appreciating beauty out of context

[VV o n g B a]

great experiment. and the write up itself was well done. just a great article. the setup is that they got a world reknown violinist to play true classics on a strad at a DC subway and filmed it. would ppl stop to listen? would he need crowd control or would he be ignored?

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Pearls Before Breakfast

Can one of the nation's great musicians cut through the fog of a D.C. rush hour? Let's find out.


By Gene Weingarten
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, April 8, 2007; Page W10

HE EMERGED FROM THE METRO AT THE L'ENFANT PLAZA STATION AND POSITIONED HIMSELF AGAINST A WALL BESIDE A TRASH BASKET. By most measures, he was nondescript: a youngish white man in jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt and a Washington Nationals baseball cap. From a small case, he removed a violin. Placing the open case at his feet, he shrewdly threw in a few dollars and pocket change as seed money, swiveled it to face pedestrian traffic, and began to play.

It was 7:51 a.m. on Friday, January 12, the middle of the morning rush hour. In the next 43 minutes, as the violinist performed six classical pieces, 1,097 people passed by. Almost all of them were on the way to work, which meant, for almost all of them, a government job. L'Enfant Plaza is at the nucleus of federal Washington, and these were mostly mid-level bureaucrats with those indeterminate, oddly fungible titles: policy analyst, project manager, budget officer, specialist, facilitator, consultant.

Each passerby had a quick choice to make, one familiar to commuters in any urban area where the occasional street performer is part of the cityscape: Do you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and irritation, aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time and your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your decision change if he's really bad? What if he's really good? Do you have time for beauty? Shouldn't you? What's the moral mathematics of the moment?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...040401721.html

[Adaon]

Holy cow.

Take the time to stop and smell roses, America, sheesh. >_<

[moser]

Personally, I would have kept on walking, partially because when I used to work in DC, my bosses (and their bosses) would check up on people to make sure they were at their desks exactly on time. And I'll definitely admit that I'm not the most laid-back person in terms of this stuff, and would probably take the time to "relax" only after the workday was done.

Maybe if it was after work I would have listened for a little bit, but at that point I would have just wanted to get home.

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Just wanted to add: IMO, DC is nothing compared to some other places (heck, I thought people practically waddled when I lived there). Imagine if this was in NYC!

[SunWuKong]

shit, people are trying to get to work. of course they're not going to notice. metro musicians are not exactly uncommon. i'll tell you what would be really beautiful - if he was handing out dollar bills. that's beauty right there.

i guess i'm just speaking as a person who was dragged to classical concerts by his mother and who actually plays the violin. if you want to impress metro riders by playing violin, you better be playing some really fast stuff like Vivaldi.

[sassymei]

[raacluse]

like SWK sez, maybe some Vivaldi would've gone over better.
I remember reading somewhere that Baroque stuff is better suited for the morning commuting lifestyle.
So, maybe, some fast Baroque pieces would be optimal.

Also, ya gotta wonder if his loudness is overwhelming the commuters. I'll bet that Stradivari is putting out a lotta decibels. Maybe a cheaper instrument, with less resonance, would do just as well. (Plus, he wouldn't have to worry about safely transporting it.)

It's obvious that Bell needs to fine tune his act for a morning commuter audience. (At least one in DC.)

[mrazntre]

i probably would have had my mp3 player on blast....screw that. i'm off to work. they could be muggers....

[SunWuKong]

commuters can hear at most a few seconds of what he was playing. this isn't about people not appreciating beauty. i don't care how talented he is, how are people supposed to "appreciate" any music that they only hear a few seconds of in passing?

[VV o n g B a]

the way i read it, commuters should be able to hear him on the escalator ride up. i dunno how long that ride is, but considering other musicians setup there too it seems like it's somewhat lengthy.

but ya, i prolly woulda just walked by too. i have seen ppl watch a subway drummer guy draw a small crowd, so it is possible to draw a crowd w/ accessible music. but this was during a holiday too so maybe that doesn't count.

[artsfartsyjanet]

i still think it's a powerful image at that instant with the child looking back out of curiousity whereas the parent is more concerned about going from point A to point B.

[SunWuKong]

Originally Posted by VV o n g B a

the way i read it, commuters should be able to hear him on the escalator ride up. i dunno how long that ride is, but considering other musicians setup there too it seems like it's somewhat lengthy.

but ya, i prolly woulda just walked by too. i have seen ppl watch a subway drummer guy draw a small crowd, so it is possible to draw a crowd w/ accessible music. but this was during a holiday too so maybe that doesn't count.

the only metro musicians i've seen draw a crowd, both in NYC and in DC, are the ones that are actually playing at the platforms. basically people are waiting for the train so they have to stand there and listen. honestly, i think the whole stunt is just kind of presumptious and snotty, like, "look, people just don't know how to appreciate beautiful music, there's a world-class violinist here and they don't stop to listen." but shit, how many people really listen to classical music compared to contemporary and popular music? personally i'm more interested in a barbershop quartet than a violinist. the guy is supposed to be pretty famous, but i've personally never heard of him because i just don't listen to classical music that much.

[sageb1]

A few days ago, I was in Vancouver at the top of the Granville Station escalators.

My excuse for not tossing $1 into the violinist's basket was cos i was looking for the bathroom man!

By the time I returned from my walk down Granville to Helmcken and down to Seymour and back to Davie, the violinist had packed up and moved on.

What I admire on Skytrains is the variety of beauty in the female form.

Aint no violinist that can beat God's hand.