I’ve noticed quite a few new buskers of various sorts around downtown this spring. It’s something I like to see and I feel they add to our quality of life. Most of the new additions have seemed pretty talented to me. Some are not musicians, but rather artists of a different sort. I’d have a hard time categorizing one of those featured today. We still have a magician or sometimes two, a couple of balloon artists and we now have a portrait artist I’d not noticed before.
If there isn’t any other reason to expand our downtown footprint, the buskers would make a good one. They sometimes fall over each other attempting to find a spot. Bill and Jake have more or less left Market Square for a spot on Gay Street. When concerts are scheduled for the Market Square Stage, it gets tough to be a busker. Some enterprising and talented (please) person needs to stake out the porch at the new Coffee and Chocolate location.
A couple of these guys are worth a few extra words. The two guys with percussion and guitar are really talented. They are pictured here on Union Avenue, but I’ve heard them play from the Market Square Stage, as well. The guitar is amplified and the sound is a strange ambient, atmospheric amalgam of styles, at once jammy and new age. The percussion keeps the sound on the tracks and the two together are quite pleasant. I can see how some people might find them repetitive, but I find them soothing and cool. And apparently so do a lot of other people – their bucket was full by the time I walked away from these shots.
The pirate is your standard issue statue guy, not moving as he stands tall over his treasure chest. He’s quite good at it and the make-up is superb. I think it has to be hard to get made up that way and stand perfectly still while people poke, tease and otherwise try to annoy you into moving. It’s certainly worth a dollar or two if you take a picture, so don’t take advantage of the guy.
Purple Man is what we call the guy who wears a lot of that color. He’s a piece of work. He walks out like a robot and stands still until approached and then bends down to kiss the hand of the ladies or shake the hands of the men. He’s also apt to follow people about and that gets a little freaky, though I think it’s all in good fun. I saw one woman, who looked as if she hadn’t run in years, run all the way across the square. More than one child broke into tears. But the guy had instant attention and a bucket full of money in a very short time.
The guitar case isn’t a busker, but it semi-related and I thought it sort of poignant as it leaned against the recycle bins. Maybe it was found by a busker a little harder up and got recycled. Have a good weekend, everybody.
