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FreeBird

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tatters
My favorite part of the story is the three-year-old boy who wanted to stay and listen. Somehow, HE KNEW he was in the presence of greatness. He was too young to have been pre-conditioned. No one told him that great musicians only play in concert halls, and that no one very good ever plays in the subway.

What makes you so sure of that? Maybe he'd been driving his mother crazy by stopping for any random street musician, no matter how bad. You're guilty of the same kind of assumptions you accuse others of.

Yeah, that was probably the eighth street musician he'd stopped to listen to that day. That boy is so damn easily distracted. Poor kid. He'll never get a job with DaveG's firm if he doesn't buckle down and focus.

Damn right! I'm just waiting to crack the whip!

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DaveG
Frankly, I think it was a useless "experiment". Seriously, how many times have we seen and heard a musician playing in a subway, on a downtown street corner, or some other crowded place, and just passed by. Why? WE'RE ON OUR WAY SOMEWHERE! Just because this world-class violinist was ignored it doesn't mean people are missing beauty or talent or brilliance. Maybe when they get home from earning a living they sit and listen to classical music for an hour to relax or maybe they went to the Boston venue and paid $100.00 to experience the symphony. It says more about the stupidity of the Washington Post for wasting their time and money trying to discover people's "priorities". Evidently, the main priority was to get to work on time.

This "stupidity", as you say, earned Gene Weingarten, the Washington Post columnist who came up with the idea, the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing for his article on the experiment.

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tatters
Yeah, that was probably the eighth street musician he'd stopped to listen to that day. That boy is so damn easily distracted. Poor kid. He'll never get a job with DaveG's firm if he doesn't buckle down and focus.

It needn't have been that same day, but the point is that YOU DON'T KNOW.

It's an assumption on your side, and probably a good one. But you can't be sure. Unfortunately you don't always have the luxury of second-guessing your assumptions.

People assume things based on experience. The assumption that people playing in the subway aren't worth listening to is pretty much always accurate. When some newspaper wants to prove a preconceived notion by artificially creating a completely unrealistic situation, it might not be accurate anymore. But is that enough reason to pay attention to all the untalented morons, even if you have better things to do (such as arriving on time, to name one very obvious example)?

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kleermaker

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StonesTod

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tatters

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Green Lady
Almost nobody ever stops to listen to a busker in the Tube, whatever the quality of the music. (And there are some that frankly you can't get out of earshot quickly enough!) Good ones give you a few minutes of pleasure as you walk by, and deserve their "tip" for cheering up your morning a bit. Joshua Bell made $32 in 45 minutes and several people actually did pause to listen for as long as they had time - in busking-in-the-subway terms, that's fairly good going, and certainly not being "ignored". But a tunnel is not the place to collect a crowd, whoever you may be.

But that's exactly the point of the experiment. We are conditioned to experience beauty and talent only in places that are designated for that purpose. If we encounter something spectacularly great in a setting where we would not expect it to be, we are unable to process it, to recognize it. We are pre-conditioned to think, "Look at that loser playing in the subway. He MUST not be very good, otherwise he wouldn't be playing HERE, he'd be playing with the Philharmonic". Likewise, anyone we see performing at Carnegie Hall sort of gets the benefit of the doubt, doesn't he? We think, "He MUST be great, because he's playing HERE". My favorite part of the story is the little kids who wanted to stay and listen. THEY knew they were in the presence of something very special, but only because they were too young to have been pre-conditioned. No one told them that you have to go to a concert hall if you want to see someone very good, and that no one very good ever plays in the subway.

good post, tatters

I agree with Stones Tod! Actually I've written about classical music and its 'entourage' some years ago. A couple of days ago I posted it on my own blog (it's about Socrates, Mozart and the good old Stones). That blog is now active for almost three weeks. Pay a visit if you like. Everybody is welcome of course. Some posts are even written in English, but most of them in Dutch of course.

[keessiedeg.wordpress.com]

This has very little to do with the perceived quality of the music. There's absolutely no reason to assume that anyone busking in the subway must be a useless musician - some are, but there are also some damn good ones around. There is, on the other hand, an assumption that you do not play in the subway if you want to have people stand around and listen to you for any length of time. They usually have other plans which they are not about to change.

Let's try another experiment. 2,000 people walked past Joshua Bell, so stop 2,000 people in the subway and invite them to come to a free concert by Joshua Bell at Carnegie Hall - right now, this very moment, whatever else they are in the middle of doing and wherever they happen to be on their way to. Would you get that many more takers than you would for people willing to stop to listen to the unknown busker?

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FreeBird

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tatters
Yeah, that was probably the eighth street musician he'd stopped to listen to that day. That boy is so damn easily distracted. Poor kid. He'll never get a job with DaveG's firm if he doesn't buckle down and focus.

It needn't have been that same day, but the point is that YOU DON'T KNOW.

It's an assumption on your side, and probably a good one. But you can't be sure. Unfortunately you don't always have the luxury of second-guessing your assumptions.

People assume things based on experience. The assumption that people playing in the subway aren't worth listening to is pretty much always accurate. When some newspaper wants to prove a preconceived notion by artificially creating a completely unrealistic situation, it might not be accurate anymore. But is that enough reason to pay attention to all the untalented morons, even if you have better things to do (such as arriving on time, to name one very obvious example)?

Why is it artificial and completely unrealistic? Your making the ASSUMPTION that famous musicians never play unrecognized on street corners and subways. Probably they don't, but YOU don't know that. Maybe they do. Maybe they sometimes get the urge to go outside on a sunny Sunday afternoon and play on the street just because they feel like it, or just for a laugh to see if anyone stops or recognizes them. No, you don't have to stop and listen to every untalented moron, but the experiment proves that 99% of the populace is too stupid to tell the difference between an untalented moron and one of the greatest musicians in the world. Our culture associates talent with celebrity. If you're famous, you must be good. If I never heard of you, you probably suck. I'm surprised at the responses this thread is getting. "I wouldn't stop either 'cause I gotta get to work on time!" You guys sure don't sound like any hard core rock and rollers that I know. You don't even sound like people who appreciate music very much.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2011-05-08 16:59 by tatters.

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Green Lady

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kleermaker

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StonesTod

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tatters

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Green Lady
Almost nobody ever stops to listen to a busker in the Tube, whatever the quality of the music. (And there are some that frankly you can't get out of earshot quickly enough!) Good ones give you a few minutes of pleasure as you walk by, and deserve their "tip" for cheering up your morning a bit. Joshua Bell made $32 in 45 minutes and several people actually did pause to listen for as long as they had time - in busking-in-the-subway terms, that's fairly good going, and certainly not being "ignored". But a tunnel is not the place to collect a crowd, whoever you may be.

But that's exactly the point of the experiment. We are conditioned to experience beauty and talent only in places that are designated for that purpose. If we encounter something spectacularly great in a setting where we would not expect it to be, we are unable to process it, to recognize it. We are pre-conditioned to think, "Look at that loser playing in the subway. He MUST not be very good, otherwise he wouldn't be playing HERE, he'd be playing with the Philharmonic". Likewise, anyone we see performing at Carnegie Hall sort of gets the benefit of the doubt, doesn't he? We think, "He MUST be great, because he's playing HERE". My favorite part of the story is the little kids who wanted to stay and listen. THEY knew they were in the presence of something very special, but only because they were too young to have been pre-conditioned. No one told them that you have to go to a concert hall if you want to see someone very good, and that no one very good ever plays in the subway.

good post, tatters

I agree with Stones Tod! Actually I've written about classical music and its 'entourage' some years ago. A couple of days ago I posted it on my own blog (it's about Socrates, Mozart and the good old Stones). That blog is now active for almost three weeks. Pay a visit if you like. Everybody is welcome of course. Some posts are even written in English, but most of them in Dutch of course.

[keessiedeg.wordpress.com]

This has very little to do with the perceived quality of the music. There's absolutely no reason to assume that anyone busking in the subway must be a useless musician - some are, but there are also some damn good ones around. There is, on the other hand, an assumption that you do not play in the subway if you want to have people stand around and listen to you for any length of time. They usually have other plans which they are not about to change.

Let's try another experiment. 2,000 people walked past Joshua Bell, so stop 2,000 people in the subway and invite them to come to a free concert by Joshua Bell at Carnegie Hall - right now, this very moment, whatever else they are in the middle of doing and wherever they happen to be on their way to. Would you get that many more takers than you would for people willing to stop to listen to the unknown busker?

Yes, you would. How do you think they get live audiences for game shows and talk shows and all the other useless crap you see on television? They have people go out into the street, right in front of the TV studio, and ask passersby if they want to see a free show.

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tatters
Why is it artificial and completely unrealistic? Your making the ASSUMPTION that famous musicians never play unrecognized on street corners and subways. Probably they don't, but YOU don't know that! Maybe they do. Maybe they sometimes get the urge to go outside on a sunny Sunday afternoon and play on the street just because they feel like it, or just for a laugh to see if anyone stops or recognizes them.

Oh, you just have to flip it over...

Why is it artificial? Simply because it is. They put him there for the purpose of writing an article. It doesn't get much more artificial than that.

Why is it completely unrealistic? Well, for one thing because it's not very wise to carry such an expensive violin down to the subway. This isn't something you should do unless you hire some extra security guards.

Something else to consider is that this was Washington DC. Not everyone who walked past him was going to work. A lot of them were tourists. They had places they wanted to get to, but they didn't HAVE to be anywhere at any specific time. They COULD have stopped to listen, especially since it's a SUBWAY. If you DO miss your train, another one will be along in a couple of minutes!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2011-05-08 17:29 by tatters.

The whole thing seems to be turning on the fact that it's not in a concert hall (with all those dressed up people etc.), but straight in the public field, so to speak.

If he'd been playing in the subway under a sign that said, "Joshua Bell, World Famous Violinist, Free Concert", he would have been surrounded by 200 people within five minutes. It's all about the context. It's like if you go to an art museum, and you see a famous painting that no one is looking at. No surprise. It's owned by the museum, it's on display every day, everyone has seen it, and you can see it again anytime you want. But take that SAME painting, and put it in a "Special Exhibit" of paintings by that particular artist, and suddenly there's hundreds of people crowding around it, trying to get a glimpse of the SAME painting that just last week was hanging in the SAME museum with NO ONE looking at it.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2011-05-08 18:07 by tatters.

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tatters
If he'd been playing in the subway under a sign that said, "Joshua Bell, World Famous Violinist, Free Concert", he would have been surrounded by 200 people within five minutes. It's all about the context. It's like if you go to an art museum, and you see a famous painting that no one is looking at. No surprise. It's owned by the museum, it's on display every day, everyone has seen it, and you can see it again anytime you want. But take that SAME painting, and put it in a "Special Exhibit" of paintings by that particular artist, and suddenly there's hundreds of people crowding around it, trying to get a glimpse of the SAME painting that just last week was hanging in the SAME museum with NO ONE looking at it.

Yep, and all those people would be late for work, unless they've got a boss like Dave. Then they would be too afraid to listen I guess.

Another example: hang any arbitrary amateur painting in a world famous museum, let's say The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Well, THAT painting would draw much attention, I guarantee you. But the moment it's out of that Van Gogh Museum context, nobody will have a look at it. The same goes for an unknown Van Gogh painting and so on. Interesting.

Here's an idea:

Decide what is really being tested here. How about we take this world famous fiddle player and stick him in a park. Then we take some body who wants to
be Keith Richards and stick him in the park too. Do we then want to guess who
will gather the larger crowd.

Marv Peck

Y'all remember that rubber legged boy

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kleermaker

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tatters
If he'd been playing in the subway under a sign that said, "Joshua Bell, World Famous Violinist, Free Concert", he would have been surrounded by 200 people within five minutes. It's all about the context. It's like if you go to an art museum, and you see a famous painting that no one is looking at. No surprise. It's owned by the museum, it's on display every day, everyone has seen it, and you can see it again anytime you want. But take that SAME painting, and put it in a "Special Exhibit" of paintings by that particular artist, and suddenly there's hundreds of people crowding around it, trying to get a glimpse of the SAME painting that just last week was hanging in the SAME museum with NO ONE looking at it.

Yep, and all those people would be late for work, unless they've got a boss like Dave. Then they would be too afraid to listen I guess.

Another example: hang any arbitrary amateur painting in a world famous museum, let's say The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Well, THAT painting would draw much attention, I guarantee you. But the moment it's out of that Van Gogh Museum context, nobody will have a look at it. The same goes for an unknown Van Gogh painting and so on. Interesting.

Or a FAKE Van Gogh painting. We like to think we know what's "great", and what's "real", but in truth, we know nothing.

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marvpeck
Here's an idea:

Decide what is really being tested here. How about we take this world famous fiddle player and stick him in a park. Then we take some body who wants to
be Keith Richards and stick him in the park too. Do we then want to guess who
will gather the larger crowd.

Someone who wants to be Keith Richards? You mean just some street musician playing Stones songs badly? Yeah, obviously even a BAD rock musician is going to attract ten times as many people as a great classical musician, and yes, that is a part of what the experiment was all about; how few people there are who know a great classical musician when they hear one, or even WANT to hear one. Of the 2,000 people who saw Josh Bell playing in the subway, only ONE person recognized him.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 2012-01-07 02:02 by tatters.

How about we take this world famous fiddle player and stick
him in a park. Then we take some body who wants to be Keith Richards and
stick him in the park too. Do we then want to guess who will gather the larger crowd.


eeerrrrrr the hot-dog wagon?



ROCKMAN

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tatters
If he'd been playing in the subway under a sign that said, "Joshua Bell, World Famous Violinist, Free Concert", he would have been surrounded by 200 people within five minutes.

I'm not convinced of that.
But, you know, they should've tried that too. Now THAT would've (potentially) been good journalism.

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tatters

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DaveG
No, I really do take time to enjoy life and all its pleasures. I simply think that, if people are on a deadline to catch a train, bus, plane because being late to work will create problems, then their first priority is to get to work, not stop and listen to a street musician, no matter how talented he may be. I wonder if the results would have been different if the violinist had been playing in one of the subway cars. Then people would have been able to at least have the choice of listening or tuning him out.

If one of my employees were late to a meeting and he told me it was because he took some time to listen to an awesome street musician, he'd be reprimanded and given a warning.

Sounds like a fun place to work.

But...most jobs are like that...I should try and tell my boss that I was late because I was appreciating art and that he's a square for not "stopping to smell the roses"

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stones78

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tatters

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DaveG
No, I really do take time to enjoy life and all its pleasures. I simply think that, if people are on a deadline to catch a train, bus, plane because being late to work will create problems, then their first priority is to get to work, not stop and listen to a street musician, no matter how talented he may be. I wonder if the results would have been different if the violinist had been playing in one of the subway cars. Then people would have been able to at least have the choice of listening or tuning him out.

If one of my employees were late to a meeting and he told me it was because he took some time to listen to an awesome street musician, he'd be reprimanded and given a warning.

Sounds like a fun place to work.

But...most jobs are like that...I should try and tell my boss that I was late because I was appreciating art and that he's a square for not "stopping to smell the roses"

The economy being what it is, people are really afraid of losing their jobs. It shows in their behavior. It shows in what people have said in this thread. Still, I think that even in this economy, employees who are really good at their jobs can get away with a certain amount of 'eccentric' behavior.

The underlying statement is of course true: Perception is, often, everything. Keith is getting more plaudits for a bum solo in front of 50 000 people than Mick T for a caring solo in front of 50 paying supporters. I guess the bottom line is that popular music not always honours the ones who deserves to be honoured.

Quite a few musicians and singers have done a gig on the London underground or elsewhere unannounced.Names that come to mind are Macca,Katherine Jenkins,quite recently and Tom Jones who did a few songs down by the Thames where the Big Wheel is.All were associated with some sort of publicity for themselves.Great if you were there and saw it.

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tatters

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marvpeck
How about people were just trying to get to work,
not be late and make money to feed their families.

I'll bet if it had been Keith Richards playing in the subway, people would have forgotten all about having to get to work on time.

Had they recognised him, then yes. But you dont expect keith in the subway, so then you're not very likely to recognise him.

On a related note, there's this story about Bruce Springsteen singing "Jumpin' Jack Flash" over a karaoke machine at a pub in Dublin called "Stanhope Arms" in 1993, and not a soul recognizing him. Don't know if it's true, though.

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Stoneage
The underlying statement is of course true: Perception is, often, everything. Keith is getting more plaudits for a bum solo in front of 50 000 people than Mick T for a caring solo in front of 50 paying supporters. I guess the bottom line is that popular music not always honours the ones who deserves to be honoured.

Right. In popular culture, fame is everything. Classical musicians are not even on the radar when it comes to the kind of pop culture celebrity fame our society seems to place such a high value on. If you're famous, it doesn't matter whether you're talented or not. If Paris Hilton sang and played the guitar at one end of a subway platform, while Bob Dylan sang and played at the other end of the subway platform, they would each draw roughly the same number of listeners.

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tatters
. Our culture associates talent with celebrity. If you're famous, you must be good. If I never heard of you, you probably suck.

Right, and the worst thing is that nowadays,kids and teenagers think that they can become famous just by showing on TV shows.
Because of that shit,they don't know how hard one has to work to be a good musician ( or a good doctor or any kind of occupation )

PERCEPTION
. . . Something To Think About . . .

THE SITUATION

In Washington , DC , at a Metro Station, on a cold January morning in
2007, this man with a violin played six Bach pieces for about 45
minutes. During that time, approximately 2,000 people went through
the station, most of them on their way to work. After about 3
minutes, a middle-aged man noticed that there was a musician playing.
He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds, and then he hurried
on to meet his schedule.

About 4 minutes later:

The violinist received his first dollar. A woman threw money in the
hat and, without stopping, continued to walk.

At 6 minutes:

A young man leaned against the wall to listen to him, then looked at
his watch and started to walk again.

At 10 minutes:

A 3-year old boy stopped, but his mother tugged him along hurriedly.
The kid stopped to look at the violinist again, but the mother pushed
hard and the child continued to walk, turning his head the whole
time. This action was repeated by several other children, but every
parent - without exception - forced their children to move on quickly.

At 45 minutes:

The musician played continuously. Only 6 people stopped and listened
for a short while. About 20 gave money but continued to walk at their
normal pace. The man collected a total of $32.

After 1 hour:

He finished playing and silence took over. No one noticed and no one
applauded. There was no recognitionat all.

No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the
greatest musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate
pieces ever written, with a violin worth $3.5 million dollars. Two
days before, Joshua Bell sold-out a theater in Boston where the seats
averaged $200 each to sit and listen to him play the same music.

This is a true story. Joshua Bell, playing incognito in the D.C.
Metro Station, was organized by the Washington Post as part of a
social experiment about perception, taste and people's priorities.

This experiment raised several questions:
*In a common-place environment, at an inappropriate hour, do we
perceive beauty?

*If so, do we stop to appreciate it?

*Do we recognize talent in an unexpected context?

One possible conclusion reached from this experiment could be this:

If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best
musicians in the world, playing some of the finest music ever written,
with one of the most beautiful instruments ever made . . .

How many other things are we missing as we rush through life?

peace.

Naturalust, I discovered this true story some months ago here :


[www.iorr.org]

Read the comments that were posted .
It's a very meaninghful story indeed.



I am a Frenchie ,as Mick affectionately called them in the Old Grey Whistle Test in 1977 .

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SwayStones
Naturalust, I discovered this true story some months ago here :


[www.iorr.org]

Read the comments that were posted .
It's a very meaninghful story indeed.

oops , SwayStones in that case you are perceptive and beautiful! I will indeed read all the comments. It is such a good story no harm in reproducing it here again. When I heard it I couldn't wait to share it with my IORR friends. Its very similar to the story I told some time back of Neil Young sitting in the lawn seats with his acoustic for a few songs, right after the gate opened to the Hoard tour shows. In that case it usually only took about 2 songs before people realized what was up and started crowding around. But Neil was the headliner on that tour. So it wasn't quite as blind and cool of an experiment as described above. But it was a blast to watch the look in people's faces when they realized it was Neil, priceless. SwayStones you rock! . peace.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012-01-06 19:21 by Naturalust.

Quote
Naturalust
PERCEPTION
. . . Something To Think About . . .

THE SITUATION

In Washington , DC , at a Metro Station, on a cold January morning in
2007, this man with a violin played six Bach pieces for about 45
minutes. During that time, approximately 2,000 people went through
the station, most of them on their way to work. After about 3
minutes, a middle-aged man noticed that there was a musician playing.
He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds, and then he hurried
on to meet his schedule.

About 4 minutes later:

The violinist received his first dollar. A woman threw money in the
hat and, without stopping, continued to walk.

At 6 minutes:

A young man leaned against the wall to listen to him, then looked at
his watch and started to walk again.

At 10 minutes:

A 3-year old boy stopped, but his mother tugged him along hurriedly.
The kid stopped to look at the violinist again, but the mother pushed
hard and the child continued to walk, turning his head the whole
time. This action was repeated by several other children, but every
parent - without exception - forced their children to move on quickly.

At 45 minutes:

The musician played continuously. Only 6 people stopped and listened
for a short while. About 20 gave money but continued to walk at their
normal pace. The man collected a total of $32.

After 1 hour:

He finished playing and silence took over. No one noticed and no one
applauded. There was no recognitionat all.

No one knew this, but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the
greatest musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate
pieces ever written, with a violin worth $3.5 million dollars. Two
days before, Joshua Bell sold-out a theater in Boston where the seats
averaged $200 each to sit and listen to him play the same music.

This is a true story. Joshua Bell, playing incognito in the D.C.
Metro Station, was organized by the Washington Post as part of a
social experiment about perception, taste and people's priorities.

This experiment raised several questions:
*In a common-place environment, at an inappropriate hour, do we
perceive beauty?

*If so, do we stop to appreciate it?

*Do we recognize talent in an unexpected context?

One possible conclusion reached from this experiment could be this:

If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best
musicians in the world, playing some of the finest music ever written,
with one of the most beautiful instruments ever made . . .

How many other things are we missing as we rush through life?

peace.

Could be that most people who like high class music don't use the transport of the hoi polloi to get about.....maybe if he'd been busking at the car valet port of Clarridges Hotel he might have struck a bit luckier........(if you'd bought some of those people tickets they might not have sat through it anyway.......)

The thing about the kids...well I think a lot of people understand that kids are less gunked up than most adults so more receptive to quality.....for a while anyway........

I walked past Bon Jovi once who were on a bandstand outside Virgin records in Cardiff - my friend had to advise me - mind you they weren't actually playing at the time so I wasn't too hard on myself.........



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2012-01-06 19:43 by EddieByword.

Thanks for this story!

Perception is a vital ingredient for success in career and personal life.

I have seen Joshua Bell in concert and high recommend him to any guitar player.