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Via the Omniscient Mussel (which always takes me 5,923 attempts to spell correctly), Tasmin Little (the violinist who pulled a UK version of the Joshua Bell busking stunt) is releasing her first album in four years completely free, gratis, etc. It’ll be up on her website “early next week”.
And while you wait for that, here she is serenading a cafe:
There is something distinctly bizarre about classical music videos.
Courtesy of Sonic Granades I discovered that the Independent, a British newspaper, did their own version of the Joshua Bell experiment. For the uninitiated, the general idea is to send some ultra-famous musician out into the wilds of a city to go busking. After they play for 45 minutes we observe how many people actually stopped to listen, find out it’s about 0%, and despair at the state of the world. This time it’s with the violinist Tasmin Little.
Well… this one has a bit more of a positive attitude about it, even if the total cash received and number of heads turned were comparable. Interestingly, it’s the young people who actually stopped and stopped and chucked cash in the receptacle, not the older audience who “were of the same demographic group that flocked to hear her play a concerto at a sold-out Queen Elizabeth Hall just two months ago”. Isn’t that cool? There’s hope for us younguns yet!
What I like about this compared to the original, is that they actively acknowledge the fact that performing on the commuter trail, with people rushing past to get places, isn’t going to result in the most receptive audience. It’s not the most ideal choice of location:
“The ground is amply layered with pigeon shit, blankets belonging to the homeless lie scrunched in a corner, and no doubt the place is used as an impromptu loo by Friday night binge-drinkers.”
They emphasise the glimmers that the performance gathers, the kid who tugs against her determined mother to stay and listen, the people who shyly hang around out of the direct orbit of Little (aren’t we English fantastically awkward?), the tourist who pretends to conduct along with the performance. Little also seems a lot more sporting: switching into a rendition of Happy Birthday for a kid whose intrigue leads her right up to center-stage, and demanding “Give us a copper!” to a group of ogling construction workers. In short, she seems way more comfortable and aware of the rules of her milieu than Joshua did.
Basically, this version of the experiment is far more prepared to accept the fact that people are not going to stop for world-class music if they are focused on other, more pressing, more immediate things. The appreciation of great music and rushing to get to work on time aren’t really compatible. Perhaps that’s why the children, with nowhere to rush off to and no timetable to keep, were some of the most enthusiastic listeners.