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A study at Ohio University has found that a quarter of people listening to music online skip a song within five seconds of the start. Songwriters seem to have reacted to that by cutting the long instrumental intros. In the mid-1980s for example you used to have to wait on average 23 seconds before the words kicked in. Now though, it’s around five seconds. Mark Beaumont, music journalist for the Guardian and NME, talks to Winifred Robinson about intros. First broadcast on You & Yours, 6 April 2017.