Royalty Board (CRB)decided that a per song fee would be more appropriate. The reason is, some web casts are done as not-for-profit hobbies – if there is no revenue collected by the website then XX% of nothing is nothing. The CRB realized this is not fair, so they are asking for a royalty rate PER SONG. Currently the figure is set at approximately $.07 per song. While that doesn’t sound like much, for some 24 hour web casts this can add up to several thousand dollars per month – prohibitive by most standards of operation. That rate is also set to double by 2010.

Currently, web casters, the Sound Exchange, and artists are arguing their case. There has been a line drawn in the sand – many “big name” artists are arguing for their piece of the pie, while other artists see the opportunity for a different sort of “profit” for sharing the music on the Internet at a lesser monetary price tag.

As this article is being posted, it appears that the deadline will be allowed to pass and that web casters can continue their work while a more favorable agreement is hammered out. I urge you to visit http://www.savenetradio.org/ and find out how you can help.

Speaking personally, I would love to be able to offer my own programs as Internet “pod casts”. With a reasonable rate, perhaps I could – and everyone will get what is truly deserved. Let’s not forget that the goal is perpetuate this music that we love.