CNN World Beat seeks new home

for your information from Neil Curry:

Dear All,

CNN's weekly global music show WORLD
BEAT has become the latest casualty of
thebin Laden experience.

At a time when the world is focusing
on more serious subjects, CNN's
coverage is properly devoting its
resources to the most important story
of the day. Unfortunately for us, that
means World Beat will not air for the
foreseeable future, a prospect which
has led the company to cut World Beat
from its schedule permanently.

This is particularly disappointing for
those artists and their
representatives due to be featured on
the show in the weeks ahead and for
that we apologise. Like you, we have
devoted time and money to many stories
which will not make air.

In just three years World Beat has
grown from an unknown show to one
which many artists, publicists and
label executives tell us is respected
around the world. We have tried to
feature a wide range of artists
honestly, intelligently and
creatively, and have done so across
the spectrum of musical styles.

Many of you might not realise that the
production team consists of just four
people based here in Atlanta. That
team is now leaving CNN. We are
looking into the possibility of
reviving the show on a different
network and I will keep you informed
about developments.

To help us pursue this goal I would be
grateful if any of you who had a good
experience with World Beat could email
me with a few words by way of
testimonial, or encourage others to do
so, which we can then present to other
network programmers.

My email address until November 1st
will remain:- neil.curry@turner.com


Thank you for the many friendships I
have made through World Beat. Once
again, I apologise if we were not able
to complete some of the projects we
started - believe me we share that
frustration - but September 11th
changed many things. World Beat
happens to be one of them.

Yours sincerely,

Neil Curry
Senior Producer
CNN World Beat

• article submitted by: WOMEX