Latest news about BBC Radio 2

RAJAR Q1 2019 – Zoe & Chris plus national and London radio round-up

Chris Evans and Virgin Radio both reached over a million listeners in the first quarter of 2019. The digital station’s audience has almost trebled compared with the last period of 2018 thanks to the arrival of Evans from Radio 2. In Q1/2019 it posts a weekly reach of 1.3m and total hours of 7.765m. A year ago those figures were 427,000 and 1.632m. Last quarter they were 447,000 and 1.686m.

Broadcasters unite once again for Mental Health Minute

Commercial Radio and the BBC are once again uniting to broadcast a one-minute message in support of mental health awareness. For the second year Mental Health Minute will feature globally famous voices and unite stations all over the UK, from national networks such as those run by Global, Bauer and Wireless, to smaller local stations and community stations, together with BBC Radio 1, Radio 2, and 5 Live.

Greg James and James Purnell sign up for Radio Festival

The Radio Festival will include sessions from BBC Radio 1 breakfast show presenter Greg James, and the BBC’s Director of Radio and Education James Purnell. Other new sessions announced today are from Google News’ Brenda Salinas and Katy Leeson of Social Chain. James Purnell will be joining RadFest to share his thoughts on the importance of treasuring radio amidst significant change in the industry and in people’s listening habits.

BBC to create single role to Control Radio 1 and Radio 2

The BBC is to create a new single role of Controller of its pop music stations Radio 1, 1Xtra, Asian Network, Radio 2 and 6 Music. Heads of each station, plus BBC Music and the Music TV commissioning heads, will report to the new Controller. A source tells RadioToday that Ben Cooper, currently Controller of Radio 1, 1Xtra and BBC Asian Network is expected to be appointed to the new position across all five services.

BBC Radio 2 reveals the UK’s best selling ABBA studio album - Arrival

BBC Radio 2’s special programme, Let’s ABBA Party! with Nicki Chapman, revealed that ABBA’s 1976 album Arrival - which features hit songs such as Dancing Queen, Knowing Me Knowing You and Money, Money, Money - is the band’s best-selling studio album in the UK to date. The programme, which also featured brand new interviews with Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, revealed a specially commissioned chart, ranking the UK sales of ABBA’s eight studio albums, from Waterloo to The Visitors.

Andrew Ridgeley to host Bank Holiday special on BBC Radio 2

Andrew Ridgeley is hosting a special 80s music show on BBC Radio 2 next month. He’ll make his radio presenting with Andrew Ridgeley’s 80s’ Playlist on Monday 6th May from 5pm till 7pm. Andrew will be playing the tracks that mean the most to him from the decade and sharing his own memories and stories from the era in which he dominated the pop charts as one half of Wham!, alongside George Michael.

Zoe Ball & Margot James confirmed for Radio Festival 2019 line-up

BBC Radio 2 Breakfast host Zoe Ball and Digital Minister Margot James have been added to the line-up of this year’s Radio Festival, joining already-announced Simon Mayo. Zoe Ball will open the Radio Academy event this year talking to Paddy O’Connell about her old Radio 1 days, history repeating itself as she stepped into Chris Evans’s shoes and taking on Radio 2 breakfast, alongside her love of radio.

Radio professionals head to Student Radio event in Swansea

A number of radio presenters, producers and management are in sharing their experience and knowledge with students in Swansea this week. The annual Student Radio Conference is taking place over three days, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and has a line-up to rival most other industry events. Radio presenters giving up their time include Greg James, Adele Roberts, Aled Hayden Jones, Stephanie Hirst, Matt Edmondson, Mollie King, Tim Cocker, Will Manning, Vicki Blight, Trevor Nelson, Tom Swarbrick, Alex Mansuroglu and Sam Darlaston.

Commercial radio ignored in Greatest Radio Shows list

The Radio Times has named what it considers to be the ’30 greatest radio shows of all time’ – but every single one is a BBC programme. The magazine’s new edition contains a six-page feature counting down the shows – from Radio 3’s Private Passions at number 30 to Desert Island Discs at number 1. But the feature has attracted criticism that no commercial radio shows are included. Former radio executive John Myers wrote on Twitter: “I’m sorry, but this is the most insulting and ill informed article on radio I’ve read in a long time."...

Radio 1 Breakfast Show with Greg James increases listeners by more than 300,000

The Radio 1 Breakfast Show with Greg James has increased listeners by more than 300,000 in his first full quarter. Latest Rajar data shows since Greg James started on the Radio 1 Breakfast Show, there has been an increase of listeners aged 10+ to 5.59m (Monday-Thursday), from 5.28m last quarter. The same period (17 September-16 December 2018) has also seen a record for digital listening, with the proportion of digital listening now at 52.6%...