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.
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?
This is silly. The whole experiment proved that people have somewhere to go when they are at a travel station, and on a deadline, considering it’s rush hour.
When you play in a concert hall, people have dedicated and planned the time to come, sit, and enjoy the music. When you go to a metro station, you’re coming or going. You can’t say people don’t appreciate beauty because they are performing an activity in a location that HARBORS (and indeed exists for) that activity.
I would have kept walking. Probably. Maybe I would have picked up on it being something special, but I doubt it. I’d be too engrossed in the “rat race” at the time.
the artists that play in the Tube in London are always good and after a few pints me and my friends were known to do some dancing for a couple minutes, tip and move on. They have to audition to legally play in the Tube
What do you mean “What would you have done”? If I knew he was famous I may have stopped for a second but otherwise just keep going as it were any other schmo. There are a lot of street acts, you can’t stop to check if they are all famous.