Is it just me or......

[JSngry]

The technology is a great tool, but I miss the heart.

The challenge for all of us is to put it there. It can be done, if for no other reason than it has always been done. Humans will get what humans need, and humans need heart.

This is going to be an ongoing thing, to be sure, but we're really just at the very beginning of it. The "Digital Age" began in earnest, what, about 20-25 years ago, right? Not even 1/100 of a bat of the eye in the evolution of humanity.

Has the technology evolved faster than we've been able to healthily absorb it? I think it has. But I don't think that it's going to stay that way forever, and that's what we're going to do - absorb it, not abandon it, and make it work the way we need for it to work in human terms. We're not going to have a collective awakening one day and say, "Hey! Screw all this convenience and shit, let's go back to the old days!"

Hore-drawn carriages ain't coming back, big bands ain't coming back, and a non-digitalized future ain't going awaay. Is it a fundamental change? Of course it is. But there ain't gonna be any stopping it. Adapt to it (or even better, help shape it!) or be prepared to spend your (as in our) remaining days as a spectator whose seats keep moving further & further into the upper deck.

[JSngry]

How do you 'get inside that eworld musically' without being a phoney or like those ridiculous guys we used to see at Bar-Mitzvhahs years ago trying to act young dancing the Frug with their paunches sticking out of their gold lame Nehru jackets?

That, my friend, is the question to which I'm looking for an answer. There may or may not be a satisfactory one, but otoh, nothing ventured...

I'm thinking, though, that one way is to look at certain things as being the "new way" of doing the same old thing and taking it from there, with an attitude that even though I'm old and experienced in the old world, I still gotta keep humble in this new one until I learn what's what. And stay humble, just like in this one, only moreso. Because we are getting in after the show's started, if you know what I mean.

One heartening thought, though - that attitude of humility automatically excludes the paunchy Nehrus!

Edited August 7, 2006 by JSngry

[Jim R]

humans need heart.

What they really need is hea-ea-ea-eart. Miles and miles and miles of hearrrrt. Just when the odds are sayin' you'll never win, that's when the... Sorry.

[Free For All]

Hore-drawn carriages ain't coming back.

That's a shame. I would liked to have seen that.

[fasstrack]

humans need heart.

What they really need is hea-ea-ea-eart. Miles and miles and miles of hearrrrt. Just when the odds are sayin' you'll never win, that's when the... Sorry.

That's the chuckle I needed today....

[JSngry]

Hore-drawn carriages ain't coming back.

That's a shame. I would liked to have seen that.

I guess in some Third World countries...

[Dr. Rat]

This is an interesting topic to me as I've always had an ambivalent relationship with buskers.

I grew up in a city, and I remember very few street musicians when I was a kid. A few times in town I remember running into street performers of various sorts and my parents' attitude toward them was essentially "it's a scam--it's a way of ripping you off (three card monte) or distracting you so someone can snatch your purse or pick your pocket."

I more or less adopted that attitude, I suppose: taking up pavement space and creating sidewalk congestion (I'm claustrophobic) is an imposition; demanding my attention is an imposition (some musicians seem certain that they have something more worthy of my attention than whatever is preoccupying me at the moment, but usually I find I disagree); playing crappy music, as most street musicians do, is an imposition, too, but probably the least of them.

Since moving to a much smaller town, though, I've softened a lot toward street musicians. First probably because I know most of them now, and second because it's regulated here and I find that I have a choice when I walk by someone busking: they are set back enough from the pavement enough that I can comfortably ignore them or give them the nod and move on; and they are out of traffic enough that I can pull out of the way and engage with them if I want.

I think for me a lot of it is a space issue: you need an area that has traffic, but has a way of getting out of it; a place where an audience can engage with you, but can do it on their own terms.

Probably not easy to find such places these days as public space disappears.

Anyhow, that's my two cents.

[Rooster_Ties]

I've almost always given street musicians a dollar or two, particularly because I see them fairly rarely (more often when I'm out of town, than here in Kansas City). If I saw them all over the place - day in, day out - that might get expensive. But as it it, I'm probably only laying down $5 or maybe $10 per year.

And if somebody can actually play -- I've even been known to give 'em $5 (probably done that 4 or 5 times in my life).

Then there was a tenor player I saw in Glasgow on my honeymoon (back in 2001) who was clearly somebody with REAL chops (and not afraid to solo for two or three choruses - over changes he could clearly only hear in his head (though I could start to hear them too from what he was playing).

That guy I think I gave a 10 pound note to (this was about 5 years ago, so would that have been about $15?? -- I forget the exchange rate).

Edited August 8, 2006 by Rooster_Ties

[David Ayers]

Just to put a dampner on things, I have to say I find street musicians pretty intrusive. I prefer to walk down the high street where I live quietly without incessant noise. This time of year my tiny city boasts penny whistles, singing guitarists, violins, flutes, Peruvian bands, fourth tenors etc etc etc, all brought in by tourists. Some use amplification and/or backing tracks - even more crass.

[Rooster_Ties]

FWIW, I'm talking about UNamplified street musicians playing acoustic instruments only (or only moderately amplified -- for instruments like electric guitar, that have to have at least some amplification).

I'm MUCH less likely to give anything to street musicians who really impose themselves on the space they play in. I'm no fan of that.