Busking

First published in Art and Soul magazine 2006

In Sean Locke’s cult radio series, "15 Minutes of Misery", the character of Honest Alf is often heard humming a well-known tune, cursing himself, then phoning up the Performing Rights Society to let them know he owes them several pence worth of royalties. I’m sure no one is really this honest, and luckily the Performing Rights Society will probably not force you to write out a cheque for 42p for singing "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head" in the shower this morning, but attitudes and laws towards live music are becoming more and more uptight. If you’re wondering why some of the pubs in Peterborough have lost their live or even recorded music, it’s probably due to more expensive music licensing.

I was lucky enough to leave this all behind for a few weeks recently and, with a few other Peterborough musicians and music lovers, visit the southern Spanish city of Granada which has a thriving arts and music scene. We stayed in the caves of Sacremento, just outside of the town along with musicians from all over the world.

We’d spend the evenings playing music by the fire or reading by candle-light in the gypsy caves, which were pock-marked by the wasps that woke us up every morning. On getting up, we’d often be greeted with the sight of other artistically-minded troglodytes fashioning digeridoos from the cacti that grew locally. We’d make our way down to the labyrinth of the city below and spend the cooler parts of the day busking. The local police were known to be somewhat temperamental; they would pass us most days smiling, but we were told stories of people who were told that busking wasn’t allowed and had their instruments confiscated with a several hundred euro return fee.

Over here, the busking laws are a shade more lax, though they vary from city to city. In Peterborough, no licence is needed to take music to the streets, though there are a few simple ground rules if you intend to busk. The most important being that you must not busk on private property.

Busking isn’t just confined to the over-vociferous and under-talented you-hum-it-i’ll-play-it penny botherers that often line the streets at the time when a headache already seems to be coming on, it is a verifiable art form that adds colour and culture to a city, and when done properly, can brighten up someone’s day.

What do Joni Mitchell, Simon and Garfunkel, Bob Dylan, Rod Stewart, Joan Baez and Eric Clapton have in common? Apart from some very questionable haircuts, they all started their careers as buskers. Other unlikely street performers include Beck, Coldplay, comedian Bob Hope and flamenco intrumentalists of the moment, Rodrigo y Gabriela.

There are some strange attitudes to buskers, one of the most common seems to be that busking is a type of begging, that all buskers are homeless. Another image of the busker is the Dick Van-Dyke styled one man band, cymbals strapped to the inside of the knees, out of tune guitar in hand, and not much upstairs. These stereotypes are both out of touch and unrealistic, just take a short trip to Cambridge and you will see student bands filling the central square with small audiences and a wide range of musical styles being played down the cobbled streets. And here in Peterborough over the past year, we’ve had Paraguayan harpists, Guitar and harmony bands, Violinists, Gypsy jazz bands, Accordionists, and flute and cello duos.

But at times like these when all forms of live music are under threat, perhaps the days of the street musician are numbered, perhaps the much loved London busker hot-spot Covent Garden will soon be devoid of string quartets, djembe players and all other musicians, and perhaps Honest Alfs will soon be made of us all. Let’s hope not.