live radio and tv

FINLAND: Finnish Radio / Podcasts

Kate , , , , ,
The Oulu Groke. Source: Atlas Obscura / HRNICK

Once again, took a spin through Radio Garden this month to listen to Finnish radio. Here’s some channels I found myself listening to.

Kaupunki Kanava – Campus radio from Laajasalo College in Helsinki – a mix of music, mainly in Finnish, with some talk interspersed. Listen live here.

Radio Inari – I tried this station at random since it was the furthest north in Finland (on Radio Garden at least). It’s turned out to be a really delightful mix of music, you can’t predict what they’ll play next. Finnish pop songs, Detroit rap, EDM, Top 40, who knows! Listen live here.

Viva Classica – Just a nice, soothing, good quality classical music station. Tends to be light, soothing classical, minimal to no talking. Listen live here.

Kaaosradio 24/7 and Kaaosradio Chillout – A pair of wonderfully weird internet radio stations in Helsinki – they play really wild and trippy mixes, usually experimental house, trance, techno and ambient music. Usually 24/7 is more wild and Chillout is more melodic, but I’ve dipped into both at different hours and got some really different beats. I really dig these. Listen to 24/7 here and Chillout here.

SuomiRäp – You want Finnish rap? 24/7 Finnish rap! Listen live here.

Government Palace, Helsinki – Source: Pixy

As well as radio stations, I poked around for some Finnish podcasts. There’s a narrow band of podcasts from Finland but in English – a lot are either in Finnish or language learning. However, there are a few neat ones in English:

The History of Finland Podcast – First of all, get ready for one of the most soothing podcast voices – the host has soft voice with a strong Finnish accent. It’s almost ASMR and will easily soothe you off to sleep. It’s still in progress, but the podcast follows through Finnish history starting from the Mesolithic onwards, as well as side episodes on Finnish minority groups like the Sami.

All Points North – English language news and culture podcast, produced through the Finnish Broadcasting Company. Usually a few topical subjects a week with a focus on politics and policy – both municipal and national. It strikes a nice balance between not dumbing-down subjects but also clarifies things that would need to be explained to non-Finns.

MOZAMBIQUE: Mozambican Radio

Kate ,
Maputo at sunset. Source: Dana Tours

Back to Radio Garden for some live Mozambican radio! I really enjoyed listening to these stations this month:

Rádio Moçambique EP Nampula – Part of Rádio Moçambique’s national network of stations, this station up in Nampula in the north broadcasts in both Portuguese and Makhuwa – a local Bantu language (as an aside, here’s the shame of how Eurocentric education is in Canada – there are more speakers of Makhuwa than Finnish and I’m only just learning about it.) Nampula has shown up a lot this month for a lot of artistic and musical output, and this radio station seems to be on the same wavelength – more music than some of the other stations, and it seems to be majority Mozambican music! Listen live here.

LM Radio – This radio station has a really interesting history – ostensibly it’s an English-language station in Maputo, but it’s less a Mozambican station and more of a South African one. LM Radio was originally started in the 30s and through the mid 20th century served as independent music radio for South Africans, outside of the state-controlled radio inside the country. After Mozambican independence, LM was shut down in 1975. It was revived in 2010 and is broadcast both in Mozambique and South Africa – it mainly plays oldies (or at least in time slots I’m listening to) and runs news reports from BBC Africa. Listen live here.

Radio Cidade 97.9 – A Maputo-based radio station with a huge variety of content – depending on the time of day there’s jazz, hip hop, dance, religious music, news, talk radio – including educational and relationship programming, most of it aimed towards youth and young adults. Much is lost on me since I don’t speak Portuguese, but I’ve caught a big variety of music depending on the time of day. Listen live here.

ISRAEL: Israeli radio

Kate , ,

Back to Radio Garden for some Israeli radio to listen to while I work! If you haven’t used Radio Garden before, it livestreams radio from around the world, with a really satisfying globe interface – great for finding new channels.

The Baha’i Shrine of the Bab, Haifa. Source: Baha’i Blog

Radio Ham Esh 99.5 – Radio station out of Haifa, a lot of the song are modern remixes of folk music, usually traditional instruments with dance or rock beats mixed in. There are ads mixed in, including many for the clearly popular American Pizza restaurant. Listen live here.

Up2Dance Radio – I love dance music while I’m working, so this has been a great background channel. This online station in Tel Aviv has lots of remixes, no ads as far as I can tell, and often 90s music. Listen live here.

Israel1 Radio – Online radio station based in Jerusalem, though I can’t find much more information on them. They play a mix mainly of folk and pop, generally upbeat and contemporary, all in Hebrew. Listen live here.

EL SALVADOR: Salvadoran radio

Kate , ,

I listen to music while I work, and I love using Radio Garden because it lets you use Google Maps to listen to live radio from anywhere in the world. I put on a few Salvadoran radio stations – since my Spanish is non-existent, I’m mainly looking for music. Here are a few fun ones I found:

The tower of San Vicente (source)

La Pregonera SV – La Pregonera (literally “the street hawker”) is a community radio station from the pretty little town of San Vicente. Their morning programming has a lot of upbeat and original remixes, including mixing beats and riffs from Top 40 songs with new vocals in Spanish (there was some Nirvana mixed into a pop-dance tune that I loved) or traditional Salvadoran music with dance beats. I had it on the background all morning while I worked. Listen live here.

Nixapa Club Radio – Midday programming on this online station based out of San Salvador is a skilfully DJ’d dance mix – no interruptions or ads as far as I can tell. There’s Latin, EDM, 90s, and Top 40 incorporated into the jam. Listen live here.

Progreso 90.5 – I don’t normally listen to Christian rock but this station caught my ear because despite everything being in Spanish, I could immediately tell it was Christian rock. It actually got me down a rabbit hole of why Christian rock is so distinctive sounding, no matter what language or country – turns out that the whole genre universally relies heavily on a specific chord progression (I, V, VI, IV) that is often meant to convey feelings of hope or optimism. Listen live here.

Agape Radio – A station with a wide variety of programming, including a lot of folk, ballads, and traditional music, interspersed with Catholic programs. This station has a neat history – Agape was founded in 1990 by a Catholic priest to help bring peace, education, and healthy outlets as the country began to recover from the Civil War. Listen live here.