Becoming Legal in Chicago

To legally busk in the city of Chicago, you must go in person to City Hall, Room 800.

Room 800 houses the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection: Business Assistance Center. You go up to the person behind the counter who asks you why you are here. When you tell him that you are here to get a street performer's license, he gives you a form to fill out and points to a ticket machine. You take a ticket, sit down to wait your turn, and, even though you are just a street performer, you marvel at the fact that you are in a government office that caters to the needs of businesses.

This was my ticket.

The form that you fill out is an application for one of three licenses: "Peddler," "Food Peddler," or "Street Performer."

And in case you're confused about what the three licenses mean... a peddler sells stuff. A food peddler sells... uh.. food. And a street performer sells... er...

...street performers? I sell street performers?
Huh.
At least that's what the clerk wrote on my form (trust me, my handwriting ain't that good).

Anyway!
Thoughts of buskers selling other buskers aside...
(And there are lots of possible jokes here, but I'll refrain from going there...)

But! If you look very closely at the last picture, you'll notice that there's a section "FOR PEDDLERS ONLY." And that section asks for an Illinois Business Tax number.

So what does that mean?

No business tax numbers are required of street performers.

In short, the city wants to know who you are, where you live, when you were born, and how to contact you, but they have no interest (or at least no expectations) of getting tax money out of you.

Why? Maybe they don't expect street performers to make a lot of money. Maybe they're just acknowledging the impossibility of keeping track of these performers' earnings.

What, then, would be the purpose of licensing?
Why did I have to go to City Hall, fill out their forms, and pay $100 fee to get this:

Look at me! I'm a street ... peddler?

And having a street performer's license matters. Police officers have come up to me a couple of times and asked to see my street performer's license. I have observed unlicensed street performers picking up their stuff and dashing away as soon as they see the police approach.

And while a peddler's license costs just as much as a street performer's license, and the clerks at City Hall don't seem to think there's much of a difference between the two, police officers have apparently fined other performers for having the wrong one (like I do in the example above).

So again: why does it matter? Why does the city of Chicago have a licensing process for street performers?

The Municipal Code of Chicago clearly defines "public areas" - where street performers specifically can and cannot perform, as well as when they can and cannot perform. On top of that, any anonymous call to the police - a noise complaint from a nearby retailer, for example - means that the performer has to move or face arrest.

Licensing, then, (and this is my argument) is a means of control - of regulating space in favor of local businesses and residents who actually have the money to pay taxes. As one woman, a street performer's fiance (and a Chicago-based teacher) was telling me:

"People would complain, whether people are residents or the businesses. And the complaints will go back to the police of course because they go to the meetings. They have to please the Michigan Avenue Association. It’s a lot of wealth. You have to keep them happy. They would make the complaints to the police, to the city, so on and so forth, and they would take action."

Government regulation is thus less about legitimizing buskers through the granting of licenses than it is a means of controlling the street performer's space. The fear is that street performances make noise and obstruct traffic - this fear makes it so that, even if a street performer has become a regular fixture of the city (or a cultural landmark, even), street performers are always in danger of losing their performance spots.

It's something that I'm interested in pursuing further and sharing with you guys - stories from individual performers on some of the encounters that have made it difficult for them to work. And since I am actually currently at the Dallas airport (spent the weekend visiting family), I will have to leave that for another time....

The Hustle

I was street performing on Michigan Avenue one day, working a particular spot early on in the spring, when a panhandler approached me after several shows with what I think was a congratulatory "That was some good hustlin'! That was some good hustlin'!"

I remember not understanding what he was saying.

I had just finished a show, and my ears were pumping - all this was just a regular part of the post-performance high that comes with busking and its accompanying surge of adrenaline. Fortunately, a classmate and friend had come downtown to watch my show. While my observation abilities had been limited by the role I was taking as a busker, hers were on. And her comment ("That was really interesting!") made me think back to what the man had said:

"That was some good hustlin'!"
Hustling.
Is street performance hustling?
And if that's the case, is it good or bad?

This is me. Hustling. (I'm the one on the left, by the way).

Hustling definitely carries with it some negative connotations in the wider community.

When I connect the two terms, "busking" with "hustling," the following questions are instinctive - a reaction almost to the negative tone that sometimes comes with the word:

Is street performing a scam? Is it a way of cheating people out of their money?

At least, that seems to be the reaction I sometimes get... when a pedestrian or two walks by before I start performing and wonder out loud whether I'm there to cheat people (with a shell game).

When I asked one street performer, the Chicago 10 Man (a living statue covered in silver), he attempted to explain to me what "hustle" means for him:

"Well, maybe some people have a different interpretation of it."

He went on to say:

"In the black community, when we talk about hustling, or a lot of them, when they talk about hustling, a lot of them talk about doing their own job, maybe selling drugs. That’s why they call it hustling. They be like, naw, naw. I get off at the gig at like 8:30 and then I’mma start hustling. Ya know, a hustle is something that you do on your own. It’s not like a job. It’s your hustle. Something you do on your own. Completely independent on anybody else. And it brings you profit.”

So, basically...

"Hustling" has bad connotations because of its association with "selling drugs."

BUT for the 10 Man, "hustling" is good because it's both profitable and independent work. The 10 Man went on to stress the hustle as one's own work:

"When you’re working a job, you’re working somebody else’s hustle. You know what I’m saying? Making the money is the hustle. But is it your hustle or somebody else’s hustle? It’s like all right."

"They [someone with a conventional job] might get $9 or $10 an hour but after insurance and Uncle Sam and everybody, they’re getting hustled, ya know? It’s Sam Walton’s hustle, not their hustle. If I wake up in the morning and it costs $10 to get to work, as far as gas, and I might pay another $15 for parking. And I pay another $5 for food. That’s $30 bucks I paid to get to work. But if I come home with a few hundred dollars, that’s my hustle. You know what I’m saying? I just hustled. It didn’t cost me nothing to make this money. That’s what a hustle is."

The Chicago 10 Man, hard at work. And yes. There is snow.

So, however it is that you might define "hustle," the 10 Man's use of the word to define street performing is his way of highlighting what he values in the work of busking:

Street performing is one's own work. Whether you fail miserably or succeed.. er.. successfully, it's all on you. Whatever you make is the direct product of your work.

For buskers, the ability to labor, identify that labor as clearly one's own, and thereby "profit" from that labor is, at its heart, what street performing is all about.

Busking: Maybe it doesn't matter

The Bucket Boys: a group of Chicago drummers
People either love them as a cultural landmark,
or hate them for the noise they make and the crowds they gather.

Here's something that I've been struggling with all year:

Why street performing?

Why is street performing important? Why did I spend a whole year following around street performers? What larger significance does a study of street performing have - I mean, other than generating some interesting facts on a few quirky individuals?

Who they are, what do they do, and why should you care?

In short, what are the stakes?

People talk about street performing as "culture" and "entertainment." These things are important in the same way that all art is important, but it's important in an abstract way that everyone agrees with in theory but rarely in practice - because sometimes it's "too noisy" or it "obstructs traffic" and because it's a little unpredictable when you have agents like this acting on their own.

So why does it matter?
And let's be honest: maybe it doesn't.

Maybe it doesn't matter that so many of us live in a de-industrialized capitalist city like Chicago, where regular blue-collar work and the corresponding middle-class wages are harder and harder to come by everyday. Maybe it doesn't matter that, for some, the only other kind of work available to them is a retail job that means "$9 or $10 an hour" - and worse, where those hours are spent selling things that you didn't make and things that you, honestly, don't really care about.

Maybe it doesn't matter that in street theater, the creation of art is more fulfilling than a job transferring merchandise from the hands of a company to the hands of a consumer - and yeah, maybe you could make more than $9 or $10 an hour on the streets.

For the rest of us, for the audiences and the consumers and the ones who don't busk - maybe it doesn't matter that, as our cities get more and more crowded, we're learning how to better and better ignore each other. It doesn't matter that we've forgotten that the things we buy was made with the sweat (and, at times, the blood) of workers thousands of miles away.

It doesn't matter that it's sometimes just a little nice to participate in a street show, to be part of an audience of strangers brought together by the work of a street performer. It's easy to forget how nice it is to actually see something being created - to see art being made and possibly to even take part in the creation of this bit of art.

And when "it's a little nice" happens over and over again to different audiences at different street corners, "a little nice" can become a distinctively urban "vibe" - and, just maybe, city spaces become less of a place where people instinctively ignore each other and, instead, more of a place where some go to specifically seek each other out through their shared participation in a street show.

Two balloon artists working side by side at Chicago's annual OktoberFest (2013)

That's my mission in this blog. A part of it, at least.
To show how exactly street performances do all this.
To argue that street performance really does matter.

See you next week!

---

A side note: in my research, I have really only been able to focus on the city of Chicago. I was able to go fairly in-depth with the handful of buskers I spoke with and observed, so I will make my arguments through the personal and lived experiences of these performers.

In the meantime, check out the Busking Project. They conducted their research all over the place. For a broader perspective, check out the Busking Project's Nick Broad's blog post. He and his team traveled all around the world to study busking in different cities. I also had the chance to read one of researcher Vivian Doumpa's presentations.

Here's some things from Vivian's presentation that's worth thinking about:

"It could be argued that each local method of busking regulation reflects each 
city’s management approach towards social inclusion, freedom of speech, 
social networking, accessibility and equal opportunities."

The heavily-regulated atmosphere for buskers in Madrid has brought about an intense dialogue over the "human right to work."

There's something about the "unexpectedness" of a street act that generates "pleasure" when someone runs into one.

She makes an argument of street performance as a "Lighter Quicker Cheaper" means of revitalizing city centers.

And something that I have observed in my time street performing but never really articulated:
"[Busking] is a source of entertainment for the disenfranchised. Beggars empty their hats into the cups of buskers, as it's the only form of live performance they will ever see. It's social inclusion not just for the busker but for their audience."

Jeremy: "The best job I've ever had" (Conclusion)

And one last time (at least, until next time):

Hi Jeremy!

For Jeremy, as it is for other street performers, this is work. This is his job - his real job. And he works all day, everyday, as long as the weather allows him to. And when it doesn't, he packs up and finds a place where the weather is just a little bit kinder.

His family is supportive of his work... so much so that one of his (at the time, high school aged) daughters learned how to make balloons so that she could make some extra money street performing near him. He mused:

"With my kids' friends, I'm like the coolest dad there is. You know. All their dads have got 'real' jobs. You know? What would you want with one of those. Whereas I'm the magic guy, I'm the one on the street corner. So there's a certain – I get cool points with the kids. And the kids' friends. I don't know if they can be embarrassed by me anymore in public places. You know what it's like when you're a kid, and your parents are like, 'Oh God…' Well, you know. They've watched me do this. And if there's anything I can say that can make them embarrassed or cringe, they've heard it."

And while busking is, he says, the job that "fits" him best, it's not all fun and games. Because street performing isn't just a hobby, because it's work-

"Some days are better than others. Some days, I mean even though I love coming to work and I love what I do, some days feel more like playing and some days feel more like work. So it's like anything else, you know? It can't all be just a honeymoon. Sometimes you're just grinding stuff out. Because that's what you do."

We will be exploring this subject of street performing as work much more later on, through the lives of all the different performers out there who do make a living off of busking.



Here are Jeremy's final words to aspiring street performers:

"Don't bother."
"Do articles on street performing but don't."

With a laugh, he continued.

"No. Uh. Aspiring street performers… well, do it. I mean, you just have to try it. You have to go out and you have to get on the horse and get knocked off. You have to go into the ring and get your nose bloodied a little bit. Whatever the images, whatever metaphor you want. The only way you will learn how to do this is by doing it. And the only way to get better is by sucking at first. So do it because you love it. And don't stop. Um, you know, you gotta put your mind in a strong place. If you want to do this, you have to commit to doing it. And then it's like any other job. There's a learning curve. You don't walk into a company at an entry level position and expect to be the CEO. You have to earn your way up. And it's the same with this."

"You have to put in the time, you have to put in the effort, you have to put in the thought, you have to experiment, you have to fail, and then if you go through that process, you can be successful at the end of it."

Final Words

I first met Jeremy on March 15, the day of Chicago's Saint Patrick's Day Parade in 2014. Through him, I was able to meet a variety of other street performers, and through him, I have learnt to distinguish what matters from doesn't matter when it comes to being a magician, an entertainer, and an all-around stand up person.

So this is a heartfelt thank you for his time, his words, his mentorship, and his friendship. If you ever happen to be in Chicago and see the magician with the British flag for a vest, stop by, say hello, and watch his show.

Hope you all enjoyed this profile piece on busker Jeremy Pitt-Payne! And (until next time), we'll be back to our regularly scheduled Monday posts.

Jeremy: "Applause is very nice but it doesn't pay the rent." (Part IV)

Building a crowd is hard.

Say hello to Jeremy again!
I'm running out of good pictures of him performing.
Soon, I might have to start using all the ones where
a part of fingers covers the edge of the lens....

But if you have the guts to try street performing and the endurance to stick through it day after day, someone will stop at some point, and an audience will form. How often that happens may depend on how good you are... but, with experience, I think, you can figure it out.

Asking people for money though?

That's a different kind of challenge altogether.

One street magician that I met performing on the streets of Chicago explained to me that he never asks for money. It didn't feel right to him.

Another street magician told me that she felt weird asking for money when she only had one or two spectators in her audience. 

And when a relative saw some video of me street performing, which he insists I should post online (and I'll do so at some point!), and we got to my hat line (where I ask for money), he gave me a funny look and said: "You have no shame, Felice."

There's something about asking people for money that seems, as this relative pointed out, almost shameful in our culture.

If that's the case, how can a busker make a living? How do street performers get paid?

Especially since, as Jeremy says, the way to get paid as a street magician is relatively straightforward:

"You just ask them for it."

Jeremy acknowledged that there's some discomfort involved when you first start busking, but he says "That's just something you have to get over. That's something I've had to learn because at first you're just kind of awkward."

And the thing for Jeremy is that there's no shame involved because, as a street performer, he has to "establish some kind of value." He explained:

"If I have given them something, and if they’re decent people, well, it’s only fair to give something back. So you've got an exchange of entertainment, enjoyment for money, you know? So my job is to entertain them and give them a nice experience, give them something to take home and talk about to their friends. If I do that, if I then ask for money in return, I feel I'm not – I'm not begging, you know? This isn't just begging with a gimmick. I know street performers have been described that way before – begging with a gimmick. I don't see this as begging. And I only ask for money once I've established that I've given them something worthwhile. And for the most part, if people have received something that they think is worthwhile, they'll give you some money. It's not a particularly difficult, strenuous concept."

"I know – not blowing my own trumpet but because people have told me – I do a nice show. I give people a nice time. They enjoy it, so to say, ok. Now. Give me what you felt the show was worth. It’s not [an] unreasonable thing to do, so I'm very comfortable doing it. Asking for money is not a problem. It's not something I'm embarrassed or ashamed of, so I just ask. If you had fun, the best way to say thank you is to put money in my hat. 'Cause applause is very nice but they don't pay the rent. And you know, I think people realize that. I think helping them understand that this is how I make a living, that does help. I'm not a street performer because I love performing or I want the attention. I'm here because this is how I make a living. I can only do that if you think that's worth something, you know?"

So... it's just that easy? Just ask for it?

I mean... once you can get over any mental blocks that you have, how hard is it just to ask someone for money? Here are some of the problems I've encountered:

• I have a hat line that I've scripted into my show. The problem? What if they leave before I get to my hat line? What if they leave before I actually even put my hat down for money?
• What if they don't show up until after my hat line?
• What if I don't even get to do a whole show?
• How much should they be giving me?

What does Jeremy do?

Jeremy mentions money at least three (sometimes more) times in his show (and thus prepares his audience for his final hat line).

First mention of money: he borrows a signed $20 bill from a volunteer. This $20 plays a role in his grand finale. He makes a joke about people giving him $20s if they enjoy the show (along with the necessary gestures... the *nudgenudgewinkwink*). By borrowing this $20, he also traps this volunteer in place and forces him/her to watch the entirety of the performance.

Second mention of money: he has just finished the second routine of his show (the cups and balls). There is already an audience there. They just had a lot of fun (cuz, let's be honest, cups and balls are amazing). He sets up that first volunteer who had earlier lent him the $20 and has this volunteer stand nearby. Now he gives his main hat line (posted here with Jeremy's permission):

"Now before I do this trick, my friends, I just want to say two things. Firstly, I want to thank you all very sincerely for stopping to see this show. You didn’t have to do that. You did just give me a chunk of your life. You won’t get it back, so I hope it was worth the investment. The second thing I wanted to say, my friends, at the end of this show, I will put my hat on the table. I know you understand why I do that. This is my job. I’m a full time professional street performer, and I can only do this if you have some fun, and you’re happy to put something in here at the end to say thanks for the fun. So tell me how much fun it was by what you put in. If you had five dollars of fun, put in five. Ten dollars of fun, ten. Twenty dollars of fun – [he said to laughter as he nudged the volunteer softly with an elbow] – well, you get the idea, don’t ya?"

The audience just saw something amazing, and they're sticking around because of Jeremy's promised grand finale. They're not going to leave right now. He establishes that his audience "had fun" and they can "thank" him "for the fun" by paying him. This is also where he educates them on the kind of bills he usually gets: They should feel welcome to stick a "$5, $10, or $20" into his hat.

Third mention of money: Jeremy cuts open a lemon. He promises that the spectator's $20 will be inside the lemon. He opens up the lemon and holds the bill in his hand. He pauses here and tells everyone that this is only amazing if the bill is signed. And IF the bill is signed, and they had fun, they should tip the magician.

Jeremy is building up anticipation here. The lemon's been cut.
People are waiting to see if there really is a signed bill in that lemon.
So! It's the perfect time to mention money again!

Last mention of money: Audience is amazed by the signature on the $20. Jeremy finishes off his show by removing his hat and turning it over.

And if he doesn't get to do a whole show (because an audience doesn't build), then he'll end the show early, ask them for money with a shorter version of his hat line, and work on building up a new audience with new people.

The key? You gotta be good enough to actually entertain your audience, you have to establish that you have entertained them, and then you have to convince them that they can give you money in exchange for that bit of entertainment.

And... yeah. That's it. I couldn't think of too many cheesy jokes this time around. Posting everyday is a whole lot harder than posting once a week. But I've got one more post for you all tomorrow on Jeremy, and then we'll be back to our regularly scheduled weekly posts!

Next up: I'll be concluding my profile on Jeremy. But don't worry. Jeremy, like many of the other street performers, will pop up over and over again throughout my weekly posts.

Jeremy: Stopping People in their Tracks (Part III)

Oops!

My bad. I forgot to post yesterday. But no worries: I'll make it up to you guys this weekend.

Anyway: Jeremy, the Magician from Britain.

(I had an interesting conversation with a friend one day: should I call him "Jeremy the Magician from Britain" as though that were his full name? Or should I stick in that comma and call him "Jeremy, the 'Magician from Britain'"? Or how about "Jeremy, who happens to be a magician from Britain"? And if you're wondering how someone can turn this little question into a full-blown conversation, just shrug it off and realize that, in the life of graduate students, questions like this are somehow very important. And if you think that this little conversation is mundane, imagine all the debates that I have when I'm speaking to that little voice in my head...

*shudders*)

Last time, I said that I would explore what exactly it is that Jeremy does. So let's go!

First off:

Where does he busk, and why does that matter?
Well, if your memory is even just a little bit better than mine (and chances are, most of you guys are better at remembering stuff than I am), you'll remember that I already told you where he works. (In street performing parlance, the spot where someone busks is also called "a pitch").

So we'll jump ahead to why it matters.

I've mapped out Jeremy's spot and the flow of pedestrian traffic around his pitch.

Jeremy is situated in the center of pedestrian flows. What this means is... anyone who wants to cross the bridge to get from either the north side of Michigan Avenue to the south side (to, I dunno, see the GIANT BEAN that Chicago has deemed as one of its main tourist attractions), or anyone who wants to get from the south side to the north side (to SHOP SHOP SHOP) has to go through Jeremy.*

Just imagine the internal dialogue (or, if you're a little bit more normal, the conversation you might have with your friends as you walk down the street)

I wanna go see the Bean!

That means I gotta cross the bridge and...

OH NO! There's a weird British guy in a top hat in our way!

Cuz it's important to go to the Bean to show you're strong enough to keep it from rolling into the city!
(And this is my lil' sister by the way. Say hi, Flo!)

 And at that point, your only options are:

1. Cross the intersection-less street that nonetheless has several traffic lights, a rotary, and a bajillion vehicles... only to possibly find another busker (say, an awesome living statue known as the Golden Girl) in your way.

2. Really go out of your way, go all the way around the block (possibly hitting a bunch of other street performers as you go) just to cross the bridge.

3. Suck it up and walk directly in front of the magician to make it over to the other side.

So yeah. Most people just suck it up and walk past the magician - and, unless they are magic lovers, most people will do their very best to ignore the crazy guy in the top hat.

But! And here's the key: most people who move through this spot are here to have fun. They're there to shop, see the sights, or take a ferry cruise. So, even if they instinctively ignore the magician, they are at the very least open to having some fun.

And that brings us to:

Getting people to stop

Here's how I understood what Jeremy tried to teach me, in terms of getting people to stop:

Talk.

Just talk to myself.

Except, you know, out loud.

With a microphone and amplifier.

So everyone can hear me talking to myself.

"You have funny hair."

"Ooh. You're wearing a bow tie! Bow ties are cool!"

And, when I've been standing there long enough and have started to get frustrated with how often people are ignoring me/speeding up as they walk past: "Yeah, I know... I'm a scary little Asian girl standing on a street corner. Run away as quickly as you can!"

And then eventually, people will mistake me-talking-to-myself with me-trying-to-talk-to-them, and maybe they'll stop and respond!

Hey! It's a lot like what I'm trying to do with my blog posts!

Except Jeremy's a little bit (a lot) better at this than I am. Here's how he describes what he does:

"So my philosophy of stopping people is, I’m kinda watching the flow of traffic, the pace people are moving at, whether it looks like that they’re on a mission to go somewhere and whether they’re traveling slowly, and I’ll just talk to people as they go by and say hello and ask them how they’re doing, You having a nice day? I’m doing a magic show. That sounds like fun, doesn’t it? You like magic, wanna see some magic? You like magic, don’t you, sir? And I’ll say silly things. And then, you know, you’ll catch people’s eyes."

"And then there are times when you do that when you can just stop them with a look. Stop them with a word. And then when you've made that contact, then maybe you could move towards her, show them a quick trick, invite them over to the table."

That's how he goes from nothing to this:

Once he's had those first few people, and his magic is good (as it always is), if he does a good job of bringing his crowd in (either through the use of space, through comments about the police not wanting him to block the sidewalks, or convincing people that they'll want to move in so they can see better), and if he's lucky (I think there's always an element of luck involved), then he'll get this:

They key to stopping someone?
Jeremy says it's about "making a connection."

"When I first started, one of the first things Emmett said to me when he watched me work – I've been doing this for about six weeks. He said, you need to be a little less desperate when you’re trying to stop people. You’re working just a little bit too hard. I think you need to get to a point when you’re looking for people in the crowd who you think you want to spend some time with, want to have fun with. So the majority of people you just have to let go. You know, I’m not interested in stopping the people who don’t want to stop. I’m looking for people who look like they have the time and inclination to have some fun."

And Busker Emmett, also known as the Windy City Wizard, has also given me the same advice when we shared a pitch my last few weeks in Chicago:

Don't be too desperate. Why? Jeremy explains it better than I can:

"I know talking to guys who are just starting out, the biggest fear is, 'How am I gonna get people to stop?'"

"And the thing is not to worry. If you're out here long enough, someone will stop. Even if you're not very good at stopping people. If it's busy enough, someone will stop eventually. And then you can build something with that."

"I think one of the keys with getting people to stop is not to stress about it. 'Cause if you look like a stressed person, why would you want to hang out with a stressed person, you know? And I've spoken to guys too who've gotten very angry or frustrated because they can't get people to stop. And it's like, well, what's that going to communicate to people? You're an angry, frustrated person. Why would they stop? So if you're feeling that way, then maybe you should go and have a cup of coffee. And if you can't stop feeling that way, maybe you should just go home. But ideally if you can talk yourself into not feeling that way, then it's going to be a benefit for everyone."

Next up: Passing the Hat - Busking and Making Money

*The City of Chicago has NOT paid me to advertise for them. In fact, I think I owe them money. Lemme check... Yep, I do.^ Evil street cleaning enforcers...

^Oh wait! I don't! I contested the ticket and got the case dismissed. Whew...@

@Hm. I don't think this is a place to talk about my parking violations..%

%And! I don't think this is how footnoting/...asterisk..ing.. in blogs works.&

&And see? This is what a conversation with myself looks like. Like the other day, I texted into my phone: "I was chatting with my dad," and it autocorrected to "I was chatting with myself." My phone knows me well.


EDIT: Just added the last bit, quoting Jeremy on WHY it's not good to seem desperate when you're trying to gather a crowd.

Jeremy: Teaching, baking, dabbling, and - finally - busking (Part II)

Say hello to Jeremy again!

Yesterday, I started my week-long series of posts on sidewalk magician Jeremy Pitt-Payne. Check out the first post to get a brief introduction to who he is and what he does. This second part is a little bit about how he came to be a street performer. I sat down with him prior to the day's performances, back on April 25th, for a long conversation. One day, I'll try to put up some footage on the whole interview here. In the meantime, enjoy these snippets!

The Early Years: Life before Busking

For Jeremy Pitt-Payne, it all began with some magic shows on tv. From there came birthday requests for magic supplies, magic books, and soon enough, catalogues from magic stores. At the age of fourteen, he wrote to magician Bobby Bernard and soon found himself training formally as a student of magic under his tutelage. At seventeen, he entered a magic competition, made it to the finals, and didn't win. At this point, I'll just let Jeremy tell you his story himself. Just read this out loud with your best British accent:

"Then pretty much after that, life just got in the way."

"I wanted to be a magician. I think maybe not winning that competition deflated my ego and maybe my enthusiasm a little bit. And so I ended up going to college, went to school, and magic took a back seat. I’d do a little bit here and there. And for a while I thought I was going to be a Catholic priest. Went to a seminary. I was there for five years and, you know, did a little bit of magic there occasionally just for like shows that would be put on in the school. And that didn't happen."

"So then I came to the States. That’s where I met my wife. Was just out here for a year, was going to school out in California. We got married and decided to stay here. So by that point it was like the early 90s. In California, dabbled in a little magic again. But never went the whole hog. [...] I was primarily a high school teacher there, did some insurance sales. I was a member of the Magic Castle, went down there a few times. That was a lot of fun. And then we just ended up moving out of California in 2000 and went to the mid-West, Peoria, three hours north of here right in the heart of Illinois. And we were there about five, six years. And I actually had a job there working for the Catholic church due to my theology background."

"Then that came to an end. There were some changes. And I ended up going to culinary school because I wasn't sure what to do next. I got trained as a baker. I did that for a few years. And I had some health issue. I wasn't able to work for a little while, and then I was between jobs."

"And that’s where we got to becoming a street performer."

Becoming a Street Performer

"I was sitting at home with no employment and I thought, That would be fun! I wonder what would happen if I did that! So I found out about what you needed to do to get a street performer license in Chicago and how that worked. And I got some props together, and I hadn't really done any magic for years, but, like, you know, if you've been trained early enough, you've got muscle memory, so all the basic moves and sleights of hand that Bobby had taught me was still in the brain. So I picked it up again and I came down here and I walked around for three hours not having the courage to set up my table 'cause I was kinda kidding myself: I was looking for a good spot, though I had no idea what a good spot is. And eventually I set it up 'cause I said to myself, you know what, if I don’t do this, if I go home now, I’ll feel like such a complete failure I’ll never show my face again."

"So I put my table up and I started. And here I am. That was in May. Like, May 6^th, I think. 2011. And here we are, 2014, and now it’s my full time gig. So. There’s a really long answer to a question."

First Day Out

"I walked around for three hours."

Jeremy, setting up

"I got off the train at Oglesby, and I went to State Street. And State Street is a big street. And I read the guidelines that the city of Chicago gave out. I wasn’t sure what the exact rules were. I knew there were restrictions on Michigan Avenue, so I was kinda very leery of coming over to Michigan Avenue because I didn't want to get in trouble. So I was walking down State Street and eventually that was where I set up my first spot. And I was there for maybe five minutes and these two older guys came up and said ok, what’d you got? And there I was and all of a sudden I had to do my first trick. So I had to do my first trick or two. Don’t remember now what I did, and they gave me a couple of dollars, and I was like ok. Well, I made something. So I stayed in State Street for a little while. It didn’t seem too busy. So I was like, you know what, Michigan Avenue. That’s meant to be the big – I’ll go over there. I’ll set up and if the police say I shouldn’t be there, I’ll say sorry I didn’t know and go away. So I came over to Michigan Avenue and I found a little spot between this real estate office and Starbucks. There’s a space between those two buildings. In some ways, it’s a natural stage. And for me it was a little bit out of the way so I thought maybe they won’t notice me, so I set up there. And I think the police did come by that day and they asked if I had a permit and I showed them and it was fine. So I’m obviously ok to be there."

"So then I stayed there probably for about three hours. And then packed up and went home. And I don’t know what I made that day. Not very much. But if you’re out of work, you know, that’s better than nothing. So the next day’s a Saturday, so I came down the next day and just never stopped after that."

"And then once I’ve been, I worked that spot for maybe a week or so. And L---, the silver man who sits out in front of the Wrigley Building there. I thought, well, he’s there, so maybe this is an okay area too. So I just went up and introduced myself and asked him if it’s ok to work here. And he pointed me up over to the bridge and said, 'That would be a good place to work. Go up there.' And I was like 'Okay.' So I wandered up there and I set up there by the bridge and that’s pretty much been home for the last three seasons."

And next up: What exactly does Jeremy do? Tomorrow, we'll look into how Jeremy fits into his immediate environment, how he uses it, and what his show is all about.

Busker Profile: Jeremy the Magician from Britain (Part I)

Meet Jeremy:

Chorus*: "Hi Jeremy!"

You can't see it, but the card on his hat also explains who he is. It reads, "Jeremy the Magician from Britain."

It's awesome. Everyone should start carrying little labels on their heads. I've been hanging out with Jeremy since March, and I haven't once forgotten his name. (That's a huge accomplishment, trust me). I also haven't forgotten who he is and what he does.

It's all in the labels.

He also has a white sign with bold black letters in front of him when he performs. Guess what it says?

MAGIC SHOW

It all makes sense, yeah? Jeremy is a magician from Britain who stands at a spot (a spot that I have borrowed before, when he wasn't working - that's his usual spot in my post last week) and does magic shows.

I mean, look at his hat!
Look at his vest!
Oh,.. you can't really see his vest here. This was mid-March in Chicago and, though it was technically spring, it was still really very cold for someone who would have to stand and work outside all day.

But here you go: a picture from April, when it's a little bit warmer:

He even has a British accent!
Though... I guess that's what happens when, you know, you're actually from Britain. You.. get.. a British accent.

Yeah.

The point? Everything about his appearance screams "MAGICIAN."

Jeremy is, in short, a street magician - one whose work I have gotten to know pretty well over the course of my research. So, for my first street performer profile (or busker profile - street performers are also called "buskers"), we're going to learn a little bit about this man, who he is, and what he does.

A Note on Performer Profiles
This will be the first of several performer profiles that I plan on writing. Unlike my regular weekly posts, performer profiles are going to involve a few days of posting. These people are going to show up over and over again in my various posts, so you guys should get to know who they are.

And, well, this is my way of thanking these performers for all the time that they have given me. It's my  belief that the best artists in the world are street performers. Imagine the environment: you're performing for people who don't really want to see you - so you gotta be good enough to get them to stop, get them to stay, and get them to pay. That's the only way they can make a living out of it. They have to be very very good at what they do.

So here we go...

The Snapshot
Performer: Jeremy the "Magician from Britain"
Started busking: May 2011
Location in Chicago: On Chicago's "Magnificent Mile," just north of the Chicago River
His act: Magic

How I met him...
I heard about Jeremy long before I met him. For one, other street performers tended to tell me about him when they found out that I was a magician as well. But it wasn't until the day of the Saint Patrick's Day Parade in Chicago that I first ran into him.

Except I wasn't entirely sure it was him because he wasn't wearing Union Jack vest that I've been told to look for. Instead, he was decked out in green. As he told me, "Everyone's Irish on Saint Paddy's Day."

When and where to find Jeremy
March, April, May: Most likely on Chicago's Magnificent Mile
June, July, August: Definitely on Chicago's Magnificent Mile
Around Mardi Gras: New Orleans

Other times of the year? There is a gap in my research... Maybe he'll make a comment here and fill in those gaps. In 2014, he was, however, "working everyday in February and March."

Stay tuned...
(Cuz this is a TV show, and we're stopping for a commercial break):
Tomorrow, we'll learn a little bit about how Jeremy became a street performer.

*Don't ask where the chorus came from. Where some people imagine theme music for the various activities in their lives, and some imagine an omniscient narrator, I sometimes take on random Greek(?) literary devices. I'm just gonna blame my childhood, Disney and their Hercules movie.

Illusions of Grandeur... and Networking on the Streets of Chicago

So I failed at posting mid-week.

That will NOT be my only failure. Be prepared. For failure.
And that ain't a great way to start, huh?

Anyway- this week, I'm going back in time to a Tuesday afternoon, two weeks ago. I had spent the previous Friday, Saturday, and Sunday street performing. Monday, I took a break, and Tuesday, I was thinking seriously about taking the day off.

That's one thing about street performing, especially those who do it as their only source of income: you're your own boss. That means a certain amount of freedom, yes, but it also means a certain degree of discipline. It's one reason I have so much respect for what I call professional street performers - those who work out on the streets, day after day.

One street performer, Jeremy the Magician from Britain, explained to me how his art is a job: "Some days it's more work than fun."
And another performer, a living statue, the "Chicago 10 Man," explained, "I have to treat my work as a career if I am going to make any good money out of it."

Me? I'm still working on getting to this mentality. On Tuesday, August 19th, at 3:21pm, I was struggling to make something out of my day. I wasn't going to go and perform, but then I got a text message from Jeremy:

"So are you going to work?"

That was all the mental push that I needed. I rolled over in my bed (Don't judge. I had just finished writing my Master's thesis. I needed the break), texted back a reply, and grabbed my stuff.

"Yeah. Heading out now. Starting late... But will see how it goes."

I headed to a spot that I knew well on Michigan Avenue. On my way there, I spotted a film crew and proceeded to ignore them. After a year of fieldwork, I had come to know the Magnificent Mile pretty well, and I had come to know just how frequently film crews work in the area. So I was surprised when, not long after I had finished setting up my table, someone from the film crew approached me.

Turns out they were filming for a Canadian TV magic special, Illusions of Grandeur. They're following around magician Zack Mirza as he makes his way through North America. It sounded like a cool show. They also asked to film a little bit of my performance.

Huh.

That was nerve-racking. But then they left, and a passerby asked to see something. I promptly forgot about them and launched into my show. Halfway through was when I noticed the cameras approaching. I finished the show, ending a little weakly on an as yet not-fully developed straight jacket escape. There was a brief interview after the show:

And then... I MET THE MAGICIANS!

I met Enrico de la Vega first, who was very nice, and tried to help me get over any nerves I had in performing for magicians. (Performing magic for magicians is a vastly different experience than performing it for laypeople). I met Lisa de la Vega, who is the first other female magician that I have ever actually spoken to and seen in person. And then I met Daniel Garcia, who is a very familiar face in the magic community. He approached just when I was performing a short routine for the crew. I felt my hands start shaking just when he popped up, but I guess loads of practice performing on the streets helped me get over that moment of stage fright.

I asked for his autograph.
It was a cool moment.
And we took a group picture!

Then - here's how I know these are awesome people - Lisa asked me for my autograph.

And then I asked her for hers.

See? No cheesy jokes. I'm all cool and chill and all that right now. Right. Erm.

The point of all this? Other than sharing my excitement... there's something about hanging out on Michigan Avenue that makes it really easy to run into people. Anyone who visits Chicago will walk down Michigan Avenue at some point. I have run into old college friends that I haven't seen for years, random classmates and their parents, and unwitting aunts and uncles of friends.

And walking down these streets, I know pretty much exactly when and where I will run into Jeremy the Magician from Britain, the Chicago 10 Man, Golden Girl, and a group of acrobats known as the Kings of Michigan Avenue. Just as much as certain street performers are anchored into certain spaces at certain times - just as much as they can be cornerstones of the city - everyone passes through here at some point. As one person looking for a job said to me, she was hanging around Michigan Avenue "to network." Running into people on Michigan Avenue is easy. Of course, convincing random passersby that you're worth their time is a different story altogether (and something that we'll explore in a future post).