McLennan credits his year as a fellow in the National Arts Journalism Program at Columbia University, in 1996-97, as the jumping off point for his Arts Journal. A year in New York was a chance to meet many of the leaders in cultural journalism from around the country. It was pretty clear what was being done and not being done. Early television made a concerted effort to bring art to the masses. Commercial television today does very little, and so people who rely on television for all news miss the connection between the arts and the greater culture.
Public television is about the only place where the arts are seen.
Because the technology of television is changing at such a tremendous speed, the broadcast universe is splitting into many fragments, which gives the world of the arts a new opportunity for finding a niche. McLennan's concept for the televised Arts Journal is a weekly 30-minute arts news magazine, with certain parallels to Nightline. McLennan is developing a news program devoted to classical music that would be supplied to classical radio stations around the country, of which there are about 150. The music service would be offered free, along with a general arts report. Radio stations could subscribe to one or both.