Click here to view the embedded video.

Ever since I first expressed an interest in street performers, people have been sending me links to Pearls Before Breakfast, a Pulitzer Prize winning article by Gene Weingarten. In it, he describes how Joshua Bell, one of the most famous violinists in the world, busked using a $3.5 million Stradivarius in the Washington D.C. subway system.

Reading that, you might think (as I did) that a brilliant musician playing a fabulous instrument would surely draw a crowd. And yet Joshua Bell — who normally packs out concert halls selling tickets for hundreds of dollars each — made just $32.17, and barely anyone stopped to listen.

The experiment could lead us to some conclusions: that we can’t recognise beauty out of context; that commuters are too busy to appreciate genius; that we are too closed minded in general; even that the average Washington D.C. commuter is a philistine.

However, although the writing in the article is good, a brief look at the details of the experiment shows that it was based on false assumptions and was executed poorly. The questions raised are interesting, but the answers given are unreliable at best, obnoxious at worst. And I can prove it: I lived with a subway violinist, Chen Cong, who goes against everything this article stands for.

But we’ll get to Chen later. First, the experiment’s flaws…

The wrong time, the wrong place, the wrong song

The experiment took place at 7:51 a.m. on the cold morning (4ºC outside) of January 11th, a time of year that is traditionally terrible for street performers (due to the post-Christmas pinch). Restrictions in the subway meant Weingarten was forced to place Bell in the small gap between the top of an escalator and a doorway, giving passersby not much room to stop and listen.

Then there’s the song choice. Bell didn’t try to appease the sensibilities of his audience. Instead, he chose to play as difficult a song as he could. Here’s how Weingarten describes it:

“Chaconne” is … considered one of the most difficult violin pieces to master. Many try; few succeed. It’s exhaustingly long — 14 minutes — and consists entirely of a single, succinct musical progression repeated in dozens of variations to create a dauntingly complex architecture of sound.”

If you’re sitting there thinking “that’s exactly what I want to hear on my morning commute!“, you’re in the minority. Buskers all over the world intentionally play music that people can relate to in a short period of time. That’s all the time they’ve got.

The Prejudice of Prestige

“In a demographic as sophisticated as Washington, the thinking went, several people would surely recognize Bell.”

If we rephrase the above quote, taken from Pearls, we get: “unsophisticated people do not listen to classical music,” or even “unsophisticated people can’t appreciate classical music.” And if you think that this sounds ethnocentric, Weingarten went on to say in emails to disgusted readers that he didn’t accept that people from different cultures and backgrounds could have different ideas about beauty. In other words, beauty is objective, and Weingarten knows what it is.

Still more tellingly, he describes the one man who seemed to appreciate Bell’s music fully as the “cultural hero of the day”, as if the other commuters should be looked down upon. Weingarten comes across like a Victorian scientist watching in disbelief as monkeys ignore a golden banana.

It makes my skin crawl. Below is how the experiment should have been done, and the results he would have found.

Chen Cong

Quite simply, he should have filmed Chen Cong.

Many years ago, when Chen was still a budding young violinist in China, Chairman Mao began his ruthless Cultural Revolution. All forms of Western music were banned, and Chen’s classically trained family (all musicians and dancers) were turned into trench diggers and pig farmers. At one point he was so destitute he was secretly teaching people how to play the violin in return for heads of cabbage, and riding his bicycle from village to village, telling people stories at mealtimes in return for food.

His father, who knew someone who knew someone, managed to smuggle a cassette tape of Chen’s playing to Mannes College of Music in New York, where he was immediately accepted. Chen escaped China, did a masters in performance in The Big Apple, and got very good reviews.

However, after he’d graduated he decided that if he wanted someone to tell him what to play or how to play it, he could go back to China for that — no need for an orchestra here. So instead, he decided to make his money busking, playing whatever he liked.

After some exploring of both his own tastes and the sensibilities of the New Yorkers around him, he chose the fairly quiet platform of the F train’s 57th Street station as his concert hall. It wasn’t busy, and in the afternoons and evenings he would make the most out of the long silences between passing trains. Here’s my first video of him, taken years ago (please excuse the quality, but the response at 2:27 is so cute from the crowd!)

Click here to view the embedded video.

At one point people were taking deck chairs and newspapers down to the subway to listen to Chen play. Both times I filmed him people stayed for over 30 minutes to listen (some for an hour or more), and both times people in the audience actually wiped away tears. People of all ages, races and genders also danced, laughed, clapped, cheered “bravo!” between songs, made eye contact with each other, felt calm and relaxed…in fact, they acted privileged to have experienced the music coming from Chen’s cheap violin.

Had Weingarten studied this humble and warm musician after his debacle with Joshua Bell, he might have been surprised at how well Chen did, both with the audience and with his donations. On most days, Chen connects with dozens of people, and brings home between $200-$400.

Click here to view the embedded video.

But would that have taught us anything?

Well, no, but Chen’s story does show that skill, fame and pomp are no substitute for experience when it comes to street performing. Oh, and perhaps that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Unfortunately, Chen’s tale has a sad ending. Despite two decades of helping people love New York, he has been forced to stop busking because of increased police harassment. But that’s another story…

“This guy always draws a crowd and it’s really amazing to see him create a big sound. The song is Secrets by One Republic. You can buy his music on this site. Check it out!”

Bryson Andrews, proving you don’t need a million dollar violin to impress people in the street. Buy his songs at reverbnation.com, or contact Jean Pollard at (907) 764-7464 / jean.pollard@gmail.com.

This is the first video that James Hancox has made, and it’s made me quite jealous. Impressed, too! Especially considering the quality of the music. Here’s the description from under the video:

KJ is just 14, & has already topped a couple of competitions. Wow.

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I was wandering home, & heard a Jimi Hendrix solo growling away from across the street. Naturally, I looked… & there was KJ. A young guy with his guitar & an amp (iPod connected for backing), just going for it on the streets of Auckland. Playing flawlessly.

No really. The kid wasn’t missing a thing. Extraordinary skill.

I don’t tend to carry cash, but I *always* have my camera on me (Canon 7D if interested)… So I hoped I could help him out in another way… One take. Not cuts. No special equipement. Shot, handheld, by a photographer who only just learned the video settings on his 7D. No external mic either… this is how the camera captured it. Imagine being there.

I hope he’s back next time I’m walking down Queen Street. You should look out for him too… and give what you can to support KJ’s incredible talent.

Rick Lewis: I began performing on the street in 1987. My main living nowadays is as a speaker and entertainer for corporate events (www.breakarule.com), but I still work the street when I can for the love of it.

I’ve rolled much of what I learned about people, human behaviour and performance into a message for organisations and it’s been very successful, mostly because there is so much juice in interactive and street style performance and corporate culture is dying for something real. I see myself as a bridge between the sanity of the street view and today’s business world.

I have authored a book that is regularly used in corporate development work that sums up what I learned and the insight I gained on the street. The title is 7 Rules You Were Born to Break. There are hidden rules in our culture that undermine the possibility of excellence. My mission is to champion the need for Intelligent Misbehaviour in the world.

Nick Broad: And busking has given you the insights needed for that mission?

RL: Busking is the most honourable form of business there is, where the product and service is generously given away and the customer is free to give back exactly what they have received in value.

There is no form of profession with a more demanding skill base. It requires the busker to be proficient in sales, marketing, branding, theatre, psychology (how individuals think), sociology (how individuals think and behave when in groups), customer service, risk management…the list goes on. People think of buskers as beggars rather than understanding that a skilled busker uses a public pitch out of choice, and that the ability to draw, hold and please a crowd necessitates mastery in a broad range of skill sets.

Street performing ought to be part of post-secondary curriculums, especially for business degrees. Busking operates as a meritocracy – if you don’t have the skills you don’t last in the profession, no matter what kind of politics you play. I love that about the profession, you can’t hide, you can’t fake it, you can’t get paid if you don’t show up and provide value to others. I wish every job operated by the same built in ethics.

And busking is culturally important, too. It is a public forum to consider society’s danger points, imbalances of attitude, behaviour, thought, habit, politics — and these are addressed through the most gentle form of necessary feedback and mirroring: humour. While digital advances abound people’s need to be directly addressed, inspired, entertained, informed and touched is only growing.

The busker reminds us of this, of the need for relationship, for spontaneity, for group experience, for team play between strangers, for laughter, for basic respect, and for doing the right thing.

NB: I love that idea — street performance taught to business students. We once had a reporter for the Wall Street Journal interview us for an article on NYC subway busking. I thought it might start a neo-liberal cultural revolution…

Anyway, playing devil’s advocate: circle shows might need all of the skills you’ve mentioned, but most buskers are musicians or statues who do little of that. Some are highly skilled and passionate, but others aren’t, barely interacting with their audience. Is that removed, bland style of performance so distant from begging? Do you see regular busking and circle shows as being in two different groups? Or should they be thought of (and treated) the same?

RL: I have seen street musicians who have moved me to tears based on the passion and feeling in their expression. I have also seen circle shows that have bored me to tears based on their lack of originality, authenticity, and willingness to risk anything of themselves. To quote the bard, “Full of sound and fury, yet signifying nothing.”

So to answer your question, yes, there are two separate categories of buskers. However, they’re not divided by circle shows and non-circle shows, but by those who are doing what they love and those who are doing what they hope somebody will give them money for.

NB: Okay, let’s move on. Gigs have been largely replaced by technology: the radio, the TV, records, CDs, youtube, file shares, and who knows what’s next. People aren’t as motivated as they once were to see “live” shows. Add to this the increasingly bland products of commercial success, and you get an idea of how important the streets are, both as a venue for artists otherwise looking for somewhere to create art, and as a vibrant, edgy space in which audiences can see “real” content, not made-for-TV rubbish.

I guess my question is: “Intelligent Misbehaviour seems as important now as it was in the 50s. Occupy everything seems like a step in the right direction. Could buskers, too, unite in some fashion, and bring on an arts revolution?”

RL: It seems to me the revolution is one performer at a time standing for his or her vision and offering the finest art they can to public audiences. Organise or unite? It’s one of the beauties of busking, that the artist trades paperwork, meetings, red tape, permissions, schedules, and organisation for the chance to focus on their art and spontaneously share it.

Organisations and organising can work wonderfully for some things, but I’m not so sure it suits the heart of the busking tradition. I guess the question is, “Do we really need an organisation to make a difference?” I think most people want to make a difference, but it’s also a scary proposition. Unfortunately, I think there is a tendency to turn to organising as a way of avoiding what we are already free to do and to accomplish as an individual.

NB: But in a world that’s organising daily in favour of commercial interests, what’s the buskers’ best defence, if not to organise themselves?

RL: Sure, we can throw out the word “organise” and say “Yes, let’s do it” but the problem is that there is not going to be agreement on what that would look like. Then who is going to decide what we are organising for exactly, what the core issues are, who we’ll elect to represent those issues to the public, and who stands to gain in what way from the organising? So then you suddenly you have a political body and to run it you need a leader, but that leader ought to be a true artist who is passionately dedicated to the essence of what busking is, but the true artist doesn’t want that desk job, they just want to do their art, and the person who takes the job (not such an artist) then winds up misrepresenting his or her constituents. Just look at any political system, the more “organised” it gets the more removed it is from the purpose of its inception.

My vote is to stay unorganised, or as loosely organised as possible. Your project is a great start to that as long as it remains a celebration of diversity and not a call to standardise approaches. We need to diversify our approaches rather than agree on them, because that puts every artist out there on a different front, attempting to reach through a different gap or loophole that the establishment of “commercial interests” as you have called them hasn’t closed yet. If we pool our approaches, agree on a focus, then its too easy to shut us down, because we’re all standing in one place when the corporate bomb hits.

The power of our movement, if we can call it that, is that we aligned in spirit, not in practice. Busking is an underground movement, if we try to surface it, we’ll just be snuffed out. We are organised when we each individually take responsibility for finding, creating, stealing, sneaking, negotiating, charming our way into a pitch – somewhere, anywhere, and just keep offering what we have on an individual basis.

Busking around the world is the traditional way. Not for these two. They needed to raise £450 in cash before getting on a plane to do a gig in London. In one day.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Definitely worth the watch! This video seems sped up until you see the lady walking along in the background. A smooth and highly-polished show.

Yes, that’s right, a School of Busking. In the words of the school’s founder, Mario Morris:

“We create a fun learning environment, in the shape of an evening course, one to one consultation or master class, we can bring our training course to you as we have done around the World – Cardiff, Cambridge, Milan, Torino, Rome, Zurich, Bologna, Orlando and Las Vegas.”

The course also includes sessions with famous street performer Owen Lean. It lasts three days and costs £225 (deposit of £115). You just have to travel to Cardiff to take the lessons. If you can’t make it, they’re selling merchandise here

Friday 18 May 10 am – 10 pm
Saturday 19 May 10 am – 10 pm
Sunday 20 May 10 am – 6 pm

Mario Morris the founder of the School of Busking. Together with his team he facilitates a fun, informative and interactive environment and invites guest speakers along to talk about different areas of performance. He has been invited to teach all over the world the art of performing and now he is part of the Faculty of the School of Mystery and Magic in Las Vegas and has taught some of the rising stars of show business. Mario is a Comedy Magician, Motivational Speaker, Author and has produced a number of teaching DVD’s to find out more about Mario and his shows go here.

Steam ON! is a street theater act performed by jugglers and acrobats.

The scene plays in the world of steampunk, a fictional age where steam power is still widely used – like the Victorian era in Britain – that incorporates elements of both science fiction and fantasy. The three weird outlaw characters are running away from the law driving their marvellous steam-powered velocipede. The complication starts when their vehicle unexpectedly brakes down. Are they skill ful enough to repair it in time?

Here’s their site: firebirds.hu/shows/steam-on

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Hi People,

I busked in Covent Garden pre permit and lists, and in Edinburgh before regulation of any kind. Yes, I’m that old.

I also travelled around various parts of the world and busked in many places, legal and otherwise. From my experience, in every case when permits and waiting lists were introduced, things went downhill.

In Edinburgh in the 1980s there was an informal ‘system’ on the mound; you could set up and try to attract a crowd at almost any time, but if you pulled people from another show, performers would have harsh words with you, seldom worse.

There was an honour system, in that almost no one used any amplifiers. Certainly in Covent Garden in early days they were really frowned upon. The presence of a large crowd focusing on a show in quiet concentration was usually enough to quieten passersby. Performers either projected their voices or worked without words.

Of course there were intrinsically noisy street acts. Pookiesnackenburger springs to mind, the precursors to Stomp, and they were a force of nature against which no one could or would try to compete. Large groups of percussion or even solo drummers can dominate public spaces but usually in the end they seem to find their own time and place where they don’t annoy other people.

I’m against regulation in general, and I’m against insurance. I think it encourages people to take more risks because they think that as they are insured they are somehow above common sense.

I’ve seen crazy shit on the street, and witnessed accidents I’ve also suffered injury, too. But people in public spaces are subject to all the normal laws governing behaviour in whatever country they are in, and a permit system and/or an official risk assessment doesn’t make people safer. In fact, I’d argue that the opposite is true.

I performed for several years in theatres around the world, and would usually have to submit to an inspection by a fire official. I found that this face to face talk and demonstration of the equipment in a relaxed and honest way would always result in the issue of a permit to use fire on stage in the theatre. I don’t recall ever being refused a permit.

I’m not sure if that would still hold good, but in London at least there was a provision that the use of fire had to be ‘integral to the action’ of the show. In other words, if the act was based on using fire and it would really not exist without it, the authorities would have to consider issuing a licence.

Read the small print on your insurance policy if you have one, the bit about ‘limits of liability’ and see if there is a section about ‘negligent behaviour’, yes I thought so.

If you are negligent and cause an accident because you acted negligently, you will no longer be covered. Your insurance company will try to prove you were acting negligently by using fire in a public place, regardless of your actions. So where does that leave you? yes exactly, with no insurance cover.

Insurance cover seems to be about a piece of paper that you can show someone else who has to be reassured that you are safe or has to maintain a paper record, so that if something happens they can keep their job. It is not about making you a safer performer.

So no, for all these reasons (and those outlined in the list of ‘cons’ on this page), I would say no, no and a thousand time no to licences, insurance requirements and permits.

Be happy, be safe, be well and keep in free.

http://the-great-davido.com/

P.S. I’m considering issuing a ‘Universal ‘Licensed To Perform’ Permit’ with ‘Access All Areas’ on the reverse. It will be valid at all times for any area in the world. Available for the cost of me making it + postage Anyone interested? Contact me at Davesp at eircom dot net.

Mark Marczyk: We’re a 14-piece Balkan-klezmer-gypsy-party-punk super-band based in Toronto, Canada. We perform anywhere and everywhere and have gained renown and infamy in the city in a surprisingly short amount of time by, you guessed it, busking.

Busking is one of the cornerstones of city culture and music culture; it’s a public expression of a lifestyle of celebrating our diverse cultural backgrounds and sharing what makes them similar and unique. We play music from over 10 countries in Eastern Europe and our members are of an even wider array of backgrounds: Ukraine, France, Mexico, India, Holland, Portugal, etc.

Check out lemonbucket.com, on which you’ll find many videos of us busking or starting street parties in various spots.

Nick Broad: How long have you been busking, and why did you get involved?

Mark: In the winter of 2006, I found myself living in Lviv, Ukraine and searching for a community with which to connect. Of all things, i discovered an Argentinian tango community and almost immediately became immersed in their world. By the summer, I had learned enough to at least look like a tango dancer to an average tourist. In 2007, as soon as the weather was nice, we went out into the main square, put out a boombox with some piazzolla and danced. There wasn’t really an impetus to make money, just a desire to dance outside on the cobblestones after a winter cooped up in a dark basement dance hall.

Through tango-busking, I met some other buskers — a group of folk musicians calling themselves Ludy Dobri (“good people”). I got along with them almost immediately. They started to teach me Ukrainian folk music; I re-learned the violin (an instrument I hadn’t played since I was a child) and we started performing together.

Nick: Why is busking important?

Mark: Busking is important because it enriches the cultural landscape of the city. This is especially true of a city like Toronto, that is lauded for being the world’s most multicultural city, but that suffers from urban sprawl and ghettoization of its multi-ethnic citizens. Yes, one can see a great Brazilian foro band in a bar in little Portugal, or a Greek rebetiko band on the Danforth, but the odds of just happening upon these scenes are slim. And what’s more, these “world music” shows are often out of the average citizen’s price range. Buskers bring culture out into the street for everyone to experience and interact with and ask only for a token of appreciation, be it financial, verbal, physical, or spiritual.

Busking also helps young performers to understand themselves and their place within a cultural landscape (as opposed to a superficial music/performance “scene”). It teaches us how to interact with people, how not to interact with them, what people respond to and how they respond. This is invaluable not just in the realm of performance, but in terms of human interaction. Of course, the experience of busking is different for every performer and in every situation/location — it can’t just be passed down orally (which is why it’s important to just pull out your horn and wail!).

Nick: What’s difficult about it?

Mark: It’s hard to be slandered. It’s hard to be ignored. It’s hard to be asked to play a song and to not be able to play it. It’s hard to play in the cold.

Nick: Anything else? What’s in your future?

Mark: I’m making a short film. The premise is that a girl walks into a pawnshop and picks up a clarinet that doesn’t have a reed. She blows into it and a canary chirps. She blows a second time and a door chime sounds. She’s so excited that she buys it and goes out into the city to play. For the rest of the film she explores the city, thinking that all of its sounds are coming from her instrument. Members of Lemon Bucket are placed in various locations and act as her imagination (i.e. What she hears). I’m really excited about it – it’s in the editing stages and should be completed by the New Year.