I Play By Ear
Today I went into San Francisco to busk in the Powell Street Station. I bought a new amp to extend the volume of my 7"x4" BOSE SoundLink Revolve+, which I bought in Barcelona for over four hundred dollars. Two weeks ago, I used the Revolve and played in the Powell Street Station for about three hours. BART Police smiled at me when walking by. They had never done that before. I was inspired. Last time (years ago) they shut me down.
So, I went today and waited for the guy who was “in the round” and decided that I should eat something and come back. I did and he wasn’t there but hundreds of stranded BART passengers were since there was a fire on the tracks somewhere in the system and they were not being allowed to pass the turnstile.
I figured those people had enough problems and they would certainly not be amenable to me given the whole idea was to try to hear through the intercom as to what was going on. Besides, the announcer was saying to please leave the area as too many people were in the station.
I headed up the street toward the Stockton Street Tunnel before taking a glance over at Maiden Lane and decided that I might want to play there, but various stores were still open. I kept going. I am often fond of playing at Harlan Place given the chamber of space created by the alley. I went up and into it, sat down, proceeded to take my speaker out and put my ear phones on. I played for a few minutes and then some voice I couldn’t understand started yelling at me through loud speakers. There were cameras everywhere. I finally took off my headphone and said, “What?!?!?” I guess he couldn’t hear me.
He literally made no sense. I assumed he was mad that I was in the alley. I ignored him and kept playing. Eventually, I could see a police car turn in at the bottom. One officer already standing at the mouth of the alley was talking to the others in the car. I was playing. I guess they liked it, because they left and never spoke to me.
Then the guy in the microphone returned. He even “woofed.”
One man near the mouth of the alley had been listening the whole time. Passersby would look into the alley. I asked him when I was done how it sounded. He said he liked it and said he used to play.
“Was there enough volume?” I asked.
He said, “Yes.” He said he really liked the tone and asked me if I could hear the man yelling? I said that I could but that I didn’t know what he was saying.
I moved on to the alley (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_Lights_Bookstore#/media/File:City_Lights_outside.jp) g next to City Lights Books and set my speaker and ear phones. I played for about 45 minutes. People, as always, come very close and position their cameras just above my hands to take in my playing of the iPhone. I am sure from a distance it looks like I am simply using my iPhone like a radio. I pitch my head back and almost always close my eyes. I play by ear and always improvise.
