Diary Of A Busker Day 90 Saturday April 30th, Bath (city centre – outside The Pump Room, Time: 6:42-7:55pm.)
A new location in a new town and on approaching the city centre I’m a bit nervous, as I am before busking in any place I haven’t played before. I’m also hungry – I eat my small apple, walking down Gay Street. It’s quite a late one for me – almost seven o’clock and in Winchester there wouldn’t be many about but there are hundreds of pubs and restaurants down here and alot of people about. On other (non-playing) visits, I’ve always noticed someone playing near the Abbey where there are a few benches around a small square, so I head there and,yes – there is someone there, playing a guitar to a backing track. So I walk past this guy and around the square…down a little street and come up outside the Pump Room(s). I remember I played at a wedding here a few years ago, in a loud covers or ‘cabaret’ group, as I call them. Back then, I was inside, now I’m on the other side! I set up against the wall – there’s a bench nearby with a couple of women on it. I start my Bath debut with La Vie En Rose and get a few coins from two Chinese people walking by. In fact most of the people walking by seem to be Chinese! – something else I recall from before. Two young guys, one with a guitar give me some money. I thank them and ask if they are going to do some (busking) now. No they’re not – they’ve done their four hours a week, they only do a day. I ask them what it’s like here, in other words, I’m trying to find out how much they make! After a few minutes of my probing, they say they get “maybe thirty pounds an hour.” That’s really good, I say. I ask their names – Taro, or Taron and Mat – “with one T”. They tell me of when they went busking in the blizzard and did very well, there being no other buskers about. Sympathy money! – like when I did my first day in Southampton and the lady who gave me a pound “for perseverance in the rain” – an utterance I’ll probably never forget. We say goodbye and they head off around the corner towards the Abbey.
Later, three young men walk by. One says “You’re better than me!” I say thanks, then think – I’m assuming he’s another musician but he might be a butcher or work in a shoe shop! Still, it’s a scarcely heard remark. Another group of young guys walk by, one puts some coins in the bucket. I say thanks and he turns around and says “It’s only 3p, sorry – it’s all I’ve got.” That’s honest – he didn’t have to admit it was only 3p. “It’s okay, thanks anyway” I say. Then they stop a bit further on and one of the others gets something out of “3p’s” rucksack. 3p comes back to me – it’s a can of Scrumpy Jack cider and he plonks it in my bucket – “That’s my cider, now you’ve got that and my 3p!” I thank him again and carry on playing but now I look like a tramp with a can of strong cider poking out of my bucket. Even so, I wait five minutes before I take it out and hide it behind my amplifier which isn’t much bigger than the can.
My last aquaintance during my Bath debut is a man who stops to listen across the road for a few minutes…then sits down on the bench and listens for a few more minutes – he’s obviously in no rush to get anywhere. After I finish The Entertainer, he claps and says “That was done by some old blues guy, wasn’t it?” I tell him Scott Joplin wrote it, for the piano. “Yes, I know, but didn’t some blues guy, someone like Robert Johnson do it?” I don’t think so, I say. This man knows I’m an outsider (an outsider in cider!) – “I haven’t seen you here before” he says. “No, I usually play in Winchester, I’m just here for a day or so. I’ll be here tomorrow – if I can get a place for a couple of hours, that is.” This man thinks all the buskers meet up near the Abbey in the morning to work out their times of playing. I’ll have to take my chances, then. Anyway, my aqauintance really thinks I should be playing this stuff in Browns, a local eatery. He gives me the golden compliment, the ultimate accolade – I’ve brightened up his day and made him smile. But it’s time I was away – I have a pressing dinner engagement at an esablishment in five minutes time…and it’s twenty minutes walk away. I pack up while my admirer tells me all about his problems with his teeth and the titanium implants the hospital are going to put in them. I’ve made just over eleven pounds for just over an hour, an acceptable rate for my Bath debut. Yes, a pleasant hour – the only annoyance being a posh man who interupted me mid-song to ask the way to Bath Springs(?) Like many posh people, he has more money than manners.
Earnings: £11.42p + 1 can of Scrumpy Jack cider
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