Internet Radio: Vocal Jazz

It’s hard to get good Jazz music on OTA radio. Vocal Jazz is harder still. Of course mainstream radio will give you Diana Krall, Michael Buble or Norah Jones every now and then, but while they are competent performers, they hardly represent the genre.

Good places to discover Vocal Jazz
AccuRadio
RadioIO
Both of the above stations have a relatively high quality 128 kbps stream. The higher that bit rate is, the more internet bandwidh it will use, giving you a Big Digital Footprint. But it sounds better. Both Accuradio and RadioIO are great for Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, Steve Tyrell, Miles Davis, etc.

If you want a smaller digital footprint (64 kbps stream) and like music from The Rat Pack, consider
Martini In The Morning

All three stations mentioned above do not require you to install any special software on your Mac or PC. If you have a Mac, I recommend trying a program called RadioLover. This nifty app allows you to record the Internet Radio stream, auto-splitting the stream and tagging/naming individual mp3 files you can play on your iPod. In fact, RadioLover can record and schedule multiple streams simultaneously.

Pandora
I’ll talk more about Pandora in a different post, as I’d like to include it in the ways you can get a Big Digital Footprint using VPNs and Proxy Servers.

Radio sucks

I’m sick and tired of listening to the radio. Mainstream radio in particular. Internet radio rules. Over-the-air radio sucks.

There are times when I cannot avoid over-the-air radio, like when I’m driving or at the mall. Right now, it’s a few days past christmas, and some radio stations are still playing christmas music. Seriously, how many times can I listen to George Michael singing “Last Christmas”?

After 20+ years, George Michael still doesn’t get it: on Boxing Day, it’s over. She/He is just not that into you. Relationships born in public rest areas do not last, George (not speaking from experience but just exercising common sense).

In lieu of OTA radio, piped music or elevator music, allow me to recommend in the next few posts a few good places to get started in achieving a Big Digital Footprint.

While there are many options out there, I’ll just mention those that worked for me. I use a couple of Macs, but Windows will work.