Busking (playing/practicing in public)

[superblonde]

I had always planned to do busking if unable to practice with others. Hence, why I got a battery powered amp (I think it is better than the Roland battery powered amps. It is a Fender Mustang Mini). So far I’ve done it a couple times and it was fun. Why sit around the mancave practicing when I might as well enjoy the great outdoors when practicing, and also, gain live playing experience at the same time. Basically if able to play with random people staring from one foot away then any other dive bar type distraction isn’t as bad. Now that I finally have enough songs in a setlist to make a reasonable length of playing time I am going to try it on a regular basis.

So has anyone else done busking as a way to have fun and also gain progress? I’ve talked to some buskers over the years and some of them make quite a bit of cash on certain evenings from nightlife, but that’s not really why I’d be doing it, though I wouldnt mind the lunch money either (“tax free” 😀 Don’t tell the IRS).

There’s laws against using amplification in public places. But in the US, any law against busking with acoustic (tho I have no plans to go acoustic) are a big grey area because of freedom of speech. Here I’ll quote a long wikipedia article on that.. because I have talked to local cops when I see them around locally and they have never had correct answers on busking. Their stock reply is “it is a noise complaint ticket, which is a couple hundred dollars. Maybe you would have to get a business license and permit to play on the street”, which is not the total picture. The intention of some city laws is to force people playing music on the street to have a permit, and that way, control the “homeless person with a guitar as a prop, hassling people for money” type problem, as well as control aspects of the city (typical gov’t control freaks), but the laws don’t really meet scrutiny.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Busking_%28U.S._case_law%29

In the United States there have been numerous legal cases about regulations and laws that have decided the rights of buskers to perform in public. Most of these laws and regulations have been found to be unconstitutional when challenged. In the US, free speech is considered a fundamental right of every individual, guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth constitutional amendments, and in the majority of legal cases it has been concluded that practicing artistic free speech is legal. Busking is legally considered to be artistic free speech and clearly not panhandling or begging.
In the United States, reasons to regulate or ban busking behavior include public safety issues and noise issues in certain areas such as hospital zones and residential zones. In residential zones, a reasonable curfew may be allowed. Such laws must be narrowly tailored to eliminate only the perceived evils by limiting the time, place and manner that busking may be practiced. They must also leave open reasonable alternative venues. The only exceptions to these free speech rules are sedition, as defined by the Smith Act, public displays of pornography and obscenity as defined by the Miller test for obscenity, criminal behavior such as fraud or defamation, certain commercial advertising and the common laws talked about above. In the US, laws regulating or banning busking must be applied evenly to all forms of free speech according to the first and fourteenth constitutional amendments and the judicial decisions listed below.
Busking cannot be prohibited in an area where other forms of free speech are not prohibited. For example, if busking is regulated or banned but people are allowed to conduct free speech behavior for pickets, protests, religious, political, educational, sports, commercial or other purposes, then the law is illegal. In the United States any form of regulation on artistic free speech must not be judgmental, and permits must not be so restrictive, complex, difficult or expensive to obtain that they inhibit free speech. It is also unlawful per federal court decision for law officers to seize a performer’s instruments.[1]
Under Title 18, U.S.C., Section 241 Conspiracy Against Rights, it is unlawful for two or more persons to conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person of any state, territory or district in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him/her by the Constitution or the laws of the United States, or because of his/her having exercised the same.[2]
Under United States law, it is the express duty of all officers of the law or individuals such as security guards, legislators, mayors, Council Persons, judges, Hospitals and Nursing Home Proprietors, etc., to protect and preserve an individual’s constitutional rights Under Title 18, U.S.C., Section 242 – Deprivation of Rights Under Color of Law. Most of these individuals take oaths to uphold the US Constitution. It is clearly a violation of federal law for these individuals to violate people’s constitutional or civil rights under the color of the law.[3]

Cases

Year Case law
1970 In the late 1920s and early 1930s, busking had grown to be quite a controversial enterprise in New York. The country was in the midst of a horrible economic depression and many people had turned to busking as a source of income. Buskers were everywhere and fights over pitches were alarmingly common between the buskers themselves and the buskers, merchants, and vendors. Out of frustration over the complaining, fighting, and violence, Mayor Fiorello La Guardia had banned busking in New York on the grounds of safety issues regarding the escalating conflicts. Busking went on, but on a much smaller scale. If anybody complained about a busker, at their discretion, the police could order the busker to move on or could even arrest him or her. In 1970 poet Allen Ginsberg challenged the constitutionality of this ban. The ban was lifted in 1970 after being found to be unconstitutional by Mayor John V. Lindsay.[4]

1979 In Goldstein v. Town of Nantucket, the Town of Nantucket had tried to regulate buskers as vendors, which the court did not accept as valid. Local businesses had complained about the competition from street artists.[5]

1983 In Davenport v. City of Alexandria, Virginia, a judge ruled that a ban on busking and other business-related activities on the streets of the central city area was unconstitutional. Several courts found that there was no legitimacy to the city’s allegations of safety issues that were alleged to be related to busking.[6]

1985 In Friedrich v. Chicago, 619 F. Supp., 1129. D.C. Ill., a Chicago court ruled in favor of allowing buskers in the city. In Chicago busking was restricted in certain areas. In the decision, buskers won injunctive relief from the city’s enforcement of the ban in some of the contested areas. They also obtained relief from a permit scheme on the use of amplifiers because the scheme was judgmental and at the discretion of the issuers.[7]

1990 In Carew-Reid et al. vs. Ny Metropolitan Transportation Authority et al., buskers defeated a ban on the use of electronic amplifiers on the NY subways. The courts ruled that it was the volume of the sound, not the use of amplifiers, that was at issue.[8]

1991 In Jews For Jesus, Inc. vs. Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority, a religious group defeated the banning of expressive behavior with a captive audience in paid areas.[9]

1996 In Bery v. New York, 97 F. 3d 684, 2d Cir., local businesses had complained about the competition from street artists, visual artists won the right to sell their art.[10]

1997 In Harry Perry and Robert “Jingles” Newman v. Los Angeles Police Department,[11] argued as Case 96-55545 before the Ninth Circuit Court Of Appeals, buskers won the right to perform and sell their original music CDs and tapes on the street. Local businesses had complained about the competition from street artists and tried to prohibit busking.[11]

1999 In Turley v. NYC, US 2nd Cir Appeal 98-7114, argued in 1999, the judge ruled that New York City busking permit schemes were too complex and difficult to obtain, and that the costs were unreasonably high. Turley also won relief prohibiting the seizure of instruments by police.[1]

2001 Street Performers won a lawsuit in Waikiki, Hawaii. After local businesses had complained about the competition from buskers, they got the city to push through an ordinance to ban busking on a very popular area, allegedly for safety reasons. But the buskers prevailed in court by proving the safety concerns were not founded.[12]

2003 District Judge Henry Lee Adams Jr. issued an injunction barring the city of St. Augustine, Florida from enforcing a recent ordinance banning street performances on St. George Street. Local businesses had complained about the competition from buskers. Judge Adams’s order stated, “Street performances are a form of expression protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution.” Merchants got the city to ban busking for alleged safety issues. After public outcry, and a lawsuit[13] with Judge Adams decision, St. Augustine acceded and as of March 2003 allows busking.[14]

2004 A San Francisco busker known as the World Famous Bushman was charged with four public nuisance misdemeanors. A jury cleared him of the first complaint, and the district attorney subsequently dropped the remaining complaints.[15]

2005 A judge rejected Seattle Center rules on buskers. “Magic Mike” Berger, a magician and balloon-twisting busker, took the Seattle Center to court and won injunctive relief and a court ordered settlement of over US $47,000. Seattle Center had some of the most liberal rules regarding busking but even they could not pass constitutional muster. The Business Improvement District formed to manage Seattle Center claimed that they had the right to manage 62 square blocks in the center of the city like private property. They wanted to limit buskers by giving preference to approved buskers, regulating the time, places and numbers of buskers performing. The judge rejected the regulations, pointing out that… “while a street performer cannot offer a meek oral request for a donation from passers by, a beggar who does not perform can solicit Seattle Center visitors with relative impunity, subject only to general criminal prohibitions on aggressive panhandling.”[16]

2007 9th Circuit Decision filed on August 29, 2007 affirmed artist Steve White’s right to display, and sell his original self-expressive art in the public fora. White v. City of Sparks [Nevada] (500 F.3d 953) addressed prior restraint in licensing schemes, it reaches into other areas of law not seen in other opinions “Nor are we convinced by the city’s argument that White’s sale of his paintings removes them from the ambit of protected expression. “[T]he degree of First Amendment protection is not diminished merely because the [protected expression] is sold rather than given away.” City of Lakewood v. Plain Dealer Pub. Co., 486 U.S. 750, 756 n.5 (1988); see also Riley v. Nat’l Fed’n of the Blind of N. C., 487 U.S. 781, 801 (1988) (“It is well settled that a speaker’s rights are not lost merely because compensation is received; a speaker is no less a speaker because he or she is paid to speak.”); Village of Schaumburg v. Citizens for a Better Env’t, 444 U.S. 620, 633 (1980).[17]

2010 Judge blocks Venice boardwalk permit system. U.S. District Judge Dean D. Pregerson says the lottery system for performers and sellers violates the 1st Amendment. He also strikes down a rule barring the use of musical instruments or amplified sound between 9 am and sunset in designated areas.[18]

I'm an intermediate student of Metal Method. I play seitannic heavy metal. All Kale Seitan! ♯ ♮ ♭ ø ° Δ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
And on the Seventh Day, Mustaine said: ∇ ⨯ E = - ∂B / ∂t ; and there was Thrash; and it had a ♭3; and it was good.

[Igglepud]

This is the first I have heard the term. Sounds fun. I might try it out.

MY ROCK IS FIERCE!!!

[vik]

Interesting.

Never considered the legality.

I know busking is legal here in Georgia, but you have to play a banjo and be an albino.

I’m kinda pale, may give it a go.

[superblonde]

Aha! We could be starting a street army of metal method buskers. 😀
Bringing hot guitar solo’s back into the everyday world!

I'm an intermediate student of Metal Method. I play seitannic heavy metal. All Kale Seitan! ♯ ♮ ♭ ø ° Δ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
And on the Seventh Day, Mustaine said: ∇ ⨯ E = - ∂B / ∂t ; and there was Thrash; and it had a ♭3; and it was good.

[safetyblitz]

Even though they haven’t given you very useful answers, I think talking to local police was a smart first step, because the reality is that if you get any push-back while busking, the cop-on-the-street is who you’ll be dealing with. Depending on where you are, there might be broadly worded bylaws e.g. against loitering that can give police pretty broad authority to rain on your parade.

[Igglepud]

Why does it matter? Are people afraid of jam bands spreading?

MY ROCK IS FIERCE!!!

[superblonde]

People are afraid of getting hassled on the street by aggressive beggars (including myself). SF for example has some very aggressive or unsightly beggars, including drug addict types (feel bad for them too, but, whatcha gonna do). People in these neighborhoods don’t like these bad types being there, so they call the cops to remove them (push them out, at least), and the cops need a somewhat legit reason. Most cities have “no begging” type rules – you can’t ask for money. The way around this, the beggars get a beat up guitar from somewhere, and say, they’re not begging, they’re playing music – when really, they are not. So then the cops have to attempt to distinguish between who is a real musician and who is a fake musician? They cant by law obviously. So they try to boot out everyone since they can’t separate the bad apples from the good apples. Example.. there’s a pedestrian underpass bridge nearby here that is kind of a tourist walkway. There’s some lowlifes (what I would call them anyway, I’m sure their moms like them just fine) hanging out under the bridge playing guitar sometimes. Often they’re doing drugs and probably selling drugs. I don’t like to judge based on appearance but you know the types when you see them. I don’t find it pleasant to walk past them even if they’re singing kumbaya.

Another reason for cities wanting permits is that buskers can get in fights with each other (literally). Because there are a limited number of high profit places (like popular street corners) in high traffic areas. So they will squat, to save the spot. It creates turf battles. This seems petty but I have seen craft vendors in public parks get into physical arguments because someone is “taking their spot”. So to protect the peace, the cities try to force everyone to get permits, and then, the city can allocate physical spots, based on some basis (first come first serve, or round robin, or lottery). A local craft area in a park has a lottery system for determining which craft vendor gets what park spot, and also a bunch of rules for kicking people out of the lottery for bad behavior or no-shows, etc.

Yea it’s a whole thing..

I agree it’s best to be friendly with the thugs I mean cops. There’s some really good info pages on the web for busking. A lot of it is common sense. Be courteous, if asked to leave then be polite and quick about it, don’t blare amps, etc. It is easy to get preferential treatment from officers if you say hello and smile to them, or meet them first, introduce yourself, etc. Cops stereotype based on looks (“unfairly”) even though they claim otherwise. Dressing nicely goes a long way. Obviously being the preferred genetic race in the world helps me personally (minorities I would bet are going to get more hassles). I have considered going to the city to get a biz license and permit if there is one, it’s no big deal, it takes a couple hours at most, and I’ve only heard that they cost a couple bucks at most. It’s the type of thing that someone with low class will consider a huge obstacle but it’s not. In many parks or public spaces it is very easy to get a party permit for example, which allows “loud but not excessive” live music for events. Hey, I’m a party of one, that’s an event, the permit applies. I haven’t looked into the details yet. It is probably overkill. Me playing guitar is less of a public threat than the dudes doing illegal skateboard jumps off the cement wall while their friends hang out under a cloud of green smoke, etc. Last time I played at a park, a guy showed up with a mini motorcycle (not street legal, and especially not legal to ride inside a public park) and proceeded to do squealing donuts on the concrete and various wheelies. That was cool for a while but the 3 cop cars which showed up later took more interest in him than in me. I turned down the amp until they left.. 😀 I was more worried about the couple shady characters who came up telling me “hey man I like your playin” and asking if I wanted to join them for a toke. Hah. No thanks, keep movin.. But I did think of a cool lyric and melody that day. I think it went: “bully with a badge! bully with a badge! Best not talk back! Got a bully with a badge!” (is that a song already? Maybe I didn’t make it up after all.) All in good fun don’t take it too literally.

Two artists today who got their early experience by busking, and even found fame that way. You know them, you love them,
1. justin beiber
2. ed sheeran

There’s others I am sure, but these guys come to mind immediately.

Oh of course, all the amazing early blues guys were buskers.
Muddy waters
Little Walter
..this list could get quite long. All of those guys started on the street corner and learned to capture audience attention by competing with the guy on the opposite corner.

I'm an intermediate student of Metal Method. I play seitannic heavy metal. All Kale Seitan! ♯ ♮ ♭ ø ° Δ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
And on the Seventh Day, Mustaine said: ∇ ⨯ E = - ∂B / ∂t ; and there was Thrash; and it had a ♭3; and it was good.

[Igglepud]

We have a downtown area attempting to revitalize itself (art walks, craft booths, etc.) so I might just find myself a corner and sing badly while I strum. If I do, I’ll post how it went.

MY ROCK IS FIERCE!!!

[rorygfan]

So street singers have a legal definition there in the home of the free and the brave. Probably for purposes of intentional government interference and harrassment. Sitting idle entertaining people seems like such waste of time for police to get involved unless your location choice is super disruptive to local business’. No such BS here. We have quite a few crazy performers here with trash can drum sets to legit guitarists and the police as far as I can tell never bother them. Glad to be out of the excessive govt,law making and police state it has become.

[rorygfan]

Speaking of such”Buskers” …. This guy “the human jukebox” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grimes_Poznikov

I recall seeing years ago in Ghiradelli Square as a kid in SF.  Very cool idea for it’s time, this video while not very interesting he did have an entertaining setup.

[Author]

Posts