Sunday, July 19, 2009

Ever Wonder Why Most Artist Are Starving?

Washington Post social experiment
A Violinist in the Metro

A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousands of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.

Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule.

A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk.

A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work.

The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.

In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.

No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best 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 his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100.

This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of an social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people. The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context?

One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be:

If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?

*Note from Eric (blog owner): Several years ago a record lable rep. gave me an arm full of CDs to listen to. Most of the music they were promoting could be considered crap, but mixed in the stack was a single CD of a performance By Joshua Bell. When I got home and played it, my love for music became obvious to me again. Not only was the perfromance insperational, but the recording was first rate. My sound system came to life.

When one is exposed to thousands apon thousands of artist, only the truly bright stand out, and this was one of them.

5 comments:

  1. Awesome blog. Very inspirational.

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  2. great story- thank you for sharing!
    it's amazing how much we are missing, don't even realize it.

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  3. Great story - very thought-provoking. Thank you.

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  4. Wow. That makes you think. Thanks for the article.

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  5. Thanks for the post Eric. We should also remember that it's not just taking time to listen to forgotten music, but also to take time out to enjoy life period. Thanks again for this.

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