(no subject)

[xiphias]

People have been talking about that story in which world-class violinist Joshua Bell plays a world-class Stradivarius playing world-class music for forty-five minutes in a Washington Metro station and most people don't notice.

And I've been thinking about it, and it doesn't bother me as much as it bothers some other folks.

It was mentioned in the transcript of an online chat that the author did that similar things have been done with other artists in various locations around the world, with similar results.

To me, this means one major thing. Busking is a skill-set. Buskers don't just have to play good, or even world-class, music -- they need to do something else as well. What exactly that is, I'm not sure -- I've never really successfully busked. But there IS something else there -- virtuosity isn't enough; you need personal charisma, as well.

In a lot of ways, it's an example of this experiment, with the basketballs. You know this one, right? Watch it, and count how many passes the people make. Every time someone throws and catches the basketball, that is one pass. It can be bounced, or thrown, or whatever -- just count the number of passes.

Then, answer the following question, which is ROT-13: Qvq lbh frr gur tbevyyn?

I think it's the same thing. If you're concentrating on one thing, such as getting to work, or counting basketball passes, you miss other things, like violinists and gorillas. It's just how the brain works.

And the part of the brain which allows you to do that is the prefrontal lobes, which are not fully developed in children, which is why THEY notice the violinist.

And then, one final thought hit me. $32 is actually pretty damn good for a busker for 45 minutes. People actually DO recognize and reward quality.

Comments

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

Can the average Joe tell a diamond from a crystal in a crowded movie theatre? I didn't find this result at all surprising.

[voltbang.livejournal.com]

"virtuosity isn't enough"

Or even relevant. A moderate musician, with a lot of charisma and the ability to engage an audience at the very personal level will make more money than an aloof virtuoso.

[(Anonymous)]

It didn't bother me, because the point I took away from it is "Sometimes it really pays off to pay more attention to the changes around you." (busker where there isn't usually one, f'example.) When I'm working with a "Notice the beauty around" mindset, I'll notice stuff like that. I like my life when I do that.

I thought it was a totally fascinating experiment, but I'm not dismayed by the results (and, as you say, $32 for 45 minutes is not bad.)

[jenett]

Yikes. You go away for a weekend, and LJ logs you out. The above was me.

[fibro-witch.livejournal.com]

Having seen him in concert once, I bet he just looked at the ground or at his music stand as he played, and someone else watched the crowd.

A busker must interact with the audience in order to get money. I always drop a dollar on someone who makes me smile, but someone who just preforms and does not interact with at least someone, even small children, gets nothing.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

There is a video, which I haven't yet watched, but the description people have said is that he's FASCINATING to watch -- he's totally lost in the music.

Which is great in a concert hall and all, but totally NOT what you want when busking.

[fibro-witch.livejournal.com]

Which I totally wanted when I paid to see him, but is the last thing I want in a busker.

[amberdine.livejournal.com]

It was a fantastic article, and I'm not dismayed by the result. In busy urban situations, people need to clamp down on distractions, no matter how fabulous those distractions are.

I know this in particular, because I can't and I can't tolerate being out for very long among lots of people and stuff. I do notice everything, and it overwhelms me. I'm barely a functional person because of it.

I was so thrilled on behalf of the few people who realized what they were listening to, and appreciated it. What a treat!

[phantom_wolfboy]

It also depends on what you consider "quality". I personallly don't much like classical music; it's just so much noise. On the other hand, I'll stop and listen to a good bluegrass fiddler, or a bagpiper -- hell, I'll stop and listen to a bad bagpiper, cause even in Toronto you don't hear it every day.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I kind of thing that it's hard to say "I don't like classical", because "classical" is SUCH a broad category. I mean, it includes Mozart, Bach, Brahms, Stravinsky, Tsachovsky, Verdi, Pachabel, Vivaldi. . . none of those sound ANYTHING alike; they're all basically different genres.

I mean, the term "classical" refers to, pretty much, anything written over, like, five or six centuries across two or more continents.

That said, the local commercial "classical" station manages to fill most of its time with utter CRAP. There is plenty of symphonic muzak and worse that you can find in those thousands upon thousands of pieces -- classical music certainly follows Sturgeon's Law.

Our local PBS station does a better job of playing GOOD classical music, but most classical stations really appear to attempt to showcase the most inoffensive, bland, BORING shit that just turns into stupid background noise that ANYBODY with taste would hate.

Bell in the Metro

[happyfunpaul.livejournal.com]

[rephrasing and adding to some comments I made elsewhere:]

Great article. Not only was it an interesting experiment, but the writer did a good job of covering the phenomenon from different angles, and did so pretty respectfully.

I'm curious what my reaction would have been as a commuter. I'd like to think I would've been late for work. :-) It's obvious within seconds that the performer is a professional, just given the technical expertise alone-- the violin is not a forgiving instrument! I do tend to ignore subway musicians, but it's hard not to listen and notice the quality of performance, if it's notable one way or the other.

I might or might not have recognized Bell upon second look; he's a favorite of my mother's and I'm quite familiar with him, but I haven't seen any recent photographs of him.

As an experiment, however, two potential problems occurred to me:

1) The performance space.

From the videos, it's clear that there was no good place to stop and listen to the music, because there was traffic coming from at least three directions. (Check out, in the final video, where the woman who did recognize Bell and stop for ten minutes was standing. Awkward location, isn't it? There's no wall to lean against or even take shelter against passing pedestrians.)

The mention of the shoeshiner typically calling either the Mall or Metro police on performers there seems to suggest that it's not even a legal performance spot (though I don't know what the DC Metro policies are regarding performers). All in all, I wondered if there weren't a better and/or more legal spot that could have been chosen, that might have allowed listeners to congregate. (I don't think that would've happened anyway, but it would've been more fair of an experiment.)

2) Time of day.

During morning rush hour? Despite the heavy traffic, that's the worst possible time of day for a busker. People don't plan any extra time into their morning commutes. They're not going to stop and listen unless they're waiting-and-not-moving anyway (which, as noted above, is not true of the space they put Bell in)-- otherwise, they'll be late.


Now, all that said, the Post experiment is still an interesting experiment and the results might not vary that much even with a better location and time. As you point out, there's a difference between the skill sets of "virtuoso musician" and "excellent busker" in a public setting.

Steve MacDonald (a filker friend of mine) mentioned something similar about musicians-vs.-performers when he talked about playing at RenFaires. Other (possibly technically-better) musicians would complain about the lack of attention and lack of donations. Steve concentrated on performance and audience interaction (and I assure, you, Steve is a very entertaining ham), and consequently didn't have much of a problem getting attention or money.

Re: Bell in the Metro

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

I used to busk in morning rush hours in London; there is a pitch booking system, and there was simply hardly any competition for pitches at 8am. Sure, the money wasn't as good as it might have been later in the day, but having my pick of the pitches made up for that. The morning rush hour is also fairly reliable in terms of the traffic through stations, so once you've figured out which ones it makes sense to play at, it's reliable. Reliability is worth a lot to someone with regular expenses and mostly irregular income...

[vvalkyri.livejournal.com]

The more I think on it the more I think it was unfair to do this in morning rush rather than at least evening rush.

But also I think that one may listen, perhaps the entire way up an escalator, and then need to hurry on one's way.

Comments from someone who used to busk for a living...

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Yeah. $32 for 45 minutes is pretty good, given only about a thousand people walked through the station. I didn't do as well as that and I had lots of busking experience and I'd say most of my rush-hour busking involved more people than that in a pitch, though I didn't generally count. A full Tube train can hold about a thousand people, and for at least 30-40 minutes of my 8am-10am pitches there would be FULL trains every 2-3 minutes. Of course it helps to select a pitch where most people are getting on or off the train.

Other things that will make a difference - playing stuff people do actually recognise, using a backing track (I have not done this but people I've spoken to have doubled their takings overnight), wearing a low-cut top, looking like I'm enjoying yourself. Eye contact with the public can also be very important. If I let the actual musical integrity slide, though, I immediately get a drop in takings. The other stuff is just showmanship... doing the showmanship but playing poorly NEVER works. Or, it didn't for me.

The difficulty with playing in train stations is that people are on their way somewhere, lots of them are listening to their personal stuff, they might not think they have time to stop and listen. If they have season tickets - as most in rush-hour do - then they don't have their hands on their money, either. The background noise can get pretty bad, too, to the point that there are some pitches I simply can't play - and I play the French horn, which is considered loud. On the bright side it does not rain inside train stations, generally speaking. When I was busking in Bath, at a pitch where there were decent acoustics, and some benches for people to sit on, I routinely made twice as much as busking in the London underground stations, for the same amount of time. I also got rained out a lot more... busking in stations is less lucrative, but more reliable, especially once I've figured out which pitches have the best conditions.

Of course, there were still days where for whatever reason I made hardly any money at all, and others when I made quite a bit for no apparent reason. Mondays were always a flop to the point that I stopped playing on Mondays - people just don't have any change yet, they haven't bought their lunches. There was the pitch where I randomly made about £80 in two hours for reasons I still don't understand. On average, though, I got about £12 an hour, and if a pitch regularly gave me less than £10 an hour I stopped playing there.

There were some pieces that were always winners in certain locations, but I tried to keep a varied programme with a mix of classical, folk, show tunes, and jazz. This was as much for my own sanity as anything else - I was doing two 2-hour pitches four or five days a week, and having a short 20-minute program would have been horrible. Playing for two solid hours without repeating anything and entirely from memory is something some people would find challenging, but I am lucky and have an excellent aural memory.

[yehoshua.livejournal.com]

You're ignoring something that the Mr. Weingarten ignored also: even on good days, I don't want a cultural experience forced on me. I really don't. Busking feels to me like a violation of my personal space, just as real and infuriating as having strangers walk up and touch me. I notice plenty of good musicians when I take the subway. They want me to stop and pay attention to them and maybe give them a buck or two. I want to push all of them down onto the third rail. It's an imperfect world.

If Mr. Weingarten wants to really evaluate my ability to discern quality, maybe he should come down to the other end of the platform where I'm hiding from the buskers and ask what I'm listening to on my music player. Maybe I'm ignoring the guy giving a recital of the Kreisler violin concerto because I really prefer my Segovia (and honestly, how couldn't I?).

[adooma.livejournal.com]

There is a great response to the Joshua Bell article by a NYC subway musician in her blog: www.SawLady.com/blog
She interprets the situation differently from the Washington Post reporters... I thought you might find it interesting.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

That was among of the things I read that made me remember that busking is a skill set of its own.

[navrins]

See, the problem with something like this is that circumstances matter.

I like classical music. I like a lot of things. I do *not* like the feeling that someone's trying to blackmail me - and that is how subway musicians feel to me. "Here, I'm giving you this cool stuff... now you should pay me for it."

Sure, they rarely if ever actually badger anyone to pay - there's usually not even a sign requesting donations, just a container into which you could drop money if you felt like it - but I DO believe in giving money for value received. When a good subway player entertains me, I feel an obligation to reward him - and that's an obligation I never asked for, never agreed to. It feels like an imposition. So if anything I tend to feel an obligation NOT to be entertained by the subway player.

Now that I'm analyzing it a bit, I recognize there's an irrationality there somewhere. But that's how I feel about it.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

When I busk, I don't want people to give me money because they feel they somehow should - I want them to give me money because they like what they hear enough to encourage it.

So, I use the same rules for whether I give money to buskers. If I like what I hear, and I'm not in a hurry to get somewhere, I will give them some money and maybe stay and listen for a bit if it's convenient. If I don't like what I hear I ignore them.

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

When I read that article I thought of you, because you taught me to appreciate buskers.

Personally, I thought it was such an unfair 'experiment' I seriously considered writing a letter to the reporter. It seemed to be playing right into stereotypes of Americans/people who work for a living as being uncultured philistines. Feh.