Today it was my first time busking. I did it in a small city, near of the kibbutz where I’m staying right now (in Israel).
There is a short pedestrian crossing, where there are some restaurants and pubs, and I played over there.
Today was a holiday, so, a lot of people was walking on that street.
When I just started playing I was rather nervous, shaking a bit, but after awhile, I gained in confidence, and I started enjoying it!
It was a lot of fun and a great experience.
I also earned quite a lot of coins, and a few nice compliments of the people.
Cool! I’ve busked with my band before (been doing it a lot lately) and it’s awesome! Never done it myself though… I imagine if I did I’d stick to the low whistle though… it plays by itself (with no accompaniment) better than the high whistle in my opinion.
The most successful street entertainer I ever saw was a guy who could make the back of his jacket leap up and down in time to music whilst playing a whistle. He was surrounded by a huge crowd of people chucking money to him.
I said ‘Do you earn a living doing that?’
He said ‘Yes, this my livelihood.’
You make more money when you’re smiling, even if it’s only with your eyes. (might be a general rule about life, actually)
Donors want to know that you’re good, not that you’re needy. Busking isn’t begging. Salt the hat with larger coins or bills, not small change. Seeing that you’re doing well reassures the punters that you’re good.
Play for yourself. You’ll do a better job at #1 when you’re playing the music you enjoy.
Play your best stuff, but don’t play the best 90 seconds of your best stuff, even if you’re in a place that people walk through in 60 seconds. Play the whole thing, and then play something different.
People that want to stop you and talk about what you’re playing will never pay for the privilege, or the time you’ve lost talking to them.
Not when someone is disrespectful enough to interrupt you while you are playing. It’s not usually meant to be, of course, but it is rude, whether you are playing for money or not. IMO, Being gracious with them is a virtue, but it is good to let them know that you’d prefer next time that they wait until you have finished the tune.
When somebody stops me playing to talk, about 50% of the time I get a $5 bill out of it, if not something bigger. Sometimes, I wind up making useful connections, or just meeting cool people. Sometimes, I wind up getting something valuable, like the time a guy gave me a Pathfinder boehm system flute (they sell for about $60 used). Or the time a guy wound up giving me a guitar, then later buying me a $170 Chieftain high D, after already giving me $5 for stopping to talk to him. I find that, overall, it’s worth it to stop and talk to people.
As for putting money in your own hat/tip jar/whatever, I always just use a single $1 bill for seed money. I just want to say “this is where the money goes”. I find that works well enough.
Some coins, sometimes one or two 50 rouble bills, and a big pack of tens is what we get.