THE BUSKING PROJECT
We exist to promote, celebrate and defend buskers with tech, advocacy, research and opportunities.
Use busk.co to get hired for events, cashless payments and sell music.
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Our Technology: Cashless Payments
busk.co gives buskers the ability to get tipped quickly and securely via Apple Pay, Google Pay and PayPal.
An easy way to find (and hire) unique talent everywhere
Post your event, anywhere in the world, and we’ll help you track down the best talent.

Sell your music
straight to their phones
Sell your albums on the world’s only platform designed for street sales. Audiences can purchase albums in a few clicks, then instantly stream and download them.
Mobile tips in the street
Using “Stripe”, we provide an easy, secure way of tipping buskers with Apple Pay and Android Pay, PayPal and cards. And we don’t take a commission.

BuskPay: Signage made Simple.
We have produced a powerful range of high-quality, durable, lightweight, and waterproof signs that use QR and NFC technology to get you tipped.
Just buy a sign, display it in the street and significantly increase how much you earn per show with our road-tested and busker-approved system.
Our Mission
Busking is a respectable and sustainable art form with a rich legacy. Street performance brings equity and colour to our communities. And it provides their environment with significant cultural, social and economic benefits.
Our mission is to promote that value with stakeholders, drive protection under law and support buskers’ efforts to build sustainable careers. We are guided by values of transparency, trust and collaboration.
A “COMMUNITY INTEREST” COMPANY
We are a CIC dedicated to one community: street performers.
No ads, no investors
We refuse to display ads, accept for-profit investments or do any work that does not directly benefit street performers. The Busking Project CIC is a committed non-profit staffed by a team of volunteers, advocates and staff who are here for the love of busking.

Unforgettable events.
Buskers make an activation interactive, an event unique, a party memorable. They’re the most engaging artists on the planet. We’ve curated events for clients of all sizes, gone on tour in Eastern Europe, filmed a music video in Singapore, run competitions, produced festivals and found performers all over the world – no event is too big or too small.


Community funded
We’ve been funded by donations, two major grant makers (Social Tech Trust and Paul Hamlyn Foundation) and various crowdfunding campaigns. All our profit-making endeavours (like booking events) directly benefit street performers.

Mission-lead
We started by filming 300 buskers in 30 countries. We discovered that buskers everywhere are facing the same two existential threats: cashless payments and criminalisation. Our motivation is to help fix those two problems. That’s why we exist.
CLIENTS WE’VE WORKED WITH BEFORE







OUR
MANTRA
Buskers are buskers; there is no difference between one and another, regardless of discipline, reputation or number of years spent busking. Everyone gets an equal say.
However, we will endeavour to ensure balance by having the same number of circle and non-circle show performers as members and board directors.
We will not show preference for the needs of “our” buskers over the needs of other buskers – we are here to help the entire busking community.
We are not a union or a “busker association”. We do not want, seek or claim any form of political power in any location. We are simply a membership organisation.
We will keep all members informed of our actions and our plans, we will ask members for help in making decisions, and we will endeavour to meet our members’ needs.
We are 100% transparent about how money is spent and raised, how we use our time/resources and who’s involved, from employees to clients to members.
We hope street performers will approach us. But, when we see anti-busking policies, we may approach local buskers to see if they want our help.
We will never speak FOR street performers, but we will give street performers help in having a voice, and having their voices heard.
We do not get involved in local pitch disputes – local buskers sort out local issues.
THE BUSKING PROJECT TEAM
Liliana Maz, Co-founder
UX and strategy expert with 8 years experience. She leads both the design & development of our digital products.

Nick Broad, Co-founder
Writer, filmmaker & busker fan who has watched and worked with hundreds of performers since 2011.

Camila Hidalgo, Busker Hunter
Political scientist since 2016, stalking since 1993, tattoo padawan. Want to find awesome street performers (or get a tattoo)? You know who to call.

Vivian Doumpa, Head researcher/placemaker
Urbanist, placemaker and music lover. Vivian researches into the strategies, policies & regulation of art expressions in the ‘public realm’.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Charlotte Campbell
London busker of 10 years, Charlotte has played Glastonbury, and had her music featured on Love Island, and in every UK Caffe Nero.

James Hessler
James has been a busking magician for over 20 years, and was previously the founder and CEO of the busk.co-inspired busktip.com.

Jonathan Goh
Jonathan Goh is a Street/Circus Artist that has been performing since he was 10 years old, he is also the Co-Chair of Buskers’ Association (Singapore). I hope to make busking be recognized as one of the major street cultures found in Singapore.

Meg Elkins
Actor and clown-turned cultural and behavioural economist and senior lecturer in the school of Economics, Finance and Marketing at RMIT.

Laura MacDonald
Development and policy strategist, board member, fundraiser, mentor, company director, and rescuer of the family dog from a dog fighting ring.

Matthew Gardiner
Speaker, advisor, investor and partner of FTSE 100 Companies, Financial Institutions, AI, Crypto, Web3 & DeFi platforms, VCs and many more

Nick Broad
Co-founder and soon-to-be-ex CEO of The Busking Project. I’ve got a fairly broad knowledge of the world of busking. Wannabe author.

Bryce Kothe
Bryce Kothe began volunteering with us in 2021, has an undergrad in Accounting, MBA in General Business Management. Perpetually interested in providing good to people.

PREVIOUS TEAM
Nick Broad, Director
In 2010 Nick had no job and nowhere to live. However, he could film, write, make websites and had a huge love of buskers, plus the desire to travel. He came up with the idea for a documentary over dinner with a friend.

Chris Smith, Director
Chris is a professional traveller and writer, who agreed to go on this trip after just one day. Planner, ticket buyer, researcher and organiser when not behind the camera, timelapse specialist when he was.

Belle Crawford, Director
Belle, a writer and artist, sold her car and move in with her dad to be able to focus on this plan. Her phenomenal “bullshit-meter” made her ideal to be our artistic director.

Dawn Marie, Filmmaker
When the team met Dawn she was a busker extraordinaire, YouTube film star and avid social networker. After just a few days on her couch in Vancouver, we invited her to join us for the South American portion of the trip.

Mardy Malika, Filmmaker
Mardy had the most professional experience of anyone on the team. She is an activist and documentary film maker with 6 years in TV production, who happened to be sick and tired of her job and willing to come with us.

Giles Roberts, Filmmaker
Giles is a consultant, connector and producer with a ton of energy and a great sense of humour. He aided us as the ‘Latin American fixer, interviewer and all-round film crew.

Irene Lema
Storymaker, Motion Graphics designer, animator, camerawoman, editor and documentary producer at Ojo de Pez

Niharika Basoae, Marketing Assistant
Graphic designer, content creator with an MA in Creative and Cultural Entrepreneurship

Jansen Peña, Front End Developer
Graphic designer, watching millions (and writing some) of lines of CSS code since 2007. Motion moves me!

Felipe Botero, CTO
Back-end engineer with 10+ years experience coding. He loves code. if(pipe==NULL){ TBP=’panic!’};

Silvana Callegari, Designer

Tristan Risk
Actor and Burlesque/sideshow performer, teacher of snake husbandry, founder of The Circus Sideshow Reptiles with partner, Burns the Dragon.
