Diary Of A Busker Day 267 Thursday August 9th 2012 Winchester High Street 1. Opposite Oxfam, Time: 2:01-3:21pm, 2. Opposite Bellis, Time: 3:47-5:16pm
My first day out since Sunday as I’ve been trying to rest my finger and it seems OK now, but I’ll only be able to tell by coming out here. Nick, the “sad man” from way back early last year, walks by during Here Comes The Sun, holds his arms wide open, looks at the sky and says, ‘Yeah, you want to keep it light and mellow. People want that, not too loud.’ Thanks for the tip. I often wonder if I should tell him about the bit I wrote about him that was in the article last year. I wonder what he would say.
I try out a new number, Ne Me Quitte Pas, by the late, great Jacques Brel. In fact, I can do two versions; the original in French and the English translation – If You Go Away. Ha Ha! – the music’s the same! I’m about twenty seconds into the original, then I mess it up…but not before a woman says, ‘Ah, Ne Me Quitte Pas.’ Good – she identified the correct version! Maria, who sang with Dean Martin, comes by, glances in the bucket and says how mean people here are – not like in Jersey, where she lives. She gives me a five pound note, asks for a pound back, says I’m a nice man and kisses me on the forehead! A couple come up; the man has long, blonde hair with a fair amount of white and I know he’s a musician before he opens his mouth. The growing old disgracefully sort. He likes my guitar, says he’s got ONE-HUNDRED AND FIFTEEN and starts listing them – ‘a 335…five Strats…a 1960 Les Paul,’ at which point I ask him to stop. He ignores me and carries on ‘…three Gretches; a Tennessean, Anniversary…’ I ask him AGAIN to stop – “I mean it! can you STOP? I really DO MEAN IT!’ He ignores me, gets out his phone and starts showing me photos! I have a thought. I reckon I can beat him at this game, although I hate to sink down to this level. ‘Whoa, wait! Right, have you got a Rickenbacker 12-string?’ ‘Uh…no.’ ‘Well, I HAVE!’ So there. There’s nothing worse than a guitar bore. Especially one intent on boring me with all one-hundred and fifteen of them. He wanders off, muttering something about ONCE having a Rickenbacker 12-string. ‘Once’ is no good to me, pal.
After an hour and twenty minutes, my finger’s OK but I’m going to have to watch it in Yellow Bird and a couple of others I have to barre the notes. Tammy’s definitely out – ‘Tammy, you’re barred from here!’ I take a break and, lo and behold, who do I bump into in the alleyway, waiting for his wife to come out of the toilets, but Mr. Guitar, and with no prompting he says, ‘Yeah, I’ve still got a record deal, at the grand old age of fifty-six.’ (I notice he talks r-e-a-l-l-y s-l-o-w like Keith Richards) ‘Really?’ ‘Yeeah.’ ‘Who’s that with, then?’ ‘Acorn Music Group…yeeahh, I’m just one my way to my studio.’ ‘You’ve got your own studio?’ ‘Yeeeaahh. Just finishing my album. Just putting on the vocals, harmonies…things like that, you know.’ ‘Yeah, right…great…well, don’t be late for your studio, see ya!’
At my second location, I arrive at the same time as an artist is setting up his easel. He’s about seventy, maybe a bit older, shock of white hair, and beard. A pleasant and friendly looking chap, I decide. I ask if he minds me playing for a bit; he doesn’t, he’s heard me before and likes what I play. He shows me a brilliant sketch he’s done of some buildings near the cathedral and tells me about some other work he’s done for the council – ‘I can put much more into a drawing than you’d get in a photo. So I can do a sketch of Winchester with a motorway through it, the whole view, which is what the planners want to see. I had to do that. We talk about busking; how there are good days and bad days and there seems to be no logic in how it works out. He tells me about his brother, who’s eighty now. He says he used to busk and would make a lot more when he took his teeth out so that’s what he started doing!
Earnings: £37.16 + 1 CD