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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! > Busking Licenses for London Underground...
Busking Licenses for London Underground...
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nacoran
9567 posts
Aug 08, 2017
12:42 PM
Saw this article. Basically, London auditions their buskers to get licenses, and they are holding auditions for the first time in a couple years, so if you are in London and you want to busk the tube, here is your shot...

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-40865017


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Nate
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First Post- May 8, 2009
Honkin On Bobo
1461 posts
Aug 09, 2017
6:02 AM
I think it's sad that government anywhere has got it's paws on this endeavor. I know it's a reality in many places, but it just sucks. Let the people sort it out. So now, instead of the people, via the tip jar/hat deciding who should and shouldn't be on the streets plying their art, we get Murray in the bowtie deciding. For all of us. Great. What's it called The Ministry of Tasteful Busking? Hey that cat MUST be good. I mean he's government approved. Hahahaha. Worse idea than American Idol.

Last Edited by Honkin On Bobo on Aug 09, 2017 6:04 AM
Andrew
1623 posts
Aug 09, 2017
6:25 AM
A friend of mine is a self-taught tenor and he got a license to sing in Covent Garden (this was maybe 20 years ago). But the local shop-keepers complained to the authorities that they couldn't stand the sound of his singing. So he was re-auditioned and the authority agreed with the shop-keepers and took away his license! True story - they even interviewed him on radio 4 or Capital Radio or something.
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Andrew.
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Last Edited by Andrew on Aug 09, 2017 6:26 AM
nacoran
9569 posts
Aug 09, 2017
10:29 AM
Honkin, so how would you run it? There are a limited number of spaces. You can't just do first come first serve on the day (ask drug dealers how that works out when they are fighting over a corner). Do you do a lottery? Do you make people buy the licenses like a cab medallion?

Presumably there is an opportunity for overcite over the board that gives out the licenses. In a crowded space where people have to wait until their train shows up (a captive audience) I don't think you can just let everyone busk. It jams up the system. From the perspective of the potential busker it may seem a little frustrating, but the buskers are the miniscule minority of the people who are going to be sharing that tube on any given day.

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Nate
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First Post- May 8, 2009
barbequebob
3442 posts
Aug 09, 2017
10:52 AM
They do that here in Boston for the MBTA subway system as well and if they didn't, since bands/musicians/poets use battery operated amps and PA's now, it would get crazier than the legendary Maxwell Street scene in Chicago and would be too loud and too raucous and eventually everybody, especially the buskers will also lose.
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Sincerely,
Barbeque Bob Maglinte
Boston, MA
http://www.barbequebob.com
CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
Littoral
1516 posts
Aug 09, 2017
11:33 AM
Honkin, Nacoran asked how you'd do it. If your suggestion to "Let the people sort it out" is serious I don't think that'll work out too well. BBQ's take isn't likely far off. As much as I'd like to I don't have that much faith in people. I certainly don't trust the government but I trust people (without rules) even less.
Andrew
1626 posts
Aug 09, 2017
11:44 AM
I suppose it's closely linked to the government's policy on begging. I see many beggars, but begging does seem to be illegal. If you made busking free and begging not, then all beggars would just sing and claim they were buskers.
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Andrew.
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Honkin On Bobo
1462 posts
Aug 09, 2017
12:13 PM
Well, i'll chalk this one up to - wow I guess everything has changed. It's funny, BBQ mentioned the MBTA subway system. i grew up in the Boston area and rode that very subway system in and out of Boston for a number of years early in my professional life. I saw, listened to and watched a number of acts over the years while waiting for the blue line train to pull up at the State and Government Center stations. Musicians, mimes, joke tellers, poets, magicians, fire eaters and the odd crazy person the nature of whose act was unclear. I'm almost positive there was no busker's license necessary back then. Never saw any busker fights over spots. Nobody pulling a gun a la drug dealer way of settling things. Probably two or three on the platform at once spaced out enough so that each act could do its thing. This would have been the mid-80s. Boston wasn't exactly a small town then.

BBQ's point about the proliferation of amps might be valid. I have no idea. I still say its sad that some bureaucrat is gonna be the arbiter of who is allowed to play in the London tube. That, to me is the antithesis of everything that is, the blues, rock and roll, the arts. Call me crazy, a dinosaur, unrealistic. No Littoral, I don't trust the government more than the people as it relates to this. Yes, if the government has to be involved than it at least should be first come first served for a permit, not auditioning for some bureaucrat.

I always thought of busking as the last bastion of rugged individualism in the music/art world. You didn't need money (other than whatever instruments/props it took to put your show on). You didn't need to know anybody in any official capacity. You didn't even need to be particularly good, although the market would sort that out for you through tips or lack thereof. It was just you, whatever your "art" was, your guts and your wits. Trial and error. What works what doesn't. You figure it out. And yes, even the competition for the best spot...or a spot at all. I guess that's considered naiveté today, or just bad municipal planning. My Bad.

Anyway, not really my problem. i wouldn't be caught dead in the subway anymore, and I don't busk, so in a way I've got no dog in the fight. Yeah, I know....I have no idea why i commented either Hahaha!

Last Edited by Honkin On Bobo on Aug 09, 2017 1:21 PM


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