Up with Fessenden, down with Marconi

[Richard Chonak]

On 10/04/2010 09:38 AM, Dan.Strassberg wrote:
> does anyone else remember a music-appreciation program
> called "A Note to You" on the old WHDH (AM)? The program was hosted by
> a Northeastern U professor by the name of Roland Nadeau and used as
> its theme (IIRC) Camille Saint-Seans "Danse Macabre."


I remember that too, and recall taking a piano class from Prof. Nadeau, 
probably in the late '80s.  For a while, "A Note to You" was aired both 
on WHDH-AM and WGBH-FM, which syndicated it nationally.   A little 
searching on the net turned up some more info:

Professor Nadeau founded the music department at NU, according to his 
obit (Sept. 23, 1997).
http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-8435910.html

He created Northeastern Records, a classical record label owned by the 
university, in 1979.  Unfortunately, it didn't break even, and after the 
University stopped funding it, it was transferred to the ownership of 
WHRB "Hillbilly at Harvard" host Lynn Joiner.

Some collections of papers related to the radio program are at Northeastern.
http://www.library.neu.edu/archives/collections/archival_collections/
http://www.library.neu.edu/archives/collect/findaids/m168find.htm

A picture of Nadeau in the studio appears with a 1984 journal article 
about "A Note To You":
http://mej.sagepub.com/content/71/4/60.extract

--RC