"keeping the mid-Atlantic style for the first 30 minutes, then gradually harden towards the pure drop "

... hey, you could call it "Country Meets Folk". It might catch on, you never know...

Lots of excellent suggestions on this thread already.

Mike Harding could be kept on as long as the BBC doesn't dictate policy to SmOps who then tell MH what to play - in fact if Mike had a free rein I supect he'd play a lot more proper folk music and enjoy it much more, as we all would.

It certainly is worth mentioning Norway's national 24-hour trad station. I doubt the BBC will do that but it is good for them and the public to know just how far behind they are. Sotland and Ireland also have huge amounts of traditional music on their regional radio - big regular programmes and not just at 2:30am...

A proper folk programme on every local radio station - essential. There is so much scope for announcements of local gigs, *totally* appropriate to local radio and the BBC needs to actively recruit good presenters for those programmes - there's plenty of suitable and willing talent!

Other than that, more on all the national channels. Radio 3 and 4 aren't doing too badly. Radio 3 is emphatically not just classsical music, and just as it has a long jazz sequence on Saturday late afternoons it could do the same with folk. Moving Late Junction back to its earlier time would help. There's a lot of folky stuff mixed in with things like the breakfast programme too, which used not to be the case. Valuable for exposing a new audience to it.

Perhaps Ralphie could come back as a part time folk programming consultant to the Beeb?

Anahata