Radio Magico

Update: Radio Magico closed its activity when Radionomy merged with Shoutcast end of 2019.

What does Radio Magico stand for?

Radio Magico is a spiritual and zen web radio, playing soft meditative music, new age, ambient, chill-out, heart songs, mantras, music from the world of Osho, dance music and international songs. Radio Magico plays randomly day and night a mix of all these different music styles. Radio Magico is listened to in 119 countries around the world.

You broadcast music and also discourses? Even meditations?

We do sometimes play very short Osho excerpts in the mix, but basically it is 24 hours of music. Although short discourses and meditations used to be part of the daily programme, now they are available on our website as video discourses from different spiritual teachers/masters; also, we have 3 short audio meditations (vipassana, gibberish and no-mind, lasting around 7 minutes each). They are available at all times and people can listen to the video discourses and/or practice a short meditation online.

How does it work? Do the listeners have to pay?

You simply connect to our website or a partner website that hosts the radio player (like Osho News), hit the play button and there you go. It is 100% free, the listeners do not have to pay anything; they just enjoy the music whenever they want.

Radionomy is a free web radio platform hosting thousands of web radios; no radio has to pay royalties for the music they air, provided they reach 130 hours average audience per day. Radionomy covers the royalty payment when the web radio reaches that minimum.

They also have the right to insert commercial ads in our program. We do not have any control over these ads. According to the country from where you listen to the radio, you may or may not hear these ads; in its place you will hear our music jingle, a soft piece of music that you will recognize very quickly when you listen to the radio for a while.

How does it work technically? Is the music streamed?

Yes, technically the music is streamed, that is why it is a web radio and you need an internet connection to be able to listen to it. We have a radio manager provided by Radionomy to upload music and manage all the functions needed to run the radio programme, etc.

Can I choose what I want to listen to or can I just hear what is running like at a traditional radio station?

No, you cannot choose what you want to listen to, you can just hear what is running; just as you say, like at a traditional radio station. The day is divided into different sections: morning, afternoon, evening, dance and night. Each section plays different styles of music so you could actually choose to connect and listen to the radio in the time slot when we play the music you like to hear.

We have the following sections running every day (time indicated is Central European Time):

6:30 – 9:00: Music for Relaxation
Music to practice yoga, tai chi, qi gong, 5 tibetans, etc. or to wake-up softly…

9:00 – 13:30: Heart & Soft Music
Mix of heart songs, mantras and easy listening songs and music.

13:30 – 18:00: Stay Zen!
A mix of soft music to stay zen, peaceful and centered.

18:00- 20:45: Easy Going…
Mix of soft, meditative music and international songs.

20:45 – 22:00: Music for Tantra
Music to relax or to practice Tantra.

22:00 – 23:00: Music to Dance!
One hour of dancing music.

23:00 – 5:30: Zen and Heart Music
A big mix of soft and light rhythm music and international songs.

5:30 – 6:30: Music to Dance!
One hour of dancing music.

What is the benefit for a musician to be aired on Radio Magico?

The obvious benefit is for his music to be heard by the thousands of people who listen to Radio Magico worldwide. Another benefit is that the listeners can see name of artist and track, and the CD cover, making it easier to recognise and buy the song or album if they like it.

Just recently, Radionomy created a free Radio Magico app for iOS on iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, and an individual app for those radios which have a strong audience (Radio Magico was among them). The great advantage is that you can buy a song directly from the app. (An app will also be soon available for Android.)

(Note: If you are a musician, singer or if you have a record label, you are welcome to send us your new releases. We will listen to them and consider them for airplay. On the website we also host banners for advertising, including a ‘CD of the month’ slot.)

Who had the idea of taking on this project?

Since a long time we (Shantidharm and Khirad) wanted a web radio connected to meditationfrance.com, our web portal on Meditation and Spirituality for French speaking countries. Because when we saw that on our website, which has an average of 75.000 unique visitors per month, many went to the meditation music page, we understood that there was a serious interest in meditative music.

Through our friend Sargam we got in touch with Omkar from Hamburg, who had a web radio. Omkar told us that he wanted to close the radio because it was too much work for him and because he could not reach the minimum average audience per day imposed by Radionomy to avoid paying royalty fees. His web radio was already called Radio Magico. He asked us if we wanted to take over and offered to show us how to use the radio manager of Radionomy.

That was in spring 2010. We took over Radio Magico and gradually changed the music and the daily programme. At the same time we created a French web page and an international website www.radiomagico.com and used our networks and contacts to let everybody know of the existence of the radio. The audience quickly grew, Radio Magico was saved and we easily passed the minimum daily average audience.

Today Radio Magico is listened to day and night in 119 countries, having an average of 60,000 listeners per month.

Can I listen to the music even if I change pages? E.g. on Osho News?

If you start listening from the player in Osho News, you have to stay on that page to continue listening; if you leave the page, the music will stop. It is advisable to open a page only for the radio and to surf on other pages within your browser, then the music won’t stop. You can also use a pop-up window, by clicking on the icon within the player, but then you need to register with Radionomy (it’s free) to use this function.

Anything else you would like to say?

We would like to conclude with an Osho quote:

“Whenever you know the keys of how to open the doors of music you have opened the doors of heaven also. The secret lies in the music. If there is a choice between philosophy, religion, science and music, if you ask me to choose one after which all the remaining ones will disappear from the earth, I will choose music. Because if there is music, spirituality will follow. It cannot disappear.”

Tao, the Three Treasures, Vol 2, Ch 10

Shantidharm grew up in France; he studied accounting, yet instead of pursuing a career, decided to travel around the world. Arriving in Pune in 1980, he took sannyas. In 1988 he started to learn computer skills and how to create websites.

Khirad was born in Israel and grew up all over the world. He studied International Economics, came to Pune as a child in 1980 and again as an adult in 1994 and worked in the ashram bakery and in Osho International Dept. He co-organised many international spiritual events and festivals.

Khirad’s passion for Osho’s vision and his networking talent was the right combination with Shantidharm’s technical skills to start a French web portal for meditation and spirituality, meditationfrance.com, an idea they had when they met in 2000 in Pune. Shantidharm lives in Tuscany, Italy while Khirad moves between France, Israel and Corfu. Since 2010, they manage Radio Magico together.