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Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Printable Version

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RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Gary Baldy - 25-02-2023

Sad times for R2- it’s like when Wake Up to Wogan ended all over again. I miss that Radio 2 morning era- Terry followed by Ken- very very gentle listening. Nothing like that will ever be able to be recreated as Terry is sadly no longer with us, and I’m not sure Greatest Hits have anyone with a soothing enough tone to be the lead-in to Ken’s show (nor does R2 these days with Zoe Ball). Ken is a broadcasting legend though- I think the BBC should have let him see out his contract- this U-turn seems very sudden.

I wonder what Popmaster will be like on GHR though? I believe they don’t often play anything beyond the 90s… for all of Radio 2’s faults in recent years, they manage to play a wide variety of records from different eras. I wonder will his last BBC Popmaster be something a bit meta? A Popmaster edition about Popmaster itself? Ken playing the quiz?

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Spencer - 25-02-2023

I would imagine Popmaster on GHR will be as similar to the existing one as they can make it. The jingle will have to change though, as it’s part of the current Radio 2 jingle package by Wisebuddah. I would imagine Bauer see it as a massive sponsorship opportunity too.

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Stooky Bill - 25-02-2023

(24-02-2023, 11:53 PM)Brekkie Wrote:  I assume he was only due an extra couple of weeks anyway when leave is taken into account.
I doubt he'd have had any leave, he isn't BBC staff. The number of days he was required to work would have been written into his contract so would have been taken into account by now

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - DavidWhitfield - 25-02-2023

"From Monday 6 March, Radio 2 favourite Gary Davies, host of the network’s much loved Sounds of the 80s (Saturday, 8-10pm), will present the show until May. Gary will also usher in Radio 2’s new weekday pop quiz."

Noteworthy that the BBC are planning to retain the pop quiz element of Ken's show when he departs. I wonder at what point within the reworked show this will feature - people have become used to there being a pop quiz at 10:30am on Radio 2 so I can't imagine the BBC want to break this routine, but one might also suppose that the folks moving over to listen to Ken on GHR would feel comforted by the familiar 10:30am scheduling so I am interested to see what happens. I can't imagine them both going for 10:30am, as I'm sure there's a pocket of quiz enthusiasts who would listen to one quiz and then turn over to play the other if given the chance, and this would eliminate the possibility of that.

I must say, as an aside, the wording of Ken's 'I'm finishing on Friday' statement - specifically "I had intended fulfilling my contract until the end of March but the BBC has decided it wants me to leave earlier" - does make it sound as though things have soured behind the scenes somewhat. It saddens me to think of the parting as being in any way acrimonious; Ken brought huge numbers of listeners to Radio 2, and devoted decades of his life to the BBC, and he's perfectly entitled to pursue other opportunities at this stage in his life should he wish to. One cannot know for certain what is happening behind the scenes but Ken's departure and the surrounding details about how it was all handled don't exactly paint the BBC in the best light for me.

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Toby brown - 25-02-2023

I completely agree with what the BBC is doing if you leave one job in an organization to move to the same job in a rival organization it's not shocking to be asked to take some time off in between the two jobs

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - peterrocket - 25-02-2023

Could also be just as simple as he had long service or regular holidays to use and the BBC didn’t want to pay for those and reimburse - likely given the BBC’s leave year ends in March. 

Not much to read into. Fairly common stuff if you’ve been employed by someone for so long.

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Ash101 - 25-02-2023

I’m fairly confident it’ll be because of how GHR are using Ken’s image for his upcoming arrival. They’ve got him all over their socials and website, plus a TV ad in the works.

I think it was a little naive of Ken to assume he’d be allowed to finish Radio 2 on a Friday, have a normal weekend and then pick the show up on GHR on the Monday.

Chris Evans had a 4 weeks grace period & he wasn’t used by Virgin in any promotions until this period.

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Division2023 - 25-02-2023

(25-02-2023, 01:14 PM)Ash101 Wrote:  I’m fairly confident it’ll be because of how GHR are using Ken’s image for his upcoming arrival. They’ve got him all over their socials and website, plus a TV ad in the works.

I think it was a little naive of Ken to assume he’d be allowed to finish Radio 2 on a Friday, have a normal weekend and then pick the show up on GHR on the Monday.

Chris Evans had a 4 weeks grace period & he wasn’t used by Virgin in any promotions until this period.

Did Tommy Vance not present a test show for the new Virgin Radio just minutes after he had finished on Radio 1?

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - Stooky Bill - 25-02-2023

Yes, the BBC never actually said when his show was going to end. He said as part of his leaving announcement that he would be on air till the end of April, but he really had no right to say that - it's not his decision.

It won't be about leave, annual or long service - he's not a BBC staff member, he was on a contract. That's also the reason he is allowed to take Popmaster, if he was staff it would belong to the BBC

RE: Ken Bruce to leave BBC Radio 2 show after 31 years - alfiejmulcahy - 25-02-2023

From a jingle perspective, Owain Wynn Evans and Scott Mills are still without sung jingles. Hopefully with the introduction of Vernon Kay they can get all three done as a job lot. It's ridiculous that 2 of the 5 main weekday shows are without a proper jingle package.