Television news music

Television news music is used by television stations to brand their news operations. Each television station uses an identifiable news theme; some themes are used by multiple stations while others are composed specifically for a certain station.

In the United States

In the United States, news themes used on local television stations are typically organized into news music packages, with each theme within a package sharing a similar musical signature. A typical television news music package consists of anywhere from 50 to as many as 1000 cuts of music. One of the largest news music packages is Overture, created by Stephen Arnold Music. This package consists of a total of 36 themes and over 1000 cuts.

News music packages consist of the following: opens, closes, bumpers, topicals (promo beds), franchise opens/stingers, IDs, utility tracks and billboards.

Stations within the same market area will always use different music packages, unless they are related to each other in some manner; e.g., if two stations may be owned by the same company (or operated by the same company under a local marketing agreement (LMA), or one station may contract out its news production to the other. For example: in Ft. Myers, Florida, ABC affiliate WZVN-TV is owned by Montclair Communications, Inc., while NBC affiliate WBBH-TV in the same market is owned by Waterman Broadcasting Corporation, which operates WZVN under an LMA. That said, both stations currently use This is Your News by Gari Communications. In newscasts airing on WZVN, NBC network ID stingers can be heard in the news opens, even though WZVN-TV is an ABC affiliate.

A case where the opposite of the aforementioned is true is in Denver, Colorado, Fox affiliate KDVR and CW affiliate KWGN are owned by the Tribune Media.

Custom news music packages

Some news music packages are custom made for one station only, as opposed to syndicated packages which are used by multiple stations. While syndicated packages are normal in the industry, there are some stations that still use custom made packages. Such examples include:

Some packages are custom made for a specific station group company, or owned and operated stations and affiliates of a specific television network:

Station imaging packages

Some news music packages are accompanied by a station image package, featuring promotional jingles which often share the same musical signature as the parent news music package. Often, imaging packages include jingles for the holiday and elections. Such promotional packages first came to prominence in the United States in the 1970s, and had become widespread by the 1980s, used by many (though not all) television stations. Many memorable packages, such as Frank Gari's "Hello"[1] and "Turn to...", were composed during this era, and some were even used on stations in some other countries and in languages other than English.

Station image packages are designed to give a positive branding method for broadcast television stations. Many such packages from the 1970s and 1980s often portrayed stations in a community-oriented light, accompanied by footages of the stations' personalities participating in recreational activities and charity events with regular everyday people.[2][3] By the 1990s, many stations had adopted a more hard-hitting approach to branding, resulting in a reduced demand for traditional promotion campaigns. However, a few stations which used Gari's Hello campaign briefly re-introduced it in the 2000s as part of their 50th anniversary celebrations.

News music adopted from other sources

Besides standard news music packages, some stations had opted to use the soundtrack from some movies or other popular songs as their main news themes; examples include:

News music worldwide

Certain News Music packages used in the United States have also been used worldwide. Eyewitness News by Frank Gari has been picked up for use in overseas markets. Hong Kong Cable News has used it for its morning newscast, and POP TV in Slovenia has used it for its main newscasts.

News music composers and production companies

United States

United Kingdom

The Netherlands

The Philippines

References

  1. ↑ http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/entertainment/85347632.html
  2. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGJnIlFflcY
  3. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNT9pnitd3E
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