Virtuoso Violinist Plays in DC Metro Station

[dlgood]

I thought alleynyc would find this particularly interesting...

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

Joshua Bell is one of the world's greatest violinists. His instrument of choice is a multimillion-dollar Stradivarius. If he played for spare change, incognito, outside a D.C. Metro station, would anyone notice?

Click to read the article

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

There is a great response to the Joshua Bell article by a NYC subway musician in her blog: www.SawLady.com/blog
She interprets the situation differently from the Washington Post reporters... I thought you might find it interesting.

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

I'm copying from one of her posters, because I think SawLady completely missed the point:

I think many of you are misrepresenting the article. I didn’t get a sense of the passers-by being judged by the writer, or the musician. And critiquing Bell’s busking abilities seems to miss the point. The point, as it seems to me, is that people don’t look for beauty in everyday places; that, placed out of context, few will notice it. Leithauser’s (the curator at the National Gallery) makes the same point with reference to an artwork, removed from its frame.

So, maybe some of you are annoyed by the article because you’re evaluating the wrong part of it. It’s not that he’s a good or bad busker, or that the writer is trying to play a trick on commuters, or anything else other than that we rarely recognise the beauty in everyday events when it’s out of context.

[cactuswatcher.livejournal.com]

I saw the video of this. One or two stopped and listened, a few small children looked very interested, but by far most of the people were too busy to even give him a look.

[kalbear.livejournal.com]

That's sad. Totally understandable, but sad. I'm honestly surprised that anyone actually spent time listening. Nice read though.

I love that all the kids, without fail, wanted to listen.

[thelastgoodname.livejournal.com]

I'm fascinated by the fact that the kids wanted to listen. There is a such an expectation in our culture that children younger than 15 can't (or don't, or won't) appreciate music.

[ludditerobot.livejournal.com]

On some mailing lists I'm on, they're on about this. They say that morning is worthless for busking, and to do it right, you should be down where the trains are, because that's where people stand around. So, either the writer knows nothing about busking, or the writer planned this to be a "people are philistines" piece.

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

Did those folks really read Gene Weingarten's piece, or his chat? He goes on about Kant, and is very clear that he's aware that it's not a great time for busking. Especially, at a place where you have Gov't workers who get docked if they show up late.

The choice of time and location was made because it was basically the only time and location he could use. And he wasn't writing to judge people for not stopping. If anything, the agenda wasn't "people are philistines" so much as "our modern hectic lifestyle crowds out our ability to stop and recognize beauty". It's melancholy, but not judgement.

[a2zmom.livejournal.com]

I read this elsewhere and it saddened me. I probably would have listened because I do it all the time in NYC.

by the by, are the DC trains reliable? I'm going to U of Maryland with A in a few weeks and we're thinking of taking the train that stops on campus to DC but we have to know that we can reliably get back, since the dinner thing there is at 7 PM.

Metro

[imarvintpa.livejournal.com]

The trains run every 15 minutes during off-peak hours till 10 or later on Friday and Saturday. They run every 5 minutes or so during rush hour.

IMarv

Re: Metro

[a2zmom.livejournal.com]

thanks!

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

By trains, which do you mean? There are both AMTRAK/MARC commuter trains and Washington Metro Rail trains that go to College Park.

The AMTRAK/MARC are somewhat noted for not always being reliable.

The Metro Rail, on the other hand, is reasonably reliable. As Marv below notes, trains will run about every 15 minutes in off-peak hours -- roughly until midnight on a week night.

Check out the Washington Metropolitan Transit Authority (http://www.wmata.com) webpage for details.

Note: The College Park rail station is about a mile from Campus. There are shuttle buses to the student union - otherwise, give yourself 15 minutes to walk.

[a2zmom.livejournal.com]

thanks for the info.

[midnightsjane.livejournal.com]

Fascinating...and kind of sad, too. I think it's a sign of the times, that we are too busy/involved in the mundane things of life to appreciate those moments that are a gift, a moment of beauty.
I found it interesting to read that the children who passed by invariably wanted to stop and listen, and their parents were the ones to drag them away.
I have had moments of great pleasure given to me by street musicians. One day downtown, there was a group of musicians from Peru playing in busy square..even though I was in a hurry, I had to stop and listen. I was transported to another world for those few moments. It was the highlight of my day.

[alleynyc.livejournal.com]

Man, where was I? Thanks Dave.

[dlgood.livejournal.com]

It's funny. I guess I forgot you never saw it.