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Busking is the practice of performing in public places to receive donations of money. Those engaging in this practice are called buskers.

The performance is often musical, but juggling, comedy, magic and forms of performance art such as living statues are also displayed.

Contents 1 People 2 Places and performance 3 Income 4 Pitch 5 Noted practitioners 6 External links

People

Many people perform on the street for a variety of reasons. Children may busk to earn some extra pocket-money, and to practice their talent in front of an audience.

Some otherwise unemployed people may busk during the day to earn some "tax-free" money. However, in some cities, such as New Orleans, street performers are licensed and taxed.

Professional buskers make a living out of performing on the streets. Some of them report their income to the relevant authorities; some do not.

Many buskers travel the world, performing at various festivals (such as the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, where street performers can perform at one of three allocated spots on the Royal Mile) and busking competitions.

Places and performance

Popular busking spots tend to be public places with large volumes of foot traffic, such as shopping malls (although this is often not permitted), exterior supermarket thoroughfares, subway/metro stations, and busy sidewalks or civic squares.

Many cities encourage buskers as they provide form of entertainment and are considered a tonic to the stresses of shopping and commuting, an influence which is favourable for shopkeepers. Some cities require that the busker obtain a license (although this is often enforced intermittently); some cities reserve certain high-traffic areas for "approved" buskers and even publish schedules of performances.

Income

During busy times of the day, buskers can earn a large hourly rate. This is naturally not a constant amount, but varies with time and place.

Pitch

A pitch is an area where buskers play. Good pitches are hard to come by and generally competed for by other buskers. The best pitches are where there is heavy pedestrian traffic and minimal noise interference. It is generally unacceptable to hold a pitch for longer than a few hours if another busker wishes to play. However, career buskers usually maintain a certain right-of-pitch over a hobbying busker. A compromise is usually agreed between competing buskers.

Noted practitioners

Many performers who later rose to greater prominence spent time as buskers. Noted examples include:

• Barenaked Ladies
• Beck
• David Byrne
• Bob Dylan
• Moxy Früvous
• Ted Hawkins
• Penn and Teller
• Damien Rice
• River Phoenix
• Rockapella
• Damo Suzuki
• Guster
• Hayley Westenra
• Mary Lou Lord
• Violent Femmes

External links

• streetnote — recording street music in the USA
• Busker Central — includes photo and video galleries
• "Striving to make music under the streets of NYC" article on Busking from MSNBC
• Music Under New York, schedule of busking in New York City
• Performers Network

This article is based on the article "Busking" from Wikipedia - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License. Here you find the list of authors of this article. The article can only edited within Wikipedia. Edit this article in Wikipedia.