Diary Of A Busker Day 79 Tuesday April 12th Winchester High Street (1. corner of Marks And Spencer, Time: 2:51-4:35pm, 2. opposite WH Smiths, Time: 5:03-6:20pm.)
It’s a slow start with not more than a meagre £2 in the bucket for twenty minutes of playing. But what’s this I see – a big figure materialising from the gloom of the archway opposite. He’s moving in slow motion, exiting from the mist or steam like some Hollywood action hero. It’s Maurice – from the other day. He’s about sixty-five, tall, well built, bald – bullet headed with a small, military moustache…and wearing slippers. And he’s seen me and he’s on his way over…”How are you my boy?! Have you made any money?!” He takes all his change out and puts it in my bucket and sees how little there is. “What? Is that all? That’s no f****** good, is it?! COME ON PEOPLE, COME AND GIVE THIS MAN SOME MONEY – HE’S OUT HERE PLAYING FOR YOU!” he bellows at the top of his voice, as he does with 90% of what he says. “Don’t you worry, I’ll get them to give you money – it’ll all change now, you’ll see! Come on, over here, he needs MONEY…! Come on, I’ll sing a song, what shall we do?” I suggest La Vie En Rose. “No! I don’t know all the words, come on you people, MONEY! Here him play!” A short Korean man walks by who Maurice knows – “What on earth do you mean by closing down your furniture shop – you know, the one you’ve got up the road. People don’t know where to go now! You’ve caused confusion and pandemonium amongst the masses!” The poor man looks bewildered. He mumbles something. Maurice leans towards him – “Con-fu-sion and pan-de-moniun, you’ve caused CONFUSION AND PANDEMONIUN AMONGST THE MASSES!” The man’s wife turns up. “Tell your husband, he’s caused CONFUSION. CONFUSION AND PANDEMONIUM!, etc…” Next in the firing line – a man about fifty, hair too long, dirty suit, dirty red V-neck sweater. “Why, HELLO my love! and how have you been? (Maurice looks him up and down) Look at your f****** suit! and what’s that?” – he prods the man’s jumper with his walking stick. “You need to get that f****** cleaned, my boy!” An old man stops to put something in the bucket, one of my regulars, always well dressed, wears a flat cap, always very polite, quietly spoken. “Hello, my sweet pea! How are you – are you going to give this man some money – oh, you have! That’s more like it! Were you in the military? – you look very smart.” “Oh yes – in the RAF” he says, “…in 1945. We used to be called The Brylcream Boys.” “Why was that?” I ask him. “We were very smart – in our ties and our hair.” he taps the top of his cap. Maurice takes over – “In the RAF! I was in the forces, in 1963 and when my commanding officer threatened to send me to Algeria, I said “you just do that, you just DO THAT! and you’ll find that I have seven relatives there, who’ll welcome me…”
Maurice’s atom bomb voice attracts attention instantly and there is now a group of teenagers with us. “All you lot, come and give this man some of your money!” They ask me to play Moonage Daydream by David Bowie. I tell them I know the song, but not to play it. They want to see my set list. “James Bond! Yeah, play that!” I play it and the collective sound of me playing, Maurice’s 150 decibel voice, the buses and everything else is deafening. “And how are you?” he asks one of the teenagers – a girl with enourmous breasts and very visible cleavage displayed in boob tube. “I’m fine!” she says. “Yes, I can see you’re fine – and so can HE!” he says, nodding to one of the males in the group who’s ogling them.
Another of my regulars turns up – the man who keeps promising to bring his banjo in for me to tune. He always wears one of those hats Australians wear. He’s drunk and in charge of a Sainsbury’s shopping bag, and leaning over. Maurice grees him – “HEL-LOOOOOW! (He always draws out this word like someone falling off a cliff and shouting Geronimo!) my sweet pea!, and how the f*** are you?!” “I’ve just bought some food, I’m a bit hungry” the man says. “You’re a bit f****** drunk as well, my sweet pea! Ha Ha!” Maurice turns to me – “Do you know Islands In The Sun?” “Uh, no I don’t.” He belts it out in an earth shaking bass register “THIS IS MY ISLAND IN THE SUN – WHERE MY PEOPLE HAVE TOILED SINCE TIME BEGAN – I MAY SAIL ON MANY A SEA – THE SHORES WILL ALWAYS BE HOME TO ME, then the song BEGINS! – OH, ISLAND IN THE SUN…” “What about Ol’ Man River?”, I say and start it. He starts singing – “It’s too f****** low – that’s Paul Robeson!” I try and raise the key but mess up the chords. I suggest Yellow Bird, as I detect a certain admiration for Calypso in Maurice (Islands In The Sun, after all). I start it. “YELLOW BIRD! HIGH UP IN BANANA TREE…DID YOUR LADY FRIEND LEAVE THE NEST AGAIN, THAT IS VERY SAD, MAKE ME FEEL SO BAD!…” Maurice belts it out, his hand resting on my right shoulder, his head bellowing a few inches from my ear. “You’ve got a good voice, Maurice!” I say. “I know, and once, when I was waiting for my money, I stood outside Neros’ and made seven pounds in FIFTEEN minutes! That was for my breakfast!” “That’s good money for fifteen minutes” I say. He actually told me this story a few months ago! “Then you sang for your lunch, and then your dinner, right?” “Yes, I did!” His mobile phone rings, he’s got it set so it rings at top volume, I reckon it’s so he can hear it over his own voice, wherever he is. He takes it out of his pocket, holds it high, stretches his arms wide, walks a few feet forward and opens his throat – “SOMEBODY LOVES ME! SOMEBODY LOVES ME!!” This cracks me up, and a few people in the fallout zone, too. Meanwhile, the drunk man has sat down just in front of me with his shopping bag and there are now two of the local tramps/beggars/drongos who walk past me several times a day – they have now joined our little gathering… Well, this is all very entertaining and often amusing but people are avoiding the immediate area around me and not giving any money – they can’t even see my orange bucket. It’s just become a bunch of freaks…and I don’t want to be one of them! I have to get out of here. Fortunately, some of the freaks get bored and wander off. I like Maurice, but this is becoming HIS show – The Maurice Show and not mine. After awhile, it’s me, Maurice and the banjo-less man on the floor, so the freak show is getting smaller – not small enough though. Maurice has a suggestion – “We could go travelling! I’ve been to France, Spain…” Maurice wants me to see something – I have to lean my guitar against the window and walk a few feet to the right. “See that? That’s mine.” He points to a huge camper van parked just beyond the arch. “See all those stickers on the door?” – there are lots of small stickers – “One for every country I’ve been to!” I don’t really want to go travelling with Maurice, my head would explode! Eventually he goes, his voice shaking the ground and nearby buildings and leaving me with a headache.
Now it’s just my drunk regular, still on the pavement. He gets a bit morose – “I wish I was gifted, like you. I can play the banjo a bit, but not much…” I interupt him, “Whoa! wait a minute, I’M not gifted – I just practise alot. You just have to practise. If you want to learn how to play an instrument enough, you can do it. I tell you, it takes a lifetime, and even that’s not long enough!” He says he has a friend who plays the piano, he has “natural talent”. “He’s still had to learn – he’s still had to spend hours every day – you can bet on it”, I say. You don’t learn to play an instrument by sitting down drunk on the pavement, I’m pretty sure of that, too.
I’m packed up and heading up the street to play somewhere else – if I can find a busker-less spot, and my drunk’s walking next to me. He wants me to join him in the Royal Oak. “Sorry, thanks but I’ve got to stay and play and I don’t drink – never during the day, anyway.” The spots at either end of the covered section are taken but I’m not going back to the corner, not today! I tell him I’m going to walk about for a bit, then maybe one of the spots will be free. I manage to shake him off – he’s a nice bloke and is always friendly to me but I’m out here to make some money, however little. I’m not here to socialise! I take a toilet/small apple break for half an hour, come back and play an uneventful session opposite WH Smiths. In fact, the most interesting thing was that I was given an East Caribbean One Dollar coin – same shape as a 50p coin, by a bunch of young foreign students who were watching me from the bench. I only noticed the coin later when I was counting the money at home.
Earnings: £24.68p
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