Where have all the buskers gone? Flickr|AndyRoberts Photos
It says something about the world in which we live that buskers can be abused in the streets when they perform every day, and Oscar worthy when they are depicted in the films. It doesn’t inspire massive amounts of confidence about real life.
Even less confidence-inspiring is the raging success of Once the Musical. Stay with me in this, I know it’s not exactly what you’d expect to read on TBP’s blog. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great that people want to hear about buskers. EVERYBODY should want to hear about buskers and celebrate them.
The problem is that in this particular instance of people hearing about buskers, they are doing it because they’ve been sold Ronan Keating, or that bloke of Dr Who. And they’ve had to get a ticket for it. Amid the promotions on the tube, the concern for box office rates and the day in day out repeat of the same show, the point of busking has been moved onto another pitch.
Once the Musical is being billed by critics as revolutionary, has this revolution become the mass commercialization for profit of a low budget indie film and a persecuted art? The plot may well be ‘heartwarming and bittersweet’ but the story has become the romance between fixed seating and bank notes.