A BRIEF HISTORY OF BUSKING: FROM YONKS TO YIKES

1860 ORGAN GRINDER

Buskers, such as I, have been around for yonks. The term, busking, was first coined (pun intended) in the 1860s, from the Spanish, buscar (to seek), in reference to the Roma as they trekked along the Mediterranean Coast, singing and playing their lutes and harps for the Spanish and French and any others who would listen along their way.

Whenever I busk, I stand as a proud member of the buskerhood (pun intended), having an aggregate of antecessors:

In 11^th Century Russia, we were known as the Skomorokh.

SKOMOROKH

We, Bhavai, a popular folk theatre in India and Pakistan, have a 700-year history.

BHAVAI

In Medieval France we were known Troubadours and Jongleurs.

TROUBADOURS

In Old Germany, we were the Minnesingers and Spielleute.

MINNESINGERS

We were the Chindon’ya in mid 19^th Century Japan.

CHINDON'YA

In Mexico we were, and still are, the Mariachis.

MARIACHIS

And Christmastime we are still A-Wassailing. Figgy pudding, anyone?!

WASSAILING

Buskers take many shapes and setups. I have seen puppeteers, knife throwers, living statues, keyboard players, accordion players, face-painters, freestyle rappers, print sellers, poetasters, magicians, ouija board readers and taro card readers. The popular pitches for these buskers tend to be in public places having large volumes of pedestrian traffic, subways, train stations, and urban parks.

LIVING STATUE 

My business model for busking is as follows.

I tend to loll always somewhere outdoors, usually in front of a vendor or in a park, either around noon hour or suppertime. Cap-a-pie, I am hatless with tousled hair, wearing either a white long-sleeved collared shirt or t-shirt, faded blue jeans, and leather work boots.

I strum my guitar whilst blowing my harp, but sometimes I play my banjo. Other times I play my didgeridoo. And when I am weary of making music (Yes, it happens!), I just take out my pencil and sketchpad and draw people’s portraits.

DRAWING IN MARRAKESH

When I am busking some people, especially dance, will dance to my songs. Some people want selfies, some people want to play my guitar (which is not always a grrrr), some people just to chitter-chatter. 

The times they are a changin.’ The artisti di strada have been performing for yonks, but nowadays some of our ilk are ditching the street to test-drive the toll roads on the information superhighway. These cyber buskers are uploading their selfie-videos to YouTube, and then wait for the consumer cryptocurrency deposits to their PayPal accounts. I am not a cyber busker, but I will neither besmirch nor belaud those of us who are. I am just an old-school busker thrumming at the nexus between time past and time future.

YIKES.

BUSKING IN AMSTERDAM MANY YEARS AGO

BUSKING IN MARRAKESH