Polskie Radio BIS
Magdalena Kozlowska, Polskie Radio Bis

Winning over the new generation 

Polskie Radio (PR) is celebrating its 80th anniversary. Over 8 million people listen to Polish Radio every day and its four national and one international stations provide altogether 41,000 hours of programmes a year.

Polskie Radio Bis

Established in 1994, the station’s profile changed on 1 September 2004 and it became a young person’s radio (12–20-year-olds). It covers major cultural and musical events, as well as scientific achievements presenting them in an attractive, accessible and interactive way.

Polskie Radio Bis not only plays music but it’s objectives also include live talk shows that look at issues that concern its young audience (education, the first job, relationship with both family and society, fashion, alternative culture, love, friendship, etc.). Sensitive issues such as political debates, faith and social problems are not avoided but are incorporated in certain programmes and the listener is encouraged to actively participate.

Polskie Radio Bis aims to shape attitudes and values by involving respected personalities to whom young people look to as role models.

Though the station faces no direct competition on the radio market there are nevertheless stations that target their offer to a similar age group but whose profile is different.

Lifestyle

Polskie Radio Bis is for young people who are open minded, seeking new experiences and spontaneous. It is a nationwide audience that is looking for non-commonplace entertainment, new sounds and who is bored with commercial hits.

It’s for young people looking for their own way and identity in a modern world that is not always easy to come to terms with: the rat race, pressure, challenges... To a certain extent they cannot avoid becoming part of this world but they want to hold on to their self-respect.

This audience is characterized by a deep need for authenticity; the authorities for the masses are not credible. They are wary of commercial attempts to ‘buy’ them and are not easily taken in. They back away from being ‘cool’ at any cost; they distance themselves from such behaviour with intelligent irony.

Interactivity

www.polskieradio.pl/Bis is a dynamic website that has detailed descriptions of shows, news & current affairs, playlists, streaming, crosswords, quizzes, forums and chats. 

Further to the station’s revamp the number of visitors to www.polskieradio.pl/Bis has increased by 1,000%, and has 700,000 visits per month. Bislista is the most popular service.

This programme promotes young, Polish musicians who do not have a record contract and whose music is not played on commercial stations. Of the 900-plus music demos received, the great majority are from high-school students. Young bands can also surface on the Internet site: users can listen to bands’ tracks in MP3 and glean information. The site’s hit list is unique as it is composed entirely of recordings available only through the Internet.

The 50,000-odd SMSs we receive every month are our main communication’s tool and it lets us stay in touch with the audience. The listeners let us know that they are following the programme, answer questions, and give their opinions on subjects that are being discussed. Most text messages can be read online in real time.

Programmes

It’s playing well  – a morning programme with the following elements: wake-up music, current news, interesting ideas for the beginning of the day, dialogue with listeners, a vote for the morning’s top band. The music is very energetic – it is supposed to wake the listener up!

Polyglots’ chat – music from all over the world, with international guests, DJs chatting, a foreign language press review, and cultural information.

Intergratka – interactive education via SMS and the Internet.

Bisowisko – a lively afternoon programme, with guest musicians and interviews.

Leave a message – deals with difficult issues such as AIDS, alcoholism, domestic and school problems. Questions asked by the listeners are answered by a psychologist, a therapist or a priest.

Polskie Radio Bis offers a wide range of music for programmes and magazines: hard and alternative rock, reggae, dance hall/ragga, hip-hop, ethnic music, experimental pop and various types of new beat. The music gives the setting of the programme.

Programmes:

Warm, calm, club rhythm, lazy sequences, accelerated beats, as well as the craziest rhythms ever created by man provide a wide, nightly spectrum of electronic music. 

New beat – DJs play live in a professionally equipped studio. The liveliest and craziest rhythms, such as drum’n’bass are featured but are also counterbalanced by calmer ones – downtempo, trip-hop, lounge, nu-jazz. There is also an electronic music niche. 

No English – a programme that plays non-English language rock music: Kazachstan punk, Japan hip-hop, Balkans turbo-folk, metal from the North, remnants of Hungarian underground music, and the sour and sweet club sounds of Asia.

Hip-Hop live mix – top-class black music, mixed live and spiced up with a commentary. The range varies from old school and ‘golden era’ classics to hot novelties that are not played by anyone else. 

Radikal Irie brooms the Dance Hall – looks at modern Jamaican music and its influence on artists from all over the world.

Special events

The Science Picnic, organized since 1997 by Radio Bis, in close cooperation with Center for Theoretical Physics of Polish Academy of Sciences and 100 other scientific and educational institutions, can be compared to a giant fair. The one day, annual picnic is organized at the beginning of June and targets families: children and adults take part in different activities during the course of the day. 

The Science Picnic aims to inform, engage and influence the public. The messages put across are: science is interesting; science is present in our daily life; science is important for society, and science is part of culture. 

Radio Polskie Bis also participates in a competition to find the youngster who has the best hip-hop, freestyle interpretation of Polish poetry combined with recordings of the poets’ original voices, music, video projections and light shows.

The station was also involved in the final of the National English Language Test; the Polish band Cool Kids of Heath played songs from its new English-language album.

Radio Polskie Bis works closely with the Foreign Department of Polskie Radio S.A. Thanks to this cooperation, and within the framework of the EBU, major concerts by foreign artists have been broadcast: Kasabian, Korn, Tribute to John Peel (live broadcast from the BBC), Faithless, Franz Ferdynand, and so on.

www.polskieradio.pl/bis

pj / ep