Day 2719
Saturday July 18th 2026
Winchester
I start up just before 5 o’clock – quite a late start in The Square. For the first half hour I get a grand total of one pound, then a couple of girls (aged 7 or 8 maybe) start dancing in front of me, soon to be joined by two toddler girls from one of the Three Joes tables. The youngest is very sweet. She has blonde hair tied with two pigtails and is just very funny, moving her arms up and down and attracting the attention of lots of people at the tables. Until these four appeared, I’m more or less ignored but the girls clap at the end of each song, which then gets me some attention/coinage.
A funny incident. One of the Old Vine barmaids comes out and says ‘There’s a pint waiting for you behind the bar. A man bought it for you the other day but you didn’t claim it.’ But I did have it, didn’t I? This was when I paused on the way back home and another Old Vine person – a man – came out and said the same thing (a bloke had bought me a pint but I hadn’t had it) and it was then that I said I’d have it now and he brought it out for me. I explain this to the girl, saying ‘I’m too honest, aren’t I? I could have had another free pint!’ She laughed at that.
Another funny moment is when a man gives me a fiver (things are definitely looking up) and thanks me for “enhancing our evening”. I thank him and say ‘It’s nice when people come up to say things like that because sometimes no one comes up to me so I never know if I’m doing a good job or not.’ ‘Yeah, that’s because you’re scary-looking!’ he says. Haha.
And here’s the first of two odd coincidences. The Old Vine bloke who brought out the pint was having a sit down break on the bench on my left – the one in front of the pub – and he’s obviously seen my album propped up and says ‘Billy Balloon, what’s the story behind that, then?’ So I told him it’s a character in a Scott Walker song, Plastic Palace People, from 1968. And then, not five minutes later, a young man comes up and he’s got my bandcamp site on his phone and he’s just bought the bloody album! This is such a rare occurrence, I’ll mention his name – Petr De-Monderik. I mean, no one buys that album and suddenly in the space of five minutes, those two things happen. I’m especially grateful for the second, of course. Petr is a very nice man and we chat about how records are so much more satisfying than listening to stuff via the internet.
‘You can hold a record. If you listen on line, it’s gone after you hear it. There’s nothing there. With a record, you can hold it and have it forever, you know?’ he says and I couldn’t agree more.
A man comes up, gives me a tenner and says ‘Have you been told to turn down? Because we can’t hear you over there’ – nods towards the Old Vine. ‘Really?’ I say. ‘Yeah really, we can’t hear anything at all. We thought someone had asked you to turn down.’
Now, I’ve been wondering for awhile about this because I’ve always thought the Blackface amp setting on the Cube Street is very quiet, even though the volume’s on almost full. I haven’t had it on the Brit Combo setting because it just didn’t sound as good as it did on the MicroCube. But I know that setting is loud enough so I switch it to that setting and suddenly I’m twice as loud…but still not loud enough because the man, now back at his table, has raised his arm and is pointing his finger to the sky – he wants it louder still! Well, he’s a punter and he’s given me £10 so he gets it louder and I get the thumbs up. Right then, we’re on Brit Combo from now on. The Arse ain’t gonna like this! His shop is now shut for the evening so he’s got a partial reprieve.
Anyway, this man then comes up and gives me yet another tenner – ‘We can hear you now, play on!’ Now, I was about to pack up because I’ve hit the two hour mark but he’s essentially paid me for another half hour at least and the customer is always right, right? So, onwards and upwards…another man, a tourist, stops on his way to the cathedral. He thanks me for the playing, then adds ‘They should really sort this bit out. I mean, they should put up a big screen so people can watch the football. I mean, I know England’s out of the World Cup but people would still like to watch it.’ A good point but there’s no way the council are going to do that now, and then tear it down in a couple of days, after the final. Maybe they can do it in four years.
Connor, who I met a year ago in O’Neill’s comes up – he had to tell me who he was as I’d forgotten! ‘How are you? I’ve started playing the guitar, just the basics. You know Nothing Else Matters, Metallica? Can you do that one?’ ‘No, not yet but I remember you mentioning that when we met.’
‘Yeah, it’s got some good picking there, you know?’ I say I’ll look into it when I get home.
I almost forgot, the bloke who gave me £20 also bought me a pint, which was brought out just after I’d put the guitar down – that was a 3 1/2 hour session!
And now the piece de resistance. While packing up, a woman comes over from the Winchester Orangery –
‘I don’t want to be morose…but you played that song Cavatina, John Williams.’
‘No, I haven’t played that.’
‘Yes you did, Cavatina.’
‘Well…no. I know it but I haven’t played it today, honestly.’
‘Yes you did.’
‘I’m really sorry, but I didn’t.’
Then she hums something that sounds like the Romance de Espana melody. Now, I played that a few minutes before I finished. I’d been playing it on the nylon string guitar at home because Gabby across the path likes it – or her mother likes it, but I’d never played it out here until a few minutes ago, which is what I say to this woman.
‘Oh my god, when you played that, we all froze because it was my husband’s funeral twenty years ago today and when you started playing that we couldn’t believe it.’
‘Wow,’ I said, ‘Isn’t that amazing? I only played that because I was running out of stuff to play but I swear I’ve never played it before, anywhere, until now.’
‘Oh my goodness, my two children, we all froze…I mean, twenty years to the day, in fact, right now – his funeral was in the evening, like right about now. My husband was in you!’
So, a memorable day in a few respects, not least because of the total coinage which, with the album sales comes to £83.20. I’ll get that album sent off to Petr promptly Monday morning.