Street music makes me unusually happy. It’s one of the reasons I try my best to walk or bike when I’m in a city instead of taking a bus or another form of transportation — leaving you stuck in a state of transit until your destination. And in fact one of my only regrets from my semester abroad was not getting a street music license from the Singaporean government (I learned of the possibility while talking to a street musician in late April).
In the past I’ve tried to “deconstruct” what goes behind my awe of street musicians, which has roughly boiled down into the following ideas:
Confidence over competence
Soundwaves, democratized (for artist and audience alike)
A remaking of identity
Confidence over competence
TLDR: it’s cool that street musicians can make a great performance merely with their confidence and performance, rather than exploiting any outstanding technical ability.
I admit that I used to see street music with a weird disdain, especially when I played the instrument of choice. I’d sometimes see a piano act and note to myself that I could do the same, effectively looking for a reason to disregard and move on with my day.
Yet I never actually did the same — I never actually performed myself, as much as I “could have.” I proposed to my scholarship bringing my oboe to the Camino to play street music after each day of walking, based on the very flawed inspiration of a person who walked the path only with the income from violin busking. I decided the day before I left that my backpack did not have enough space. For this summer, I proposed buying an old saxophone to perform street music for a month in Asia. I asked around, but some part of me was not confident enough to put myself out there.
I did something close, though, performing in a band for our residential college end-of-semester formal. As a first time vocal performer, I learned a perverse lesson: it was easier to exude confidence and have fun when I placed higher standards on my performance than my vocals. The distinction is subtle but it’s the more complicated version of “fake it til you make it.”
absolute highlight of the semester
I started to enjoy street music more when I focused less on technical ability (which was often very high regardless) and note to myself the performative moves of the artist — how they carry themselves, how they engage the audience. This is where street music comes alive. That an amateur street musician can captivate an audience does not imply a “dullness” to the activity; it instead implies its vibrancy.
found this awesome guitarist in Kyoto, Japan
This realization wouldn’t have been possible, I think, if I had not picked up new instrumentation in college. Before I turned 18, I had played the oboe for 7 years and roughly liked it, but I could not disassociate my interest with my ability. I had no clue how much of my interest in playing the oboe had to do with the fact that I could produce a half-decent sound.
In Spring 2022, I picked up alto sax on a very short notice for a semester of marching band where I performed at least 5x as many hours as I rehearsed. And I loved it, especially the choreography (I also loved that no one could actually hear what my instrument sounded like). And then as mentioned, I last semester performed vocals for the first time.
Soundwaves, democratized
The construction of concert halls is often framed as an investment into acoustic quality — and not enough framed as an investment into acoustic exclusivity. The very utopian side of me finds it weird to gatekeep sound, but obviously, I also support that musicians make careers out of their work.
But much like free walking tours for tourists and travelers, street musicians give an unlimited audience the chance to hear and watch their work — if they so desire, said audience can then opt-in to compensating performers. And they certainly don’t have to pay as much as they might for a performance hall ticket, where all the acoustic engineering is folded into the price tag. They don’t have to take 3 hours out of their night either.
found this performer in Hong Kong
For performers, street music might not be a self-sufficient source of income, but the activity doesn’t have to be their full-time job either. The Singaporean musician I talked to mentioned that he uses street music as a side hustle in addition to his full-time job. His 5-9, as they call it. Depending on governmental regulations, pretty much anyone can start singing on the street.
I’m a fan of the transience of it all.
A remaking of identity
Street performance has been around for millennia — stretching all the way back to ancient Rome. It is one of the oldest activities there is.
Musicians have in the past often been conflated with beggars, people just trying to squeeze a buck or two out of their surrounding community. That said, I speculate this conflation has diminished as street music, as a result of viral culture, has become more socially proximate to the average person.
To elaborate: with TikTok making it easier for anyone to go viral with their music, more people from diverse backgrounds are taking the leap to perform on the street, and so the image of street music has steadied as a result. If my brother starts playing because why not, then I can’t keep calling street musicians beggars.
I have only anecdotal evidence to support this, so don’t take me too seriously. I’ve just been fascinated at the wide range of backgrounds I have encountered in listening to street music. I also floated the idea of a “Humans of” but for street musicians and almost actually made that my project for the month of May, but alas.
I start work on Monday in DC but browsing jazz and karaoke events in the city had me thinking about street music and ways to get involved. I sit once again on the edge of “try something out, find an audience” and “it’s too much work damn it.” I guess we’ll see what happens.