Chapter 2: Radio as Resonance Chamber

…Torilla Tavataan

In many ways, Scenes from the Northern Lights stands as an intervention into aural imaginaries of Finland as perpetuated by “world music” and similar segments of the sprawling overall music industry. Heinonen notes that aside from uusikansanmusiikki acts, Finland has produced instances of “internationally successful contemporary Finnish rock (HIM, Nightwish, The Rasmus), techno (Darude), or rap (Bomfunk MC’s)” (2005, 138). Each of the artists and groups he lists there found international success primarily with English-language or instrumental music. Lordi, the first Finnish entrant to win the Eurovision Song Contest (in 2006), did so with English-language song “Hard Rock Hallelujah” (Kannisto and Kauppinen 2020). “Transmitting aspects of Finnish and Finno-Ugric tradition to international audiences” has, meanwhile, been a job long left to the “neo-folk or world music” acts that have often been marketed in comparison to other projects that “combine elements of various local (ethnic) folk music traditions on the one hand and of global popular music on the other” regardless of whether the musics involved have any significant connection outside of their external placement in the world music category (Heinonen 2005, 138)—e.g., the comparisons of Värttinä to ABBA and LMDVB, among so many others. Scenes has widened the framework of what its audiences might consider Finnish music. When John plays English-language Finnish music, he scaffolds it as music from Finland rather than eliding the fact to perhaps universalize it. In doing so, he nevertheless presents diverse enough imaginaries to resonate with audiences who may not be invested in world music as it was framed in the 1980s and 1990s.

Such programming is not a cure-all for the problems of world music. Is it less fetishistic or othering to lump all Finnish music together into a single program than to play only the music specifically funneled to the U.S. because it is marketable as world music? Is it more or less problematic when, for example, I drop a Finnish-language indie pop track alongside one in Amharic during one of my own Planetary Caravan shifts? Is it justified to silo music marked as international into a single show so long as the songs flow together smoothly? Does it, as Guardian writer Ammar Kalia hopes, serve the purpose of “championing and signposting [marginalized music] in the west” to designate a specific space for music Bloomington audiences might not hear without such a slot (2019)? Or does it, as David Byrne writes, simply serve as “a bin in the record store signifying stuff that doesn’t belong anywhere else in the world” (1999)? Further, in a digitally interconnected age in which more and faster exchanges take place between people across the world from one another, the popular music industry has become increasingly multilingual, suggesting opportunities for music in other languages far beyond world music. In 2023, for example, Finnish musician Käärijä placed second in the Eurovision Song Contest with Finnish language song “Cha Cha Cha.” It reached 27^th place on the Billboard Global 200 two weeks after the Eurovision final, indicating high numbers of sales and streams globally (Billboard 2023). How to adjust to these shifting phenomena is an ongoing quandary at WFHB.

Internally, the station does not use the term “world music,” instead categorizing music marketed as such—and some music that is not marketed as such—as International for library organization purposes. Meant to be more accurate than using “world” to refer to music from outside of the United States and Anglophone pop, the term is still an alienating one. It is also ultimately not accurate. Some albums that end up in this category are from artists born and/or based in the United States, playing music that indexes traditions from outside of the popular mainstream. Other artists based outside of the United States and not playing “marginalized music” end up filed under more stylistically explanatory categories like Rock/Pop, Electronic, Folk & Country, Jazz, or Blues. In the international section, on the other hand, there are several subcategories for compilation albums by various artists that are based simply on national identity, as in Figure 2.10. There is also English-language pop music that ends up in the International section purely by virtue of its producers being from outside the United States, perhaps the most accurate use of the term. Externally, it is difficult for WFHB to completely detach from the “world music” label. Each week, WFHB’s music director and volunteer genre directors[1] report the ten most-played new albums of each genre to the North American College and Community Chart (NACC). Music promoters, especially independent ones, use these reports to decide what stations they will reach out to with new music categorized under a particular genre. One of the NACC categories available to submit to is bluntly labeled “World.” This is a flawed system, and WFHB is part of it.

Faced with these systemic snarls, though, John has engaged in some laudable maneuvers in his programming. Like many of WFHB’s other programmers, he brings to the airwaves genuine interest in and knowledge of the music he plays and a desire to share that with his listeners and bring them something they will not hear elsewhere. The parameters John works within, including Planetary Caravan’s focus on “international music” and the industry’s “world music” category, are themselves imperfect. John nonetheless brings his repertoire in full, signaling an outpost of Finnish music in Bloomington. It surprises people I speak with to hear of someone so invested in music from Finland—Suomi mainittu!—actively shaping the Indiana mediascape. When John plays music by progressive rock group Wigwam, Finnish mainstream singer-songwriter J. Karjalainen, folk fiddler Arto Järvelä, made-for-film comedy group Leningrad Cowboys, and Värttinä—all Finnish artists—in the same two hours under the heading of Scenes from the Northern Lights, he is articulating a virtual performance geography of Finland-in-Indiana informed by his personal experience and working to some extent against the “dominant arrangements of racial capitalist space” that otherwise shape what imaginaries exist of Finnish music on U.S. radio (Dorr 2018, 9). He creates an ethereal analogue to the town square in which like-minded or otherwise intrigued listeners can virtually gather (albeit in acts of one-way interaction) and experience resonance. Torilla tavataan!

Figure 2.11: A subsection of the International section in WFHB’s library specifically for Finnish compilation albums (and some miscategorized Dutch music).

John is one of many WFHB programmers who brings his personal experiences to the airwaves through musical curation in ways that resonate with specific communities. One programmer I spoke with, a regular host of an old-time music specialty show and a participant in some of Bloomington’s old-time music scenes, explained:

This old-time community in Bloomington is such a long-standing group of people, many of whom will tune in to this show specifically, because they just need as much old-time music in their lives as possible. So those are people who will talk to me about it. I’ll get a text about it or something like that. Or it’ll come up in conversation if I bump into somebody I know who listens to the show… I have become less afraid to play things that might be more bluegrass-y. That is a change in my own sense of… I don’t know if ownership is the correct word, but my sense of personal knowledge regarding this music. (Interview 11)

This colleague, like John, is well aware of the dominant aural imaginaries of their specific niche, noting boundaries between old-time and bluegrass musics as one example that is significant to the old-time community, even though it may not be as obvious to other listeners. Even so, this programmer pushes against such borders—with care—for the sake of engaging programming. As they have become better acquainted with some of their listenership off the air, they have adjusted their work accordingly. The degree to which such acquaintanceship is possible varies. I have connected with a small number of listeners whom I do not personally know through social media, but I know very little about their specific thoughts on individual elements of my programs. I know more about the thoughts of my friends and family, who are more likely to tell me when they do or do not like the music I play. Whether my fellow programmers and I decide to change our programming based on this feedback is a decision that surely varies from case to case, but we proceed with at least a little more understanding of the impact of our choices.

Programmers of weekday morning and afternoon music mixes are encouraged to draw from a wider range of genres in their curation. They are required to play four tracks per hour from a curated pool of new music reviewed and deemed worthwhile by the music director and genre directors, but can otherwise fill the hours with virtually any music they choose. This free rein can, almost paradoxically, result in narrower aural imaginaries, as one longtime morning mix programmer explained to me:

You’ll hear stuff on WFHB that you’ve never heard before, whether that’s something that’s been pulled out of a record crate at a flea market that’s some deep cut, or if it’s a brand new, independent, cutting-edge artist, you’re not likely to hear that stuff on commercial radio. With that said, you’ll also hear stuff that you hear on commercial radio. Today was one of those days; there was a programmer that played a lot of recognizable tunes. And I have noticed that DJs do that a lot when they first start out. They’ll play their favorite songs until they run out of their favorite songs. And then they’ll start digging a little further outside of their comfort zone and discovering music. And that’s part of the discovery that happens with both the DJs and the listeners. So they’re on this journey together in some ways. (Interview 26)

The range of styles found on a mix show is ideally eclectic, but in a different way than on a show dedicated to a particular genre. As the above programmer notes, the effect for the listener is not that of immersion in one place, as with a town square, but of following the programmer through uncharted territory. Rather than deepening the listening audience’s idea of a single style or place, mix show programmers’ aim is to expand the pool of what is worth broadcasting in general on the same local segment of the spectrum as mainstream hits. In providing alternatives to commercial radio, WFHB personnel cross the line from echo chamber to resonance chamber: discovery instead of complacency, a journey or gathering instead of isolation. This is philosophically critical to the community radio ethos. A community radio programmer’s performance, like those of chindon-ya practitioners, “is intended to move listeners through sound, inviting them into unexpected social encounters” (Abé 2018, 28). The unexpected encounters produce aural imaginaries that resonate as alternatives to those on other, more mainstream platforms.

Musical discovery is a difficult goal to facilitate without reiterating the top-down authoritarianism community radio detests, and as the above quote notes, that means that WFHB is not always immediately distinct from commercial stations. The music director nonetheless strongly encourages an expansive soundscape through messaging like the signs that appeared in the WFHB air room in 2024 reading “HEY DJ’s! KEEP WFHB WEIRD” (Figure 2.12).

Figure 2.12: A sign posted in the WFHB air room. Stuck to the bottom right of the sign is a sticky note on which is handwritten an enthusiastic approval: “Right ON!”

The signs were upbeat and encouraging, but also offered guidance to programmers to help them move outside of their presumed comfort zones in curating their programs:

Want to play that giant hit or classic banger that everyone knows? Cool! Do it! But aim to make those only 10-15% of your show. Our mission is music discovery, so dive in & play new music, local music, & deeper cuts from well known artists for the majority of your show. Happy curating!

The ability to play music that falls beyond the narrow range of money-making hit songs is one of the most cited reasons people volunteer at and listen to WFHB in my interviews, in listener feedback received during fund drive, and in my personal experience. Community radio broadcasters have the creative freedom to put forth a seemingly infinite range of sonic signals into local airspace, and in doing so, they expand the idea of what a genre can be, what a place can be, and what the community can sound like. As a college town that has historically drawn people from a wide range of different places, Bloomington may in theory be more receptive to these shifting imaginaries. Whether this is true in practice, it is the case that WFHB as a community station is conducive to a wide range of in-studio performances.

[1] Genre directors are volunteers who aid the music director in reviewing music that arrives at the station and is marketed as falling in whatever “genre” they direct. At their recommendations, the music director adds genre directors’ top-rated picks each week to a pool of new music. Weekday morning and afternoon mix programmers are required to select at least four tracks from this pool per hour. This was not always the case, but was a policy instituted in the early 2000s to try and better unite the mix programmers and move them away from treating their shows as walled-off blocks unrelated to one another.