10 Advantages of Busking

10 Advantages of Busking (Besides Earning Money)

18/7/2017

If you’re good at what you do, then busking can be a great way to boost your career. You are seen and heard by a lot of people who get a sample of what you are all about. It’s an easy way to promote yourself and there are lots of other benefits you don’t think about until you actually start busking. It’s not always just about how much you can earn! Here are 10 ways busking can benefit your life:

1. Buskers Become Well Known In The Community

If you’re a regular busker, people will start to look forward to you coming every week. For instance, there’s a market town I go to sometimes on a Thursday (if it’s not raining). Every time I go, the stall holders will come up to me and request songs or tell me that people were asking about me earlier. Also pub and restaurant owners take notice and ask me to come to their locations. Business owners recognise that street performers can bring in more money for them. It's a great way to build a following in your local area (or the wider world if your videos go viral online).

2. The City or Town Becomes More Enriched By Talent

People really appreciate seeing and hearing interesting things when they’re walking through a city centre. Children are especially excited when they come across an unexpected act. As a musician, I can say that music adds atmosphere and can brighten people’s moods. A good busker adds charm to any place.

3. Photographs

Particular locations get a lot of tourists, and tourists often get excited by buskers and they want to take lots of pictures. Likewise there are a lot of photographers that walk around looking for interesting things to take pictures of. I usually get at least 2 picture takers a day plus a video or two.

As a side note, it always makes me wonder where those pictures end up. I never come across any of them online, so I’m assuming they are just shared privately amongst friends? The only time I see them is if the person gets my contact details. But when that happens there’s the advantage that you get a few professional photos that you can add to social media (with the photographer’s permission).

4. Make New Friends

Most buskers are genuinely friendly people with the exception of one or two of them. They can help you find a good spot and tell you about events you might want to perform at. Also, there might be some people out there who are looking for another person to collaborate with. For instance, sometimes musicians are looking to put a band together and need good musicians to join them.

Busking is a good way to meet like-minded people. There are also other people who work in the town that are happy to help you out if they enjoy what you do. You might even make a new friend or two after all of that.

5. Get Recommended For Things

When you make new friends, then your name comes up in conversation when an opportunity arises. Someone is looking for a busker to be featured in a documentary? Or maybe someone is creating a big event, like a festival, and needs entertainment? Organisers ask around and if people know who you are and what you do, they might recommend you. And that can potentially lead to more gigs.

6. Get Offered Gigs

It’s much easier to get offered wedding gigs, parties and other types of gigs if people can see and hear you. Going around from place to place (like bars and restaurants) and asking for people to hire you takes a lot of time and effort. But when you are out busking, you don’t have to go out looking for gigs, the gigs come to you! The more highly skilled you are the more offers you will get.

7. Exercise

You end up walking around quite a bit in different towns. Whether you take public transport or drive, you still need to walk to the centre with all of your equipment and then continue walking to find a good spot. Some days you don’t walk that much, but others you end up walking up and down the streets. Some of these are big obstacles (e.g. Steep Hill in Lincoln). I didn’t even need to prepare myself to do the Inca trail in Peru because I got all the training I needed through busking! It helps you keep fit and it sure beats sitting in an office all day.

8. Vitamin D

In the UK particularly, a lot of people suffer from Vitamin D deficiency. It doesn’t get very sunny here. But if you work indoors all day every day, there isn’t much of an opportunity to catch some sun when it does appear. Buskers end up spending a lot of time outside. It’s much easier for a person to increase their Vitamin D intake if they’re standing in the sun for a couple of hours a day.

9. You Get Paid To Do The Thing You Love Most

There are so many people out there that hate their jobs, and just go in every day because they have to pay the bills and they don’t see an alternative. I used to be like that. I worked in financial services for years. Although I was good at what I did, I was miserable. I didn’t feel like I was producing something that made me feel like I was making a real difference in the world.

When I turned my hobby into my job, everything changed. I felt like I was making a great contribution to society which benefited a lot more people than just the faceless accounts I used to deal with day in and day out. I don’t have to motivate myself to get up in the morning and go out, because I’m my own boss and I just go out if I want to. And I want to because I enjoy it!

10. Brighten People’s Day

I get a lot of people coming up to me saying how they were having a bad day and then they heard my music and it cheered them up. Or it reminded them of a happy memory like a wedding or a distant (or deceased) relative. I also hear from fellow buskers that they have experienced the same thing. I feel like when you can touch people’s emotions, it makes your job that much more special. You aren’t just standing there for your health; you are standing there for other people's health too!

Do you go busking? What other advantages have you discovered from performing on the street? Write your thoughts in the comment section! And watch out for my next blog post later this week on the disadvantages of busking.

6 Comments

Busker Phil

8/4/2018 18:47:11

I am a busker in the UK. I am also autistic, so I imagine that the benefits I receive from busking are unique to other autistic people. There are, however, several benefits that have become very important aspects of my life.

I find that the experience of busking has done wonders in my battle against my social phobias and anxieties, as well as providing me with the 'forced human interaction' that I experience when people speak to me, giving me the experience of engaging in conversations that I would otherwise not have done. I would likely not leave my house at all, were it not for the fact that I am a busker, and so this occupation prevents me from becoming isolated.

I also find that although there are occasionally some difficult inter-personal encounters, for example with people who try to impose intense conversations upon me (one such example is a person who equates busking to begging and tries to make me feel like I am a beggar who is wasting my life and/or being a burden to the local community), despite this the vast majority of the public are very supportive and give positive encouragement and compliments, which does absolute wonders for my personal confidence. This also gives me experience of not allowing negativity to affect me quite so much as I learn to take these comments on the chin and detach myself emotionally from them.

I find that a lot of my 'regular' supporters also give bigger tips at special times of the year, such as Christmas, Easter, etc, The same people also often request for me to learn certain songs that I would otherwise not have heard, thereby expanding my knowledge of music, and simultaneously increasing the breadth of my repertoire, stimulating further learning on my instrument.

I was asked the other day, by two separate people, to learn a song called The Bard's Song by Blind Guardian, and a song called Calypso by John Denver. These songs are at vastly opposite sides of the 'musical spectrum' and I have enjoyed both listening to, and learning, these new songs. Had I relied solely upon encountering new music through exploration of genres of which I held an interest, I would not have heard either of these songs.

As it stands, however, I have heard, and enjoyed both of these songs, as well as having made a positive impact upon the days of the two people that requested for me to learn the songs, which has also resulted in higher value tips from these two individuals.

Serena

9/4/2018 19:48:09

Hi Phil, Thanks so much for your reply! That's great that busking has helped you out in the way that it has. I also feel a sort of boost from having gone out and interacted with people. I sometimes lack motivation to actually go out there if I'm really tired or something, but I never regret it when I do. You meet all types of people when you are out there, so definitely builds character. That's good to know about getting bigger tips around the holidays. I haven't tried it consistently enough to know.

I'm always updating my repertoire based on what's new and what people are interested in hearing. Sometimes I'm lucky enough to get requests of songs I actually know. Otherwise I just say I'll learn it for next time.

Last time I went busking in London someone gave me a leftover pizza! It always surprises me when people bring me food. I had already eaten so I gave it to someone holding up a sign saying he ways hungry. Overall everyone benefits. I'm glad you're able to eat more regularly because of busking. There's so many benefits we don't tend to think about until we actually go out there and try it!

Thanks again!

BUSKER PHIL

8/4/2018 18:55:48

Also, as I am autistic, I often forget to eat. Prior to me starting to busk, it was common for me to go for over a week without eating anything. This was not because I was unable to afford to eat, but rather because it has not become an established part of my personal routine and, due to my condition, I have developed a situation in which I have become unable to recognise the sensations of hunger. i would often not eat anything for 7, 8, 9 days, and then remember that I needed to eat, at which point I would gorge on as much food as I could physically consume, often resulting in me feeling very sick, and further reinforcing a negative association with food. I find that people (possibly having recognised the sickly thin and skeletal nature of my stature) would (and still do), often tip me with food instead of money, and this reminds me to eat.

As a result, busking has improved my health enormously as there is rarely a day that goes by now, in which I do not eat any food, whereas it was previously an extremely rare occasion in which I would eat on any given day.

Iris Smith link

6/4/2023 09:35:21

I appreciate you pointing out that buskers frequently spend their time outside. A person may improve their vitamin D intake far more easily if they spend a few hours each day outside. My sister desires a wedding. She has a date with the open park on Wednesday. I'll advise her to attend live performances by the musician so she may take in vitamin D while also enjoying the music.

Serena Smith link

11/5/2023 10:11:31

That's a good idea. Thanks for sharing!

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