Music in the Outdoors...

So I did a thing today, kinda like things I have done before but not quite. I'll get to that by way of these folks I saw playing street music in New York City. 

Saw this sax and drum duo on a nice spring day in Central Park. It's a gig, they got the tip jar out and I tipped them and made their photo. 

This was a soprano sax and piano duo playing in Washington Square. I bet there is some pretty good tips for these guys, maybe not a living but darn sure keep you in sax reeds and piano tunings. Washington Square has a long history of protests and performers. It was a gathering place in the 50s and 60s for the beat and hippie movements. Texas music legend Buddy Holly once lived nearby and spent time sitting in the park with a guitar helping others with their chords.  

Here was another duo in the Square. Check out the banjo bass. I've been kicked out of lot of bands for showing up with things like this that some people did not think fitted the music. Looks like these two go together real well. I was surprised that there were so few musicians, poets, and artists doing there thing in this famous place. Seems there might be some new rules about how close you can be to this or that that might be killing the vibe. 

Not quite the same category but on a walk we stumbled into a Jewish/Greek Festival. The band was a stringed instrument (just when you think you know everything) I could not identify, a clarinet and a hand drum. I don't know the band but I bet they are stars of the Jewish/Greek Neighborhood.  

I think the first night in town we were walking along the Hudson River and it was kind of a dark area with loading docks for the hotels and townhomes and at the curb I spotted a pile that looked to be a homeless person's nest. He was sitting totally unaware of us and playing this home made guitar with headphones on. Rather that intrude into his home and privacy this late at night I went on but returned to the area a couple of days later and made friends with Randy. He made the guitar, confessed to it being hard to get a good sound from and we shared a few tips with me telling him I built cigar box guitars. I don't think you could really call Randy a homeless person or a bum because his set up was a little trailer type thing that could be moved and he was neat, clean and polite. I was prepared to tip him for his playing but he did not seem to need that or expect it so we wished each other well and parted ways.  

This photo taken at a park between Chinatown on the way to the Bowery neighborhood. I saw a couple of Asian guys playing a one stringed instrument, very similar to some of the coffee can guitars I have made only they played with a bow instead of a slide. He was reading music as he played and had his instrument amplified through a pink transistor radio sized thing that was really putting out some sound. I love my little Blackstar Fly3 battery powered amp but this guy might have drowned me out. Let's just say he was cutting through the mix very well. Again no tip jar, no expectation, just alone in the middle of the city with his music. 

So here's the thing I did. I was off work early with Cathy sleeping because she works nights. I took my horn out to a local park. I sat in the gazebo. Kids and parents playing on the splash pad 30 yards away. A basketball game was being played about 100 yards away. People circled but not too close on the walking trail. Some kind of event at a distant pavilion but screened by trees. I took out my music, a couple of trombone books with simple folk songs and a beginner baritone horn book with familiar melodies. I practiced the music for the brass quintet me and some fellows are rehearsing. I worked on an etude from the old Blazhevich 70 Tuba Studies Book, first published in 1942 that I have had since college and few simple tuba solos. I played all these things, plus working on some brass band type grooves for over an hour. 

Once some people passed and said "hey, good rhythm!" A mother and child walked past and I over heard her telling the little one "he will start back playing in a moment."  

After a pretty good lip work out I loaded my gear and I found that for over the past hour I had not thought about anything else but music. Now I play a lot around the house but there are the distractions, a text, a call, let's see how they do this one on youtube and so one. Playing in the park was different. It was different than the street busking that me and Cathy have done. It was relaxing. I'll do it some more.