National Endowment for the Arts Announces '05 Grants For Arts on Radio & Television

		Contact: Garrick Davis 202-682-5551 davisg@arts.gov

EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE:
May 5, 2005

Washington, D.C. -- The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) announced today that it will award nearly $3.85 million through 47 grants in the Arts on Radio & Television Grants category. Today's grant announcements follow recent awards of more than 800 grants -- totaling more than $61 million dollars -- to national, regional, state, and local arts organizations across the country.

"The arts simply don't have enough presence today on radio and television," said Dana Gioia, Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. "The NEA is committed to making the best of the arts as widely available in America as possible. Our new grants for Arts on Radio and Television will bring jazz, opera, symphonic music, literature, and theater into millions of homes."

The Arts on Radio & Television category supports the development, production, and national distribution of radio and television programs focusing on the arts. Priority is given to programs that have the potential to reach a significant national audience. The 47 projects funded for a total of $3.85 million will support the creation and presentation of more than 3,100 hours of arts programming, reaching Americans in every state.

In addition:

• 92 hours of television programming will reach an estimated cumulative audience of 250-300 million viewers.

• Nearly 3,000 hours of radio programming will be aired throughout the year, reaching more than 14 million listeners per week.

Arts on Radio & Television Grants include:

Capital Concerts, Inc. – Washington, DC
The National Memorial Day Concert and A Capitol Fourth are two patriotic concerts at the United States Capitol that will be nationally broadcast live on PBS in 2005. A national television audience of 13 to 15 million watches each of these 90-minute programs every year.

ETV Endowment of South Carolina, Inc. – Spartanburg, SC
To support the production of new programs for the weekly radio series Marian McPartland's Piano Jazz. National Public Radio will distribute the programs to American audiences on 246 stations in the United States, and to international audiences via NPR's Worldwide Service.

Please see the complete listing of Arts on Radio and Television grants.

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The National Endowment for the Arts is a public agency dedicated to supporting excellence in the arts - both new and established - bringing the arts to all Americans, and providing leadership in arts education. Established by Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government, the Endowment is the nation's largest annual funder of the arts, bringing great art to all 50 states, including rural areas, inner cities, and military bases.

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