Hello everyone,
A few people responded to my investigation on the Lies and Distortions in Westminster's busking report that the council was just reacting to the complaints of its residents, because amplification, low talent, bad sound quality, frequent repetitions and the persistence of London's street performers are the likely culprits here.
I appreciate the feedback, but respectfully disagree.
First of all, rather than well-meaning council officials, it's apparent that a few council officers (who I won’t name here) have utter disdain for the street performers who busk on the property they manage. My evidence is the frankly mind-blowing insults the council had written into their report, and all the other insults the council has inflicted on buskers over the years:
Clearly, there are a few council officials that have some personal issues they need to work through. Possibly they should be reassigned, as busking appears to bring out the worst in them.
However, the fact that some people working for the council have bad intentions doesn't argue against the above points about talent/amplification/etc.
So, below is an edited response I sent to someone (a street performer himself) who'd suggested that some form of quality control or amp ban might alleviate the situation in Westminster. It lays out my thinking on why it shouldn't be up to the busker to make changes.
Maybe you'll find these arguments useful next time you're defending your right to use an amp in court or a council meeting.
But first, to explain why amplification is just so important, I was even going to make a video about it. However, I ran out of time and energy to add visuals. So, here it is in mp3 format:
Dear █ █ █ █ ,
I agree that cheap amps aren’t ideal, and high sound levels are part of the problem. Bad technique can also be to blame for complaints. However:
Amplification isn’t a choice for a lot of acts (like dancers, beatboxers etc), and it improves the sound of many others (like violinists with backing tracks)
A good amp can and should enhance the sound a busker produces, enabling them to play with a subtler technique when in loud parts of town, rather than having to play an unamplified instrument louder
The blues and rock and roll were largely invented by street performers who began busking shortly after picking up a guitar. They were also the products of buskers performing amplified in the 40s and 50s. Had there been busking auditions or amp bans 70-100 years ago, a lot of the music we listen to today would never have been invented.
A side note, but equally important: people living in modern cities have an unreasonably low standard for what they believe should be the noise levels outside their homes.
This latter point is as true today as it was in the mid-19th Century, when the first middle-class-backed anti-busking legislation was being pursued in various cities around the world. Crusaders for silence couldn’t go after the horses with their metal shoes on cobblestones, because they knew that would have been a losing battle (much like how people ignore traffic noises today). Instead, they could put an end to young people playing ‘hoop’ (rolling a metal wheel along the ground with a stick), hawkers, street performers and other people who make a living from street life.
Today, campaigners for silence in Westminster—London’s loudest borough—ignore the taxis, trucks, motorbikes and busses making a din outside, because they also know such noise is unavoidable. They don’t make the same allowances for street performers.
I get that silence is golden, and the sound of a bad musician coming in from outdoors can be stressful. I live above a kindergarten, whose children appear to be about as miserable as it's possible for a child to be. Their constant crying has led to the residents in our building joking about methods we can use to shut them up.
Double glazing and an empathetic busking policy that focuses on self-regulation and decibel readings is the answer, rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater by giving council-approved individuals the power to judge whether a musician is talented enough to busk.
Busking in Covent Garden goes back a minimum of 3 centuries, and likely much longer. Street performers have been putting on shows in busy public spaces ever since there were public spaces. We should take history into account. Other laws do. For example, the UK has recently changed the rules to say that if a property development goes up near a music venue it’s up to the developers to pay for whatever soundproofing or noise abatement is needed to protect residents from the music emanating from that venue. This is called the “agent of change” theory. The developer is the ‘agent’ who ‘changed’ things, so they should be the one who pays, not the venue.
If we were to use the same logic for properties around busking hotspots in London, we’d quickly find that it’s the people who built properties next to our busiest and most popular plazas (Trafalgar Square, Leicester Square and Covent Garden are examples) who have given their residents and those who work in their buildings the experience of living or working in noisy areas. Just like with music venues, it should be up to developers to soundproof their buildings, rather than up to buskers to ensure that locals in those areas can live or work in utter silence.
Normally I'd believe in a compromise, but not on this issue. Sure, buskers should keep their sound to 'reasonable' levels—this is a view shared universally by street performers themselves—but anywhere that there is a large open market or plaza or pedestrian thoroughfare (i.e. any popular location other than residential areas), it should be up to property owners to ensure their properties are protected from the exact noises that have been made in public spaces since public spaces were invented.
If it is impossible to live in an apartment or work from home next to our busiest busking hotspots, that is a problem with the materials made to build the buildings, rather than with the street performances.
Any council that decides to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayer's money on restrictive busking policies before spending hundreds of thousands of pounds on soundproofing is laying the blame squarely at the feet of the wrong people.
Thanks,
Nick