It’s Done: Hockey Night in Canada theme is gone.
TEXT OF A NEWS RELEASE FROM CBC
COMMENT AND FOLLOW-UP TO COME LATER IN THE WEEKEND
After more than 13 months of negotiations, CBC is saddened to announce that a deal has not been reached with the rights holders for an extension of “The Hockey Theme” – CBC’S HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADA theme song.
“We share with all Canadians the disappointment of this news, as we feel as strongly about the theme as they do,” said Scott Moore, executive director of CBC Sports. “We are proud of the association with the former theme song and are saddened that we were unable to reach a deal, especially when we presented an offer which we believe was not substantively different from what the rights holders had proposed to us. We love the song and know this is a huge disappointment for us and for millions of Canadians. As of today, CBC Sports is moving forward with our plan to have the Canadian public compose the new Hockey Night in Canada theme song.”
CBC, in conjunction with leading music producers Nettwerk Music Group, will conduct a nationwide search, inviting Canadians to write and record an original song for CBC’S HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADA. Then, in a debate that is certain to dominate conversations throughout the country, fans and a jury of experts will choose the best new composition. CBC will offer $100,000 for the winning song, which will then become the new “official theme song” of CBC’S HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADA and will be heard in every broadcast. A portion of the new theme song’s royalties will be donated to minor hockey in Canada. Details surrounding the contest will be announced next week.
“This contest will generate passionate interest among Canadians,” said Moore. “The winning theme promises to be an anthem for a whole new generation to kick off our coverage every Saturday night and beyond.”
This is not the first time CBC’S HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADA has introduced a new theme song. Since the show’s debut in 1952, numerous pieces of music have been used to welcome viewers to hockey on Saturday nights. The program’s most recent theme, “The Hockey Theme,” made its debut on CBC’S HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADA during the 1968 season.
“It will be amazing to hear how Canada’s musical artists will interpret the show and to follow the contest through which the new song will be selected,” Moore continued. “We’ll have more details on the new contest next week.”
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Here’s the real test: if CBC (or an independent group) held a fundraiser to pay for the license for the song, would they be able to raise the necessary $65,000 each year?
this is disappointing…….NOT EXCITING!!!!!!!!!!!! how inept
[...] I will spend a few minutes here to share my thoughts. CBC’s official blog and CBC National (as the lead news item) that the deal to keep the Hockey Night in Canada theme has [...]
Why does the CBC hate Canada?
I thought the CBC’s offer was very reasonable (I think it was mentioned in the story, hopefully in your further thoughts you can post the amounts so the public sees it some more). I think she should’ve taken the $1 million or at least the cash every year.
It is strange to think people won’t hear it, as the program has been ongoing for so many years – the USA doesn’t really have anything that’s still airing after 40 years except “Monday Night Football” and that moved to cable due to its lower ratings and high costs.
Not fair to the rank and file staffers, that question.
I suggest TSN buy it up quick.
also, how much do Ron and Don make again? I also suggest pay cuts.
I wonder how quickly TSN will cut a deal with Ms. Claman. What a cost-effective promo campaign for them- ‘Sounds Like Hockey’
Until next October rolls around, I won’t believe that “it’s done”. I’m sure they are hoping that Ms. Clamen and Co. backs down in the face of losing the revenue stream associated with the theme (and betting that TSN won’t swoop in and poach it). All part of the bargaining tactics, I would bet.
like the cw for no wwe
Mark, the CBC does hold a fundraiser every year. It’s called tax filing day for ordinary Canadians. Unfortunately, the fundraiser isn’t completely voluntary. Unfortunately, ordinary Canadians aren’t represented very well or fairly for their financial contributions.
[...] was in shock today when I heard that CBC Teleivsion did not renew its contract with the owner of the Hockey Night in Canada theme song! I don’t khow how they can find [...]
Mike, you get the pundits on Don Newman’s Politics, you get Rex Murphy via The National and Cross-Country Checkup, and there are others I’m likely blanking on. Heck, even Preston Manning’s done a stint with This I Believe. Which was another import, but a good one in my opinion.
Your corner of the debates is getting air time on an ongoing basis, just as I hope everyone else’s is.
It strikes me, however, that HNiC is a place where most of us of all political stripes park our mutual disagreements on whatever else is going on. Or rather, where we ought to.
[...] To Be Trusted With Knives {June 7, 2008} As I’m sure you’ve already heard, we are losing the Hockey Night in Canada theme song. That just sucks. The HNIC theme song is a piece of Canadiana and I honestly can’t image [...]
Great, lose the theme AND turn it into a cheap reality TV-like joke all at the same time. So much for the CBC mandate about serving Canadian culture. When a piece of music means this much to Canadians, sorry but “people will still watch hockey” hardly cuts it as an excuse not to keep it around.
Perhaps Molsons or Tims will buy up the anthem for an ad campaign so we can keep it in our cultural fabric somehow. Wouldn’t it be ironic if a commercial entity did for us what the CBC is supposed to?
Better yet, why doesn’t the Canadian government just buy it and make it the real national anthem and be done with it?
Kill The Orchestra. Kill Classical. Kill jPod. Kill Intelligence. And now Kill The Hockey Night in Canada Theme Song?
WTF is going on there? How come us normal everyday Canadians do not get a say in any of these decisions? As I’ve come to learn, we can protest this quackery until we are blue in the face, but our cries are squashed quicker than a mosquito in Muskoka.
Is there some sort of Citizen Committee that is involved in what Programming and Content is on the CBC? If there isn’t, there should be. I’ll be the first to volunteer.
The HNiC Theme is practically our Nation’s Second Anthem, recognized throughout the world. That music blaring from the TV was like a battle cry – especially as a kid, when I heard it I ran to the “Rec Room” with my Dad and brothers to watch Saturday Night Hockey. My own boys flock to the TV when they hear it.
My Dad was the Ultimate Hockey Fan, Coaching 4 sons, and a daughter, all throughout our lives. He passed away in 2006 with a Jersey hanging from his I.V. beside his bed at St. Michael’s, and fortunately lived long enough to see one of his Grandsons make it to the NHL. I can’t even stand the thought of how upset he would be about this!
All this…. for an “American Idol” type contest to find a new song, which by the way has been in the works for over a year. The increase Mrs. Claman is asking for is standard throughout the industry, and little old me was able to find out that among the numerous options presented to the CBC was a suggestion to do the same license that has been in place for about 10 years. (There would be no increase in license fee for the first 2 years, and in the business of licensing music, it is pretty much etched in stone that any time a license is renewed or extended, there’s a bump in the fee by approximately 15%.) What is so unreasonable about that for something that is considerd a Canadian Tradition? It’s more than “Just a Song”, for many, it’s a part of who we are.
Bah, I’m done with you, CBC. You may be the “Canadian Broadcaster” in name, but I feel that you no longer effectively represent me as a Canadian.
This is all just such a shame…
Save the Song!!!
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=15856240115
To say that Rex Murphy’s lone balanced view is proof that the CBC is not left leaning is wacky at best. Preston Manning had a piece on This I Believe once. Even you must realize that these are lone voices in the wilderness of socialists and urban Toronto elitists who feel that they know best.
Once again, this site is proof that the CBC doesn’t represent the many opinions and positions of Canadians. It is a club of like minded left wing elites. Who would really care (as no one really watches or listens) if not for the $1 Billion a year that it soaks up from the tax payers.
Mike,
For someone who so obviously hates the CBC – and obviously would never be caught dead paying any attention to it – you sure seem to spend a lot of time on this site. Time that you could actually spend watching, reading and listening to CBC programming so you could see the Corp’s journalistic balance holistically, rather than slavishly repeating “facts” that aren’t.
There are plenty of small-c conservatives, and even a good number of capital-C conservatives who work at CBC. I met a bunch of them when I worked there. I was in plenty of editorial meetings where all – and i mean *all* – political viewpoints are aired out. In the end, good journalists put out the facts and columnists put out opinions.
If you’re honked about what you see as anti-Conservative coverage of the current federal government, you’re confusing political bias with one of journalism’s key tenets – “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable”. Any media organization that is deferential to the government in power isn’t doing its job. The CBC is every bit as hard on the Liberals in Ontario or the NDP in Saskatchewan as it is the Conservatives in Ottawa.
If you don’t remember the incident, Google “Andy Scott” and “Julie Van Dusen”. No one could say that Julie wasn’t exactly kowtowing to the federal government. And who was it who broke Adscam? (Hint: it wasn’t CTV or Global)
I know it might be tiresome for you, but I’d suggest that you actually look at the CBC’s annual report (to see exactly how much Canadians pay and what they’re paying for), and look at the independent reviews of CBC’s political coverage.
If all of that is too much work for you, Mike, at least quit wasting your time here and go back to the “right wing elites”, since you don’t feel the CBC has anything to say to you that you don’t know already.
Just a foaming and furious comment regarding CBC’s new programming.
You guys are idiots! This new schedule is total Bull, I can’t even count now the number of times I have heard retread Pop Lite crap on the Late night CBC slot that once housed the venerable BNW!
I do not need to hear Coldplay, Barenaked Ladies, Chantal Kreviazek and Alanis Morisette on the CBC. there are plenty of radio stations with that commercial Infrastructure already!
Bring back the expeimental electronics and creative adventurous music, sure it wasn’t all good, but it was better than this.
Losing sound advice is a huge loss!
Losing Here’s to You is even BIGGER!!
Losing tom Allen is a criminal injustice. CBC you are a losing cause!
The HNIC theme cannot be replaced and Scott Moore’s “brilliant idea” to run a contest across the country for a new song is perhaps the most retarded thing I have ever heard. Canada’s National Broadcaster has been hijacked by amateurs and those with below average IQ’s. The CBC recklessly abused the terms and conditions of its licensing agreement with the composer of the HNIC anthem leaving her with no choice but to file a civil action and force a legal remedy. Then the “geniuses” at HNIC argue in the media that Dolores Claman wanted too much money for the use of her song and that her people wouldn’t negotiate in good faith? CBC executives should be fired over the way this issue has been handled. The CBC’s mandate is to nurture and represent Canadian culture – not to misappropriate intellectual properties to the benefit of their advertising clients.
It’s just a theme song, and a boring one at that. Its fame comes from being associated with Hockey Night in Canada, not the other way round. Let’s move on.
Who cares? I stopped watching hockey when the squeaky voiced and uncharismatic Cassie Campbell became a colour commentator on HNIC.
You are entitled to call me a sexist. And I am entitled to take my coveted consumer eyeballs elsewhere while demographics take their course on what’s left of HNIC’s viewership. Saturday night is now UFC Fight night for me and my high earning cohort.
The great thing about mixed martial arts is that you can watch it for hours without being subjected to a single instance of the “soft, left, envious pap” that still typifies the Canadian media and makes HNIC unbearable.
Clearly a dissenting voice is not kosher for Keith. To list and compare left and right wing offences of the CBC will get no where. As for now, I get a bit of entertainment from the reactions of the CBCers who are so affronted by opinions counter to their pre-approved ones. Also, I’m owed it as I pay for it. If I can’t get entertaiment out of the *hilarious* Air Farce, I’ll get it by poking a stick at the comfortable CBC groupthinkers.
Anyone who knows me knows that I have no problem with dissent, as long as it’s constructive. Sniping from the sidelines isn’t constructive.
And if you’re still bound and determined to poke people with sticks, don’t be surprised if one of them grabs the stick and whacks you with it from time to time.
What do you think the value would be if these comments sections actually reflected the real opinions of the populace — both viewing and non — and not just the opinions of the self-interested (myself included in that cadre) the self-aggrandizing (“I will provoke because it makes me important!!!”) and the knee-jerk biased (“Kill the CBC! Stab it, for I am from Alberta hear me roar..Grrr! Liberal bias, my tax dollars, arrrgh!”)
In closing, let me just say that I “don’t know much about the french I took…”
Hum it with me, folks…
Still trying to figure how to speak my own mind on this latest development…
Keith says: “And who was it who broke Adscam? (Hint: it wasn’t CTV or Global)”
You’re right Keith. It was the National Post who broke Adscam. Surely you didn’t mean to imply CBC did?
Maybe you need to revisit history some.
Start here:
http://www.maharaj.org/nat-post5.shtml
I don’t particularly want to drag this any further off-topic than we already have but, er, it wasn’t the National Post either. Read http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/groupaction/index.html , which credits the Globe & Mail for asking the first questions as early as 2002.
The point I was trying to make is that any news organization should be casting a critical eye at any and all viewpoints. If the Liberals do something boneheaded, the media can and should call them on it. Ditto for the Conservatives, the Greens, the NDP or anyone else.
[...] God! Stop! NO! June 11, 2008 — snowy2004 What’s worse than CBC losing the Hockey Night in Canada theme? Having CTV buy it and hearing it on anything that isn’t HNiC? Yeah, that’s bad. [...]