Busking?

[Electricblue]

How much would you expect to earn on a saturday in a UK city?

I would be playing acoustic guitar, maybe with a friend, no singing from me

How many songs would I have to line up? Is it ok to repeat your setlist? I would be playing from about 12 noon to about 5pm.

Any advice from the buskers out there?

[MrSnuts]

a friend of mine told me they made around 600 Euro in two days busking in cologne. They do a duo with didge and percussion... Think its about your performing skills wether you get people to stop.
Its fine to repeat the setlist, the shopowners around would propably appreciate if you switched position before the repitition (german cities even have rules on that, dunno bout UK).
To me personally, a five hour stretch of busking sounds like a hard road to go, always found it really tearin on my nerves. No audience sucks more power than walkers-by...

good luck, and tell us how much ya made!


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[T-Bird]

Hi.

Well, I have no UK experience, and the things have probably changed (for better or worse???) since I played and sung in the street a bit over a decade ago.

I considered it to be a good day if I made enough to eat well every day and to get some gas/spending money.

Perhaps I sucked, and You guys won't, but I wouldn't expect anything like 150€/head/day. If that was the average days pay for lousy 5 hours, there'd be a player in every street corner, and a couple in between.

I wouldn't even consider playing (or listening for that matter) on the street if there wasn't any vocals. (Pandemic IIRC SP season 14?)

I had about 40 or so songs to play and sing, any less and I personally wouldn't bother going if it wasn't a gig-like performance.

Just my 0.02€
Sam

[Jason P Bass]

I gave this a try in Washington DC, at Dupont Circle. It was an original folk rock act. We had ~14 songs and just played "one we haven't done in awhile" to play next.

We had a battery powered PA for vocals, acoustic guitar, and I plugged in my electric bass. We handed out fliers for gigs and 3-song CD samplers for donations. This, IMO, was the ticket to bringing in money.

We averaged about $3 per CD, enough to cover cheap duplication.

When the singer/guitar did this solo, he said he could get up to $500 on a good day, but $250-$300 was typical. We did about $350 when I went with him.

The real value, however, was handing out thousands of fliers and CDs, AND make it cash positive.

In retrospect, the music was garbage, the singer/songwriter had horrible personal skills and body odor, but our gigs always had huge turnouts. This was all due to meeting thousands of people face to face, introducing them to the person and music, and giving them something tangible to take home (flier, CD, card, anything).