Looking to lift up your midday radio audience? Try some uplifting music. That’s a lesson from 10 classical radio stations that have been jiggering their midday playlists with help from a listening study backed by CPB and conducted by the Public Radio Program Directors Association. Eight of the 10 stations saw their midday audiences grow after changing their mixes of music — some grew quite significantly — and the two that lost audience suffered only very small declines. The study began in 2007 when researchers hired by PRPD played 150 half-minute samples of classical pieces for test audiences in four cities.

So what will journalism and, for that matter, all content look like in five years and how will it be delivered? It will all come together on devices resembling the rumored iTablet ...

The number was a compromise between the House’s $40 million figure and the Senate’s $10 million.

Stations struggling with mounting deficits often cut jobs, but the shears rarely lop off the highest rank as they did at WHQR in Wilmington, N.C., a year ago.

Interestingly, PBS Ombudsman Michael Getler didn’t receive any comments from viewers on the revamped PBS NewsHour, he reports in his latest column (well, one that was “not for posting”). Getler, who calls himself “a devoted watcher” of the program, writes of its latest incarnation: “I, personally, found the first few days of the new format and approach to be a distinct improvement. The program seemed to have more zip and energy, faster paced, with good interviews and without the always predictable language that introduced the show in the past.” The new version, with its online anchor Hari Sreenivasan, kicked off Dec.

Penn State Public Broadcasting has created an interesting web site filled with documentaries by student war veterans, “Back from Iraq: The Veterans’ Story Project.” Eight students completed a special class for them last semester, “Narrative, Oral History, New Media Technologies,” at Penn State University’s main campus that taught the vets documentary filmmaking. They chronicled their experiences in their docs. Among the vets is a Marine machine gunner, a surface warfare fire controlman and an intelligence officer. Support for the project was provided by CPB.

Washington Week’s Gwen Ifill chatted with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show last night. One revelation: Pubcasters on her show “are seated hours before we begin, just to have a chance to stare at each other.” Who knew?

CPB has expanded the list of conferences for professional development small-station grants. Staffers at public TV stations receiving nonfed financial support of $2 million or less may attend various conferences in 2010. Want to go to NETA in January? Or the PBS tech conference, or Showcase? There’s a rolling deadline to apply for no more than two $1,500 grants per year for professional development.

Radio Bilingüe has retained Denver-based Paragon Media Strategies to conduct research for its LA Public Media Project, a multiplatform service aimed at young minority listeners in Los Angeles. The contract, announced late yesterday, calls for intensive research to identify the audience and test content for the service, slated to launch next year on a yet-to-be identified radio channel and digital platforms. “For the first time, a national media research firm will be studying this young audience to find out what it wants from a public media service,” said Hugo Morales, executive director of Radio Bilingüe. “Our goal is to work with Paragon to map out the needs and aspirations of this audience and design and test content that resonates with them.”

The PBS NewsHour, which relaunched its revamped show and web presence on Dec. 7, is starting a “major new initiative” on YouTube, the Google Blog reports. Its YouTube channel — complete with a welcome from host Jim Lehrer — is running reports from the TV broadcast on the same night the show airs, along with web-original news videos. PBS has had success with YouTube in the past, particularly during last year’s election. Its “Video Your Vote” drew 2,500 viewers posting videos of their Election Day experience. PBS incorporated the channel into its election coverage.

A House and Senate conference committee has approved a package of six unfinished fiscal 2010 spending bills, including funding for CPB and other pubcasting programs. The $446.8 billion omnibus appropriations bill is expected to pass muster with the House soon, then proceed to the Senate and on to President Barack Obama for his signature. The omnibus gives CPB a $445 million advanced appropriation for FY 2012; $36 million for digital conversion; $25 million for the public radio interconnection system and $27.3 million for Ready To Learn for FY 2010. It also provides $25 million in “fiscal stabilization” grants to pubTV and radio stations.

Joaquin Alvarado, senior v.p. of diversity and innovation at CPB since June, has resigned to take a similar position at American Public Media in St. Paul, the corporation announced this afternoon. Alvarado, a leading advocate for broadband expansion, will be senior v.p. of digital innovation at APM, focusing primarily on its Public Insight Journalism project, according to a spokeswoman. APM is the national distribution arm of Minnesota Public Radio. Alvarado will continue to advise the CPB Board’s digital media committee. His interim successor at CPB will be Joseph Tovares, acting v.p. Early in his short tenure at CPB, Alvarado was involved in retooling the PBS World digital channel into what he called “World 2.0,” a multimedia service for a younger, more diverse audience.

Participants at the upcoming “Kids @ Play” include Susan Zelman, education s.v.p. at CPB; Rob Lippincott, education s.v.p at PBS; and Terry Fitzpatrick, e.v.p. of distribution for Sesame Workshop. The session is part of a larger meeting, “Living in Digital Times,” at the January International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Other speakers are as diverse as the “chief information and logistics bear” from the Build-A-Bear Workshop to the under secretary for the U.S. Department of Education. The other summits: Digital Health, Mommy Tech and HigherEd Tech.

NPR Executive Editor Dick Meyer denies any connection between his request that political correspondent Mara Liasson reconsider her appearances on the Fox News channel and the White House’s recent campaign to discredit the cable outlet as a mouthpiece of the Republican Party. “NPR has not had any communication of any kind with the White House regarding the status of any of our reporters or their work for anyone outside of NPR,” Meyer wrote in an email to NPR Ombudsman Alicia Shepard. “Any suggestion to the contrary is simply false.” The suggestion, put forward yesterday in an anonymously sourced story by Politico, has stirred up the blogosphere and generated 142 emails to NPR in roughly 24 hours, according Shepard.

SesameWorkshop today announced its first eBooks for Sesame Street. Several are now online for free, with more titles available for purchase in spring 2010, the Workshop said in a statement. There’ll also be an annual subscription that provides access to more than 100 books, with new titles added monthly. The eBooks “will help us leverage our library of 40 years worth of traditional print publishing,” said Scott Chambers, the Workshop’s s.v.p. of worldwide media distribution. The Workshop’s top-selling title, The Monster at the End of This Book, is the first eBook (above).