Diary Of A Busker Day 2354 Thursday April 25th 2024 Winchester.
We’re back to 10 degrees or below so quite a cold day at The Buttercross. The sun was on me when I set up but I kept having to drag everything a foot or so to the right, as the shadow kept moving over me, which made it colder still.
I intended to do an hour and a half at the most then come home for a break but the coinage was so slow, I kept playing and got to the two hour mark when I decided enough was enough and I was going to pack up, go across to Costa and warm up for a bit before resuming here, if someone else hadn’t jumped in the spot…
…and then, just as I was finishing the Gnossienne, a couple came by and asked if I had it on a CD! Well, they were in luck and not only that, they fell for the ‘two CDs for £15, special offer just for today in Winchester’, so I was quids in, because that’s a whopping £13 profit. So they gave me the dosh and also an interesting story, to boot.
They were Steven and Mary and had come over from Carolina to visit the last of their ageing relatives, an aunt who’s in a care home. Steven really liked my Satie interpretation and was asking about my repertoire so I played some very brief snippets of a few others, including Here Comes The Sun, which prompted him to say his father used to be involved with some of the pop magazines of the early sixties and met all the groups, like the Beatles, Rolling Stones, and all the rest.
He worked with Fiona Adams, who was a photographer; he organised the sessions and she took the photos, and one of the sessions was the one that became the shot on the Twist And Shout EP; the famous picture where the Beatles were shown jumping on a derelict site – ‘My dad said to Fiona “just take them out and do something interesting with them” so that’s what she did.’ She also had to pick up George Harrison and take him to a gig because he was late getting somewhere.
Anyway, while we were chatting, I had my hands in my pockets so by the time Steven and Mary left (clutching the two CDs), I was quite warmed up and able to play a bit more, or at least another five minutes…but then that old bloke who is always quite generous and loves dancing came by, donated and sat opposite, so I felt obliged to do a few numbers for him. Oddly enough, he didn’t hang about but I carried on, thinking I might as well make it 2 1/2 hours, have a longish break at Costa, then back out for another hour. So I finished up, packed up and went inside, got a cup of coffee and a piece of carrot cake – and the next time I’m there, I’ll make sure they don’t give me the smallest slice – and settled down.
After half an hour I’m warmed up and thinking of resuming…and it starts drizzling so that was the end of that.