(MELBOURNE) Locals were treated to a musical feast when 10 very different performers competed for the title of Melbourne’s best busker.Sounds ranging from a homemade flute to the Tibetan guitar flooded City Square rousing smiles, applause, and dancing from passersby.

The public voted with their wallets donating to the bucket of their favourite busker.

Guitarist and singer Jenny Biddle (shown above) raised the most money and took home the mantle of the city’s best busker and a cheque for $1000.

The event - Street Change - was held as part of the Melbourne Music festival to raise money for homelessness charities - the Lighthouse Foundation and Home Ground Services.

The event was organised by the Rotary Club of Melbourne Park.

Video...

[ Continued ]

(NEW ORLEANS) It's the same old story with a different twist. Just as most captive audiences are tough on buskers, the same held true recently when a busker decided to entertain passengers on a public streetcar in New Orleans.Being the birthplace of jazz, it isn't unusual to find buskers performing songs up and down the venues in the French Quarter which is quite famous for the impromptu entertainers. However, this time was to be different.

The busker pulled out his guitar on the trolly and started singing old Beatles tunes including "A Hard Day's Night". The passengers went about their business expecting the street-performer to soon pass the hat and be on his way. Much to their surprise, the busker just kept playing more Beatles songs having a seemingly endless supply of them on hand.

When...

[ Continued ]

Newsletter
Berlin lacht! e.V. February 2009
Dear friend,
This is our Newsletter.
We want to inform you about our activities and possibilities to participate in our upcoming festivities. As well, we would like to explain a little bit about the situations of street theatre in Germany
We hope that this will make you understand the importance of coming to Berlin in order to support and
participate in the street theatre opportunities at the Berlin lacht! International street theatre festival,
even if the conditions might be less attractive compared to other festivals.

About Street theatre in Germany and Berlin
In general
Compared to other countries, Germany does not give much attention, knowledge nor funding in the
area of cultural politics for street theatre.
Main Goals
Equal rights and artistic fulfilment
Street theatre has to be treated as an equal to other art forms, and have the will to stop the
“repressive tolerance”.
Street theatre has to have the same chance that other cultural for...

[ Continued ]

(LONDON) An article in The Guardian examines where the streets have no change - and how buskers are surviving in cashless times.A recent hot topic, the article asks is it time performers turned to contactless readers? After all, dropping coins in a hat is increasingly, well, old hat.

Speaking of hats, they're down in London. Again, society is changing. Spending our money is much more convenient nowadays using plastic rather than carrying around coins and notes. Americans have gone plastic for decades but now it's becoming more of a world-wide trend.

For buskers, touchless card readers are now "the thing" since people are carrying around a lot less cash. With plastic, even if you get robbed right there on the street in broad daylight, the poor crook doesn't have access to your PIN number(s)....

[ Continued ]

(AUSTRALIA) Chayne Hultgren a.k.a. "The Space Cowboy" has just set a new Guinness worlds record by swallowing 18 razor-sharp swords. The brave performance artist acomplished the feat by swallowing the 72cm swords in Sydney. "The Space Cowboy" beat his own 2008 record of 16 and used different throat stretching methods to perfect the art.

More...