Following the Trump administration’s withdrawal of $1.1 billion in funding for public broadcasting, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting has been damaged, putting organizations such as PBS and NPR, as well as other member stations, in jeopardy.

According to the Washington Post, this puts listeners who depend on public radio for news and information, particularly in rural and remote areas, in a precarious position. Many broadcasters have made hundreds of job cuts. For classical music lovers, this means that many concerts will no longer be available on the radio, and the selection of concerts offered by the European Broadcasting Union will also shrink. U.S. public broadcasters have often shared their concerts with European stations.

This is all the more catastrophic given that 96 per cent of classical music broadcast on U.S. radio is transmitted via public airwaves.