Radio: Lyric FM reverend, ponderous and anal

So little fun on Lyric. Actually no fun. Furrowed seriousness and demands for concentrated attention. Is there no Ronan Collins of classical music – someone with a light touch, a bit of humour, just a little fun now and again? Or Lillian Smith (she of Late Date on RTÉ Radio One when the wonderful Val Joyce is away)? Or indeed Val Joyce himself?

Lyric is/was supposed to give us music, so why the anal Artszone (Thursday at 7.30pm and Saturday at 5pm)? But what really gives me the heebie jeebies is the "Quiet Corner" on Lyric Notes (Weekdays 10am to 12.30pm). Writers are invited to offer us their reflections on profundities. I race across the kitchen to snap it off or change the station. I like Máire Nic Gearailt (although I wish she would drop the credits) – there is a tinge of mischief to her voice which suggests she could be fun if allowed. But that "Quiet Corner"! "Thought for the Day" to the power of 167.

Lunchtime Choice (every day, 12.30pm) with Liz Nolan is perhaps the best of the programmes. And with good reason. The clue is in the title, "choice". The music is more accessible, more fun and the listeners' emails and letters are light relief from the sanctity.

Lyric is such a relief from the endless chatter on Radio One, the endless, mindless chatter for much of the time on The Ryan Tubridy Show (Mondays to Fridays 9-10am). He gets right in there with inanities from the off: "great to have you with us", and then endless chatter about nothing at all. It is not that Ryan Tubridy is mindless, it is that the programme is mindless and it will make him mindless and the listeners mindless if it goes on like that. There has to be some substance at some stage but so often the programme is about nothing.

My mother in Cork likes Ryan and has enjoyed the "twenty something", "thirty something" and "sixty something" slots because the people on the programmes have been interesting, leaving Ryan with less opportunities to twitter on and on. He has a nice personality, he can be witty, he doesn't stumble over his words like others we could mention, have mentioned and will mention again if they do not improve. Ryan is – or was – intelligent, but why the lobotomy? My father hates him. Something to do with Ryan Tubridy's grandfather, which seems a little unfair. Apparently the grandfather shut down the railways, but what that has to do with the grandson twittering on the radio is beyond me.

Lyric FM, all the time
The Tubridy Show, Monday - Friday 9-10am