[Reader-list] [Urbanstudy] Article from the Washington Post: an experiment in context, perception, priorities

[Priyasha Kaul]

and what do you think of the reactions of the people, especially if
the musican was a woman? the jumble of gender, power, expression and
space in the interstices of a city like delhi, indeed a worthy
experiment !

On 4/18/07, paramita ghosh <paramita_gh at yahoo.com> wrote:
> just wonder how an experiment like this would play out in the delhi metro?
> which artist do u think could be game for this?
>
>
> lalitha kamath <elkamath at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
> A story ran in The Washington Post this week -- on Easter Sunday --
> In a nutshell, the Post convinced one of the world's greatest violinists
> to=20=
> go incognito and play his fiddle at a Metro station, standing there with
> his=
>  open case like just another street musician, begging for money. He was
> play=
> ing some of the most beautiful and complex violin pieces from history,
> thing=
> s that people shell out $100 and put on their Sunday best to go see in a
> con=
> cert hall. But would anyone appreciate him -- or his music -- as
> essentially=
>  a street corner beggar, even though the same gorgeous music was being
> playe=
> d?
>
> The results are astonishing. Check it out:
>
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/04/AR2007040401=
> 721.html
>
> Here's the story, for those who can't get to it online:
>
> Pearls Before Breakfast
> Can one of the nation's great musicians cut through the fog of a D.C. rush
> h=
> our? Let's find out.
>
> By Gene Weingarten
> Washington Post Staff Writer
> Sunday, April 8, 2007; W10
>
> HE EMERGED FROM THE METRO AT THE L'ENFANT PLAZA STATION AND POSITIONED
> HIMSE=
> LF AGAINST A WALL BESIDE A TRASH BASKET. By most measures, he was
> nondescrip=
> t: a youngish white man in jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt and a Washington
> Na=
> tionals baseball cap. From a small case, he removed a violin. Placing the
> op=
> en case at his feet, he shrewdly threw in a few dollars and pocket change
> as=
>  seed money, swiveled it to face pedestrian traffic, and began to play.
>
> It was 7:51 a.m. on Friday, January 12, the middle of the morning rush
> hour.=
>  In the next 43 minutes, as the violinist performed six classical pieces,
> 1,=
> 097 people passed by. Almost all of them were on the way to work, which
> mean=
> t, for almost all of them, a government job. L'Enfant Plaza is at the
> nucleu=
> s of federal Washington, and these were mostly mid-level bureaucrats with
> th=
> ose indeterminate, oddly fungible titles: policy analyst, project manager,
> b=
> udget officer, specialist, facilitator, consultant.
>
> Each passerby had a quick choice to make, one familiar to commuters in any
> u=
> rban area where the occasional street performer is part of the cityscape:
> Do=
>  you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and
> irritation=
> , aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time
> and=
>  your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your
> decision=20=
> change if he's really bad? What if he's really good? Do you have time for
> be=
> auty? Shouldn't you? What's the moral mathematics of the moment?
>
> On that Friday in January, those private questions would be answered in an
> u=
> nusually public way. No one knew it, but the fiddler standing against a
> bare=
>  wall outside the Metro in an indoor arcade at the top of the escalators
> was=
>  one of the finest classical musicians in the world, playing some of the
> mos=
> t elegant music ever written on one of the most valuable violins ever
> made.=20=
> His performance was arranged by The Washington Post as an experiment in
> cont=
> ext, perception and priorities -- as well as an unblinking assessment of
> pub=
> lic taste: In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty
> transcen=
> d?
>
> The musician did not play popular tunes whose familiarity alone might have
> d=
> rawn interest. That was not the test. These were masterpieces that have
> endu=
> red for centuries on their brilliance alone, soaring music befitting the
> gra=
> ndeur of cathedrals and concert halls.
>
> The acoustics proved surprisingly kind. Though the arcade is of
> utilitarian=20=
> design, a buffer between the Metro escalator and the outdoors, it somehow
> ca=
> ught the sound and bounced it back round and resonant. The violin is an
> inst=
> rument that is said to be much like the human voice, and in this
> musician's=20=
> masterly hands, it sobbed and laughed and sang -- ecstatic, sorrowful,
> impor=
> tuning, adoring, flirtatious, castigating, playful, romancing, merry,
> triump=
> hal, sumptuous.
>
> So, what do you think happened?
>
> HANG ON, WE'LL GET YOU SOME EXPERT HELP.
>
> Leonard Slatkin, music director of the National Symphony Orchestra, was
> aske=
> d the same question. What did he think would occur, hypothetically, if one
> o=
> f the world's great violinists had performed incognito before a traveling
> ru=
> sh-hour audience of 1,000-odd people?
>
> "Let's assume," Slatkin said, "that he is not recognized and just taken
> for=20=
> granted as a street musician . . . Still, I don't think that if he's
> really=20=
> good, he's going to go unnoticed. He'd get a larger audience in Europe . .
> .=
>  but, okay, out of 1,000 people, my guess is there might be 35 or 40 who
> wil=
> l recognize the quality for what it is. Maybe 75 to 100 will stop and
> spend=20=
> some time listening."
>
> So, a crowd would gather?
>
> "Oh, yes."
>
> And how much will he make?
>
> "About $150."
>
> Thanks, Maestro. As it happens, this is not hypothetical. It really
> happened=
> ..
>
> "How'd I do?"
>
> We'll tell you in a minute.
>
> "Well, who was the musician?"
>
> Joshua Bell.
>
> "NO!!!"
>
> A onetime child prodigy, at 39 Joshua Bell has arrived as an
> internationally=
>  acclaimed virtuoso. Three days before he appeared at the Metro station,
> Bel=
> l had filled the house at Boston's stately Symphony Hall, where merely
> prett=
> y good seats went for $100. Two weeks later, at the Music Center at
> Strathmo=
> re, in North Bethesda, he would play to a standing-room-only audience so
> res=
> pectful of his artistry that they stifled their coughs until the silence
> bet=
> ween movements. But on that Friday in January, Joshua Bell was just
> another=20=
> mendicant, competing for the attention of busy people on their way to work.
>
> Bell was first pitched this idea shortly before Christmas, over coffee at
> a=20=
> sandwich shop on Capitol Hill. A New Yorker, he was in town to perform at
> th=
> e Library of Congress and to visit the library's vaults to examine an
> unusua=
> l treasure: an 18th-century violin that once belonged to the great
> Austrian-=
> born virtuoso and composer Fritz Kreisler. The curators invited Bell to
> play=
>  it; good sound, still.
>
> "Here's what I'm thinking," Bell confided, as he sipped his coffee. "I'm
> thi=
> nking that I could do a tour where I'd play Kreisler's music . . ."
>
> He smiled.
>
> ". . . on Kreisler's violin."
>
> It was a snazzy, sequined idea -- part inspiration and part gimmick -- and
> i=
> t was typical of Bell, who has unapologetically embraced showmanship even
> as=
>  his concert career has become more and more august. He's soloed with the
> fi=
> nest orchestras here and abroad, but he's also appeared on "Sesame
> Street,"=20=
> done late-night talk TV and performed in feature films. That was Bell
> playin=
> g the soundtrack on the 1998 movie "The Red Violin." (He body-doubled,
> too,=20=
> playing to a naked Greta Scacchi.) As composer John Corigliano accepted
> the=20=
> Oscar for Best Original Dramatic Score, he credited Bell, who, he said,
> "pla=
> ys like a god."
>
> When Bell was asked if he'd be willing to don street clothes and perform
> at=20=
> rush hour, he said:
>
> "Uh, a stunt?"
>
> Well, yes. A stunt. Would he think it . . . unseemly?
>
> Bell drained his cup.
>
> "Sounds like fun," he said.
>
> Bell's a heartthrob. Tall and handsome, he's got a Donny Osmond-like dose
> of=
>  the cutes, and, onstage, cute elides into hott. When he performs, he is
> usu=
> ally the only man under the lights who is not in white tie and tails -- he
> w=
> alks out to a standing O, looking like Zorro, in black pants and an
> untucked=
>  black dress shirt, shirttail dangling. That cute Beatles-style mop top is
> a=
> lso a strategic asset: Because his technique is full of body -- athletic
> and=
>  passionate -- he's almost dancing with the instrument, and his hair flies.
>
> He's single and straight, a fact not lost on some of his fans. In Boston,
> as=
>  he performed Max Bruch's dour Violin Concerto in G Minor, the very few
> youn=
> g women in the audience nearly disappeared in the deep sea of silver
> heads.=20=
> But seemingly every single one of them -- a distillate of the young and
> pret=
> ty -- coalesced at the stage door after the performance, seeking an
> autograp=
> h. It's like that always, with Bell.
>
> Bell's been accepting over-the-top accolades since puberty: Interview
> magazi=
> ne once said his playing "does nothing less than tell human beings why
> they=20=
> bother to live." He's learned to field these things graciously, with a
> bashf=
> ul duck of the head and a modified "pshaw."
>
> For this incognito performance, Bell had only one condition for
> participatin=
> g. The event had been described to him as a test of whether, in an
> incongruo=
> us context, ordinary people would recognize genius. His condition: "I'm
> not=20=
> comfortable if you call this genius." "Genius" is an overused word, he
> said:=
>  It can be applied to some of the composers whose work he plays, but not
> to=20=
> him. His skills are largely interpretive, he said, and to imply otherwise
> wo=
> uld be unseemly and inaccurate.
>
> It was an interesting request, and under the circumstances, one that will
> be=
>  honored. The word will not again appear in this article.
>
> It would be breaking no rules, however, to note that the term in question,
> p=
> articularly as applied in the field of music, refers to a congenital
> brillia=
> nce -- an elite, innate, preternatural ability that manifests itself
> early,=20=
> and often in dramatic fashion.
>
> One biographically intriguing fact about Bell is that he got his first
> music=
>  lessons when he was a 4-year-old in Bloomington, Ind. His parents, both
> psy=
> chologists, decided formal training might be a good idea after they saw
> that=
>  their son had strung rubber bands across his dresser drawers and was
> replic=
> ating classical tunes by ear, moving drawers in and out to vary the pitch.
>
> TO GET TO THE METRO FROM HIS HOTEL, a distance of three blocks, Bell took
> a=20=
> taxi. He's neither lame nor lazy: He did it for his violin.
>
> Bell always performs on the same instrument, and he ruled out using
> another=20=
> for this gig. Called the Gibson ex Huberman, it was handcrafted in 1713 by
> A=
> ntonio Stradivari during the Italian master's "golden period," toward the
> en=
> d of his career, when he had access to the finest spruce, maple and
> willow,=20=
> and when his technique had been refined to perfection.
>
> "Our knowledge of acoustics is still incomplete," Bell said, "but he, he
> jus=
> t . . . knew."
>
> Bell doesn't mention Stradivari by name. Just "he." When the violinist
> shows=
>  his Strad to people, he holds the instrument gingerly by its neck,
> resting=20=
> it on a knee. "He made this to perfect thickness at all parts," Bell says,
> p=
> ivoting it. "If you shaved off a millimeter of wood at any point, it would
> t=
> otally imbalance the sound." No violins sound as wonderful as Strads from
> th=
> e 1710s, still.
>
> The front of Bell's violin is in nearly perfect condition, with a deep,
> rich=
>  grain and luster. The back is a mess, its dark reddish finish bleeding
> away=
>  into a flatter, lighter shade and finally, in one section, to bare wood.
>
> "This has never been refinished," Bell said. "That's his original varnish.
> P=
> eople attribute aspects of the sound to the varnish. Each maker had his
> own=20=
> secret formula." Stradivari is thought to have made his from an
> ingeniously=20=
> balanced cocktail of honey, egg whites and gum arabic from sub-Saharan
> trees=
> ..
>
> Like the instrument in "The Red Violin," this one has a past filled with
> mys=
> tery and malice. Twice, it was stolen from its illustrious prior owner,
> the=20=
> Polish virtuoso Bronislaw Huberman. The first time, in 1919, it
> disappeared=20=
> from Huberman's hotel room in Vienna but was quickly returned. The second
> ti=
> me, nearly 20 years later, it was pinched from his dressing room in
> Carnegie=
>  Hall. He never got it back. It was not until 1985 that the thief -- a
> minor=
>  New York violinist -- made a deathbed confession to his wife, and
> produced=20=
> the instrument.
>
> Bell bought it a few years ago. He had to sell his own Strad and borrow
> much=
>  of the rest. The price tag was reported to be about $3.5 million.
>
> All of which is a long explanation for why, in the early morning chill of
> a=20=
> day in January, Josh Bell took a three-block cab ride to the Orange Line,
> an=
> d rode one stop to L'Enfant.
>
> AS METRO STATIONS GO, L'ENFANT PLAZA IS MORE PLEBEIAN THAN MOST. Even
> before=
>  you arrive, it gets no respect. Metro conductors never seem to get it
> right=
> : "Leh-fahn." "Layfont." "El'phant."
>
> At the top of the escalators are a shoeshine stand and a busy kiosk that
> sel=
> ls newspapers, lottery tickets and a wallfull of magazines with titles
> such=20=
> as Mammazons and Girls of Barely Legal. The skin mags move, but it's that
> lo=
> ttery ticket dispenser that stays the busiest, with customers queuing up
> for=
>  Daily 6 lotto and Powerball and the ultimate suckers' bait, those
> pamphlets=
>  that sell random number combinations purporting to be "hot." They sell
> bris=
> kly. There's also a quick-check machine to slide in your lotto ticket,
> post-=
> drawing, to see if you've won. Beneath it is a forlorn pile of crumpled
> slip=
> s.
>
> On Friday, January 12, the people waiting in the lottery line looking for
> a=20=
> long shot would get a lucky break -- a free, close-up ticket to a concert
> by=
>  one of the world's most famous musicians -- but only if they were of a
> mind=
>  to take note.
>
> Bell decided to begin with "Chaconne" from Johann Sebastian Bach's Partita
> N=
> o. 2 in D Minor. Bell calls it "not just one of the greatest pieces of
> music=
>  ever written, but one of the greatest achievements of any man in history.
> I=
> t's a spiritually powerful piece, emotionally powerful, structurally
> perfect=
> .. Plus, it was written for a solo violin, so I won't be cheating with some
> h=
> alf-assed version."
>
> Bell didn't say it, but Bach's "Chaconne" is also considered one of the
> most=
>  difficult violin pieces to master. Many try; few succeed. It's
> exhaustingly=
>  long -- 14 minutes -- and consists entirely of a single, succinct musical
> p=
> rogression repeated in dozens of variations to create a dauntingly complex
> a=
> rchitecture of sound. Composed around 1720, on the eve of the European
> Enlig=
> htenment, it is said to be a celebration of the breadth of human
> possibility=
> ..
>
> If Bell's encomium to "Chaconne" seems overly effusive, consider this from
> t=
> he 19th-century composer Johannes Brahms, in a letter to Clara Schumann:
> "On=
>  one stave, for a small instrument, the man writes a whole world of the
> deep=
> est thoughts and most powerful feelings. If I imagined that I could have
> cre=
> ated, even conceived the piece, I am quite certain that the excess of
> excite=
> ment and earth-shattering experience would have driven me out of my mind."
>
> So, that's the piece Bell started with.
>
> He'd clearly meant it when he promised not to cheap out this performance:
> He=
>  played with acrobatic enthusiasm, his body leaning into the music and
> archi=
> ng on tiptoes at the high notes. The sound was nearly symphonic, carrying
> to=
>  all parts of the homely arcade as the pedestrian traffic filed past.
>
> Three minutes went by before something happened. Sixty-three people had
> alre=
> ady passed when, finally, there was a breakthrough of sorts. A middle-age
> ma=
> n altered his gait for a split second, turning his head to notice that
> there=
>  seemed to be some guy playing music. Yes, the man kept walking, but it
> was=20=
> something.
>
> A half-minute later, Bell got his first donation. A woman threw in a buck
> an=
> d scooted off. It was not until six minutes into the performance that
> someon=
> e actually stood against a wall, and listened.
>
> Things never got much better. In the three-quarters of an hour that Joshua
> B=
> ell played, seven people stopped what they were doing to hang around and
> tak=
> e in the performance, at least for a minute. Twenty-seven gave money, most
> o=
> f them on the run -- for a total of $32 and change. That leaves the 1,070
> pe=
> ople who hurried by, oblivious, many only three feet away, few even
> turning=20=
> to look.
>
> No, Mr. Slatkin, there was never a crowd, not even for a second.
>
> It was all videotaped by a hidden camera. You can play the recording once
> or=
>  15 times, and it never gets any easier to watch. Try speeding it up, and
> it=
>  becomes one of those herky-jerky World War I-era silent newsreels. The
> peop=
> le scurry by in comical little hops and starts, cups of coffee in their
> hand=
> s, cellphones at their ears, ID tags slapping at their bellies, a grim
> danse=
>  macabre to indifference, inertia and the dingy, gray rush of modernity.
>
> Even at this accelerated pace, though, the fiddler's movements remain
> fluid=20=
> and graceful; he seems so apart from his audience -- unseen, unheard,
> otherw=
> orldly -- that you find yourself thinking that he's not really there. A
> ghos=
> t.
>
> Only then do you see it: He is the one who is real. They are the ghosts.
>
> IF A GREAT MUSICIAN PLAYS GREAT MUSIC BUT NO ONE HEARS . . . WAS HE REALLY
> A=
> NY GOOD?
>
> It's an old epistemological debate, older, actually, than the koan about
> the=
>  tree in the forest. Plato weighed in on it, and philosophers for two
> millen=
> nia afterward: What is beauty? Is it a measurable fact (Gottfried
> Leibniz),=20=
> or merely an opinion (David Hume), or is it a little of each, colored by
> the=
>  immediate state of mind of the observer (Immanuel Kant)?
>
> We'll go with Kant, because he's obviously right, and because he brings us
> p=
> retty directly to Joshua Bell, sitting there in a hotel restaurant,
> picking=20=
> at his breakfast, wryly trying to figure out what the hell had just
> happened=
>  back there at the Metro.
>
> "At the beginning," Bell says, "I was just concentrating on playing the
> musi=
> c. I wasn't really watching what was happening around me . . ."
>
> Playing the violin looks all-consuming, mentally and physically, but Bell
> sa=
> ys that for him the mechanics of it are partly second nature, cemented by
> pr=
> actice and muscle memory: It's like a juggler, he says, who can keep those
> b=
> alls in play while interacting with a crowd. What he's mostly thinking
> about=
>  as he plays, Bell says, is capturing emotion as a narrative: "When you
> play=
>  a violin piece, you are a storyteller, and you're telling a story."
>
> With "Chaconne," the opening is filled with a building sense of awe. That
> ke=
> pt him busy for a while. Eventually, though, he began to steal a sidelong
> gl=
> ance.
>
> "It was a strange feeling, that people were actually, ah . . ."
>
> The word doesn't come easily.
>
> ". . . ignoring me."
>
> Bell is laughing. It's at himself.
>
> "At a music hall, I'll get upset if someone coughs or if someone's
> cellphone=
>  goes off. But here, my expectations quickly diminished. I started to
> apprec=
> iate any acknowledgment, even a slight glance up. I was oddly grateful
> when=20=
> someone threw in a dollar instead of change." This is from a man whose
> talen=
> ts can command $1,000 a minute.
>
> Before he began, Bell hadn't known what to expect. What he does know is
> that=
> , for some reason, he was nervous.
>
> "It wasn't exactly stage fright, but there were butterflies," he says. "I
> wa=
> s stressing a little."
>
> Bell has played, literally, before crowned heads of Europe. Why the
> anxiety=20=
> at the Washington Metro?
>
> "When you play for ticket-holders," Bell explains, "you are already
> validate=
> d. I have no sense that I need to be accepted. I'm already accepted. Here,
> t=
> here was this thought: What if they don't like me? What if they resent my
> pr=
> esence . . ."
>
> He was, in short, art without a frame. Which, it turns out, may have a lot
> t=
> o do with what happened -- or, more precisely, what didn't happen -- on
> Janu=
> ary 12.
>
> MARK LEITHAUSER HAS HELD IN HIS HANDS MORE GREAT WORKS OF ART THAN ANY
> KING=20=
> OR POPE OR MEDICI EVER DID. A senior curator at the National Gallery, he
> ove=
> rsees the framing of the paintings. Leithauser thinks he has some idea of
> wh=
> at happened at that Metro station.
>
> "Let's say I took one of our more abstract masterpieces, say an Ellsworth
> Ke=
> lly, and removed it from its frame, marched it down the 52 steps that
> people=
>  walk up to get to the National Gallery, past the giant columns, and
> brought=
>  it into a restaurant. It's a $5 million painting. And it's one of those
> res=
> taurants where there are pieces of original art for sale, by some
> industriou=
> s kids from the Corcoran School, and I hang that Kelly on the wall with a
> pr=
> ice tag of $150. No one is going to notice it. An art curator might look
> up=20=
> and say: 'Hey, that looks a little like an Ellsworth Kelly. Please pass
> the=20=
> salt.'"
>
> Leithauser's point is that we shouldn't be too ready to label the Metro
> pass=
> ersby unsophisticated boobs. Context matters.
>
> Kant said the same thing. He took beauty seriously: In his Critique of
> Aesth=
> etic Judgment, Kant argued that one's ability to appreciate beauty is
> relate=
> d to one's ability to make moral judgments. But there was a caveat. Paul
> Guy=
> er of the University of Pennsylvania, one of America's most prominent
> Kantia=
> n scholars, says the 18th-century German philosopher felt that to properly
> a=
> ppreciate beauty, the viewing conditions must be optimal.
>
> "Optimal," Guyer said, "doesn't mean heading to work, focusing on your
> repor=
> t to the boss, maybe your shoes don't fit right."
>
> So, if Kant had been at the Metro watching as Joshua Bell play to a
> thousand=
>  unimpressed passersby?
>
> "He would have inferred about them," Guyer said, "absolutely nothing."
>
> And that's that.
>
> Except it isn't. To really understand what happened, you have to rewind
> that=
>  video and play it back from the beginning, from the moment Bell's bow
> first=
>  touched the strings.
>
> White guy, khakis, leather jacket, briefcase. Early 30s. John David
> Mortense=
> n is on the final leg of his daily bus-to-Metro commute from Reston. He's
> he=
> ading up the escalator. It's a long ride -- 1 minute and 15 seconds if you
> d=
> on't walk. So, like most everyone who passes Bell this day, Mortensen gets
> a=
>  good earful of music before he has his first look at the musician. Like
> mos=
> t of them, he notes that it sounds pretty good. But like very few of them,
> w=
> hen he gets to the top, he doesn't race past as though Bell were some
> nuisan=
> ce to be avoided. Mortensen is that first person to stop, that guy at the
> si=
> x-minute mark.
>
> It's not that he has nothing else to do. He's a project manager for an
> inter=
> national program at the Department of Energy; on this day, Mortensen has
> to=20=
> participate in a monthly budget exercise, not the most exciting part of
> his=20=
> job: "You review the past month's expenditures," he says, "forecast
> spending=
>  for the next month, if you have X dollars, where will it go, that sort of
> t=
> hing."
>
> On the video, you can see Mortensen get off the escalator and look around.
> H=
> e locates the violinist, stops, walks away but then is drawn back. He
> checks=
>  the time on his cellphone -- he's three minutes early for work -- then
> sett=
> les against a wall to listen.
>
> Mortensen doesn't know classical music at all; classic rock is as close as
> h=
> e comes. But there's something about what he's hearing that he really likes.
>
> As it happens, he's arrived at the moment that Bell slides into the second
> s=
> ection of "Chaconne." ("It's the point," Bell says, "where it moves from a
> d=
> arker, minor key into a major key. There's a religious, exalted feeling to
> i=
> t.") The violinist's bow begins to dance; the music becomes upbeat,
> playful,=
>  theatrical, big.
>
> Mortensen doesn't know about major or minor keys: "Whatever it was," he
> says=
> , "it made me feel at peace."
>
> So, for the first time in his life, Mortensen lingers to listen to a
> street=20=
> musician. He stays his allotted three minutes as 94 more people pass
> briskly=
>  by. When he leaves to help plan contingency budgets for the Department of
> E=
> nergy, there's another first. For the first time in his life, not quite
> know=
> ing what had just happened but sensing it was special, John David
> Mortensen=20=
> gives a street musician money.
>
> THERE ARE SIX MOMENTS IN THE VIDEO THAT BELL FINDS PARTICULARLY PAINFUL TO
> R=
> ELIVE: "The awkward times," he calls them. It's what happens right after
> eac=
> h piece ends: nothing. The music stops. The same people who hadn't noticed
> h=
> im playing don't notice that he has finished. No applause, no
> acknowledgment=
> .. So Bell just saws out a small, nervous chord -- the embarrassed
> musician's=
>  equivalent of, "Er, okay, moving right along . . ." -- and begins the
> next=20=
> piece.
>
> After "Chaconne," it is Franz Schubert's "Ave Maria," which surprised some
> m=
> usic critics when it debuted in 1825: Schubert seldom showed religious
> feeli=
> ng in his compositions, yet "Ave Maria" is a breathtaking work of
> adoration=20=
> of the Virgin Mary. What was with the sudden piety? Schubert dryly
> answered:=
>  "I think this is due to the fact that I never forced devotion in myself
> and=
>  never compose hymns or prayers of that kind unless it overcomes me
> unawares=
> ; but then it is usually the right and true devotion." This musical prayer
> b=
> ecame among the most familiar and enduring religious pieces in history.
>
> A couple of minutes into it, something revealing happens. A woman and her
> pr=
> eschooler emerge from the escalator. The woman is walking briskly and,
> there=
> fore, so is the child. She's got his hand.
>
> "I had a time crunch," recalls Sheron Parker, an IT director for a federal
> a=
> gency. "I had an 8:30 training class, and first I had to rush Evvie off to
> h=
> is teacher, then rush back to work, then to the training facility in the
> bas=
> ement."
>
> Evvie is her son, Evan. Evan is 3.
>
> You can see Evan clearly on the video. He's the cute black kid in the
> parka=20=
> who keeps twisting around to look at Joshua Bell, as he is being propelled
> t=
> oward the door.
>
> "There was a musician," Parker says, "and my son was intrigued. He wanted
> to=
>  pull over and listen, but I was rushed for time."
>
> So Parker does what she has to do. She deftly moves her body between
> Evan's=20=
> and Bell's, cutting off her son's line of sight. As they exit the arcade,
> Ev=
> an can still be seen craning to look. When Parker is told what she walked
> ou=
> t on, she laughs.
>
> "Evan is very smart!"
>
> The poet Billy Collins once laughingly observed that all babies are born
> wit=
> h a knowledge of poetry, because the lub-dub of the mother's heart is in
> iam=
> bic meter. Then, Collins said, life slowly starts to choke the poetry out
> of=
>  us. It may be true with music, too.
>
> There was no ethnic or demographic pattern to distinguish the people who
> sta=
> yed to watch Bell, or the ones who gave money, from that vast majority who
> h=
> urried on past, unheeding. Whites, blacks and Asians, young and old, men
> and=
>  women, were represented in all three groups. But the behavior of one
> demogr=
> aphic remained absolutely consistent. Every single time a child walked
> past,=
>  he or she tried to stop and watch. And every single time, a parent
> scooted=20=
> the kid away.
>
> IF THERE WAS ONE PERSON ON THAT DAY WHO WAS TOO BUSY TO PAY ATTENTION TO
> THE=
>  VIOLINIST, it was George Tindley. Tindley wasn't hurrying to get to work.
> H=
> e was at work.
>
> The glass doors through which most people exit the L'Enfant station lead
> int=
> o an indoor shopping mall, from which there are exits to the street and
> elev=
> ators to office buildings. The first store in the mall is an Au Bon Pain,
> th=
> e croissant and coffee shop where Tindley, in his 40s, works in a white
> unif=
> orm busing the tables, restocking the salt and pepper packets, taking out
> th=
> e garbage. Tindley labors under the watchful eye of his bosses, and he's
> sup=
> posed to be hopping, and he was.
>
> But every minute or so, as though drawn by something not entirely within
> his=
>  control, Tindley would walk to the very edge of the Au Bon Pain property,
> k=
> eeping his toes inside the line, still on the job. Then he'd lean forward,
> a=
> s far out into the hallway as he could, watching the fiddler on the other
> si=
> de of the glass doors. The foot traffic was steady, so the doors were
> usuall=
> y open. The sound came through pretty well.
>
> "You could tell in one second that this guy was good, that he was clearly
> a=20=
> professional," Tindley says. He plays the guitar, loves the sound of
> strings=
> , and has no respect for a certain kind of musician.
>
> "Most people, they play music; they don't feel it," Tindley says. "Well,
> tha=
> t man was feeling it. That man was moving. Moving into the sound."
>
> A hundred feet away, across the arcade, was the lottery line, sometimes
> five=
>  or six people long. They had a much better view of Bell than Tindley did,
> i=
> f they had just turned around. But no one did. Not in the entire 43
> minutes.=
>  They just shuffled forward toward that machine spitting out numbers. Eyes
> o=
> n the prize.
>
> J.T. Tillman was in that line. A computer specialist for the Department of
> H=
> ousing and Urban Development, he remembers every single number he played
> tha=
> t day -- 10 of them, $2 apiece, for a total of $20. He doesn't recall what
> t=
> he violinist was playing, though. He says it sounded like generic
> classical=20=
> music, the kind the ship's band was playing in "Titanic," before the
> iceberg=
> ..
>
> "I didn't think nothing of it," Tillman says, "just a guy trying to make a
> c=
> ouple of bucks." Tillman would have given him one or two, he said, but he
> sp=
> ent all his cash on lotto.
>
> When he is told that he stiffed one of the best musicians in the world, he
> l=
> aughs.
>
> "Is he ever going to play around here again?"
>
> "Yeah, but you're going to have to pay a lot to hear him."
>
> "Damn."
>
> Tillman didn't win the lottery, either.
>
> BELL ENDS "AVE MARIA" TO ANOTHER THUNDEROUS SILENCE, plays Manuel Ponce's
> se=
> ntimental "Estrellita," then a piece by Jules Massenet, and then begins a
> Ba=
> ch gavotte, a joyful, frolicsome, lyrical dance. It's got an Old World
> delic=
> acy to it; you can imagine it entertaining bewigged dancers at a
> Versailles=20=
> ball, or -- in a lute, fiddle and fife version -- the boot-kicking
> peasants=20=
> of a Pieter Bruegel painting.
>
> Watching the video weeks later, Bell finds himself mystified by one thing
> on=
> ly. He understands why he's not drawing a crowd, in the rush of a morning
> wo=
> rkday. But: "I'm surprised at the number of people who don't pay attention
> a=
> t all, as if I'm invisible. Because, you know what? I'm makin' a lot of
> nois=
> e!"
>
> He is. You don't need to know music at all to appreciate the simple fact
> tha=
> t there's a guy there, playing a violin that's throwing out a whole bucket
> o=
> f sound; at times, Bell's bowing is so intricate that you seem to be
> hearing=
>  two instruments playing in harmony. So those head-forward, quick-stepping
> p=
> assersby are a remarkable phenomenon.
>
> Bell wonders whether their inattention may be deliberate: If you don't
> take=20=
> visible note of the musician, you don't have to feel guilty about not
> forkin=
> g over money; you're not complicit in a rip-off.
>
> It may be true, but no one gave that explanation. People just said they
> were=
>  busy, had other things on their mind. Some who were on cellphones spoke
> lou=
> der as they passed Bell, to compete with that infernal racket.
>
> And then there was Calvin Myint. Myint works for the General Services
> Admini=
> stration. He got to the top of the escalator, turned right and headed out
> a=20=
> door to the street. A few hours later, he had no memory that there had
> been=20=
> a musician anywhere in sight.
>
> "Where was he, in relation to me?"
>
> "About four feet away."
>
> "Oh."
>
> There's nothing wrong with Myint's hearing. He had buds in his ear. He was
> l=
> istening to his iPod.
>
> For many of us, the explosion in technology has perversely limited, not
> expa=
> nded, our exposure to new experiences. Increasingly, we get our news from
> so=
> urces that think as we already do. And with iPods, we hear what we already
> k=
> now; we program our own playlists.
>
> The song that Calvin Myint was listening to was "Just Like Heaven," by the
> B=
> ritish rock band The Cure. It's a terrific song, actually. The meaning is
> a=20=
> little opaque, and the Web is filled with earnest efforts to deconstruct
> it.=
>  Many are far-fetched, but some are right on point: It's about a tragic
> emot=
> ional disconnect. A man has found the woman of his dreams but can't
> express=20=
> the depth of his feeling for her until she's gone. It's about failing to
> see=
>  the beauty of what's plainly in front of your eyes.
>
> "YES, I SAW THE VIOLINIST," Jackie Hessian says, "but nothing about him
> stru=
> ck me as much of anything."
>
> You couldn't tell that by watching her. Hessian was one of those people
> who=20=
> gave Bell a long, hard look before walking on. It turns out that she
> wasn't=20=
> noticing the music at all.
>
> "I really didn't hear that much," she said. "I was just trying to figure
> out=
>  what he was doing there, how does this work for him, can he make much
> money=
> , would it be better to start with some money in the case, or for it to be
> e=
> mpty, so people feel sorry for you? I was analyzing it financially."
>
> What do you do, Jackie?
>
> "I'm a lawyer in labor relations with the United States Postal Service. I
> ju=
> st negotiated a national contract."
>
> THE BEST SEATS IN THE HOUSE WERE UPHOLSTERED. In the balcony, more or
> less.=20=
> On that day, for $5, you'd get a lot more than just a nice shine on your
> sho=
> es.
>
> Only one person occupied one of those seats when Bell played. Terence
> Holmes=
>  is a consultant for the Department of Transportation, and he liked the
> musi=
> c just fine, but it was really about a shoeshine: "My father told me never
> t=
> o wear a suit with your shoes not cleaned and shined."
>
> Holmes wears suits often, so he is up in that perch a lot, and he's got a
> go=
> od relationship with the shoeshine lady. Holmes is a good tipper and a
> good=20=
> talker, which is a skill that came in handy that day. The shoeshine lady
> was=
>  upset about something, and the music got her more upset. She complained,
> Ho=
> lmes said, that the music was too loud, and he tried to calm her down.
>
> Edna Souza is from Brazil. She's been shining shoes at L'Enfant Plaza for
> si=
> x years, and she's had her fill of street musicians there; when they play,
> s=
> he can't hear her customers, and that's bad for business. So she fights.
>
> Souza points to the dividing line between the Metro property, at the top
> of=20=
> the escalator, and the arcade, which is under control of the management
> comp=
> any that runs the mall. Sometimes, Souza says, a musician will stand on
> the=20=
> Metro side, sometimes on the mall side. Either way, she's got him. On her
> sp=
> eed dial, she has phone numbers for both the mall cops and the Metro cops.
> T=
> he musicians seldom last long.
>
> What about Joshua Bell?
>
> He was too loud, too, Souza says. Then she looks down at her rag, sniffs.
> Sh=
> e hates to say anything positive about these damned musicians, but: "He
> was=20=
> pretty good, that guy. It was the first time I didn't call the police."
>
> Souza was surprised to learn he was a famous musician, but not that people
> r=
> ushed blindly by him. That, she said, was predictable. "If something like
> th=
> is happened in Brazil, everyone would stand around to see. Not here."
>
> Souza nods sourly toward a spot near the top of the escalator: "Couple of
> ye=
> ars ago, a homeless guy died right there. He just lay down there and died.
> T=
> he police came, an ambulance came, and no one even stopped to see or
> slowed=20=
> down to look.
>
> "People walk up the escalator, they look straight ahead. Mind your own
> busin=
> ess, eyes forward. Everyone is stressed. Do you know what I mean?"
>
> What is this life if, full of care,
>
> We have no time to stand and stare.
>
> -- from "Leisure," by W.H. Davies
>
> Let's say Kant is right. Let's accept that we can't look at what happened
> on=
>  January 12 and make any judgment whatever about people's sophistication
> or=20=
> their ability to appreciate beauty. But what about their ability to
> apprecia=
> te life?
>
> We're busy. Americans have been busy, as a people, since at least 1831,
> when=
>  a young French sociologist named Alexis de Tocqueville visited the States
> a=
> nd found himself impressed, bemused and slightly dismayed at the degree to
> w=
> hich people were driven, to the exclusion of everything else, by hard work
> a=
> nd the accumulation of wealth.
>
> Not much has changed. Pop in a DVD of "Koyaanisqatsi," the wordless,
> darkly=20=
> brilliant, avant-garde 1982 film about the frenetic speed of modern life.
> Ba=
> cked by the minimalist music of Philip Glass, director Godfrey Reggio
> takes=20=
> film clips of Americans going about their daily business, but speeds them
> up=
>  until they resemble assembly-line machines, robots marching lockstep to
> now=
> here. Now look at the video from L'Enfant Plaza, in fast-forward. The
> Philip=
>  Glass soundtrack fits it perfectly.
>
> "Koyaanisqatsi" is a Hopi word. It means "life out of balance."
>
> In his 2003 book, Timeless Beauty: In the Arts and Everyday Life, British
> au=
> thor John Lane writes about the loss of the appreciation for beauty in the
> m=
> odern world. The experiment at L'Enfant Plaza may be symptomatic of that,
> he=
>  said -- not because people didn't have the capacity to understand beauty,
> b=
> ut because it was irrelevant to them.
>
> "This is about having the wrong priorities," Lane said.
>
> If we can't take the time out of our lives to stay a moment and listen to
> on=
> e of the best musicians on Earth play some of the best music ever written;
> i=
> f the surge of modern life so overpowers us that we are deaf and blind to
> so=
> mething like that -- then what else are we missing?
>
> That's what the Welsh poet W.H. Davies meant in 1911 when he published
> those=
>  two lines that begin this section. They made him famous. The thought was
> si=
> mple, even primitive, but somehow no one had put it quite that way before.
>
> Of course, Davies had an advantage -- an advantage of perception. He
> wasn't=20=
> a tradesman or a laborer or a bureaucrat or a consultant or a policy
> analyst=
>  or a labor lawyer or a program manager. He was a hobo.
>
> THE CULTURAL HERO OF THE DAY ARRIVED AT L'ENFANT PLAZA PRETTY LATE, in the
> u=
> nprepossessing figure of one John Picarello, a smallish man with a baldish
> h=
> ead.
>
> Picarello hit the top of the escalator just after Bell began his final
> piece=
> , a reprise of "Chaconne." In the video, you see Picarello stop dead in
> his=20=
> tracks, locate the source of the music, and then retreat to the other end
> of=
>  the arcade. He takes up a position past the shoeshine stand, across from
> th=
> at lottery line, and he will not budge for the next nine minutes.
>
> Like all the passersby interviewed for this article, Picarello was stopped
> b=
> y a reporter after he left the building, and was asked for his phone
> number.=
>  Like everyone, he was told only that this was to be an article about
> commut=
> ing. When he was called later in the day, like everyone else, he was first
> a=
> sked if anything unusual had happened to him on his trip into work. Of the
> m=
> ore than 40 people contacted, Picarello was the only one who immediately
> men=
> tioned the violinist.
>
> "There was a musician playing at the top of the escalator at L'Enfant
> Plaza.=
> "
>
> Haven't you seen musicians there before?
>
> "Not like this one."
>
> What do you mean?
>
> "This was a superb violinist. I've never heard anyone of that caliber. He
> wa=
> s technically proficient, with very good phrasing. He had a good fiddle,
> too=
> , with a big, lush sound. I walked a distance away, to hear him. I didn't
> wa=
> nt to be intrusive on his space."
>
> Really?
>
> "Really. It was that kind of experience. It was a treat, just a brilliant,
> i=
> ncredible way to start the day."
>
> Picarello knows classical music. He is a fan of Joshua Bell but didn't
> recog=
> nize him; he hadn't seen a recent photo, and besides, for most of the time
> P=
> icarello was pretty far away. But he knew this was not a run-of-the-mill
> guy=
>  out there, performing. On the video, you can see Picarello look around
> him=20=
> now and then, almost bewildered.
>
> "Yeah, other people just were not getting it. It just wasn't registering.
> Th=
> at was baffling to me."
>
> When Picarello was growing up in New York, he studied violin seriously,
> inte=
> nding to be a concert musician. But he gave it up at 18, when he decided
> he'=
> d never be good enough to make it pay. Life does that to you sometimes.
> Some=
> times, you have to do the prudent thing. So he went into another line of
> wor=
> k. He's a supervisor at the U.S. Postal Service. Doesn't play the violin
> muc=
> h, anymore.
>
> When he left, Picarello says, "I humbly threw in $5." It was humble: You
> can=
>  actually see that on the video. Picarello walks up, barely looking at
> Bell,=
>  and tosses in the money. Then, as if embarrassed, he quickly walks away
> fro=
> m the man he once wanted to be.
>
> Does he have regrets about how things worked out?
>
> The postal supervisor considers this.
>
> "No. If you love something but choose not to do it professionally, it's
> not=20=
> a waste. Because, you know, you still have it. You have it forever."
>
> BELL THINKS HE DID HIS BEST WORK OF THE DAY IN THOSE FINAL FEW MINUTES, in
> t=
> he second "Chaconne." And that also was the first time more than one
> person=20=
> at a time was listening. As Picarello stood in the back, Janice Olu
> arrived=20=
> and took up a position a few feet away from Bell. Olu, a public trust
> office=
> r with HUD, also played the violin as a kid. She didn't know the name of
> the=
>  piece she was hearing, but she knew the man playing it has a gift.
>
> Olu was on a coffee break and stayed as long as she dared. As she turned
> to=20=
> go, she whispered to the stranger next to her, "I really don't want to
> leave=
> .." The stranger standing next to her happened to be working for The
> Washingt=
> on Post.
>
> In preparing for this event, editors at The Post Magazine discussed how to
> d=
> eal with likely outcomes. The most widely held assumption was that there
> cou=
> ld well be a problem with crowd control: In a demographic as sophisticated
> a=
> s Washington, the thinking went, several people would surely recognize
> Bell.=
>  Nervous "what-if" scenarios abounded. As people gathered, what if others
> st=
> opped just to see what the attraction was? Word would spread through the
> cro=
> wd. Cameras would flash. More people flock to the scene; rush-hour
> pedestria=
> n traffic backs up; tempers flare; the National Guard is called; tear gas,
> r=
> ubber bullets, etc.
>
> As it happens, exactly one person recognized Bell, and she didn't arrive
> unt=
> il near the very end. For Stacy Furukawa, a demographer at the Commerce
> Depa=
> rtment, there was no doubt. She doesn't know much about classical music,
> but=
>  she had been in the audience three weeks earlier, at Bell's free concert
> at=
>  the Library of Congress. And here he was, the international virtuoso,
> sawin=
> g away, begging for money. She had no idea what the heck was going on, but
> w=
> hatever it was, she wasn't about to miss it.
>
> Furukawa positioned herself 10 feet away from Bell, front row, center. She
> h=
> ad a huge grin on her face. The grin, and Furukawa, remained planted in
> that=
>  spot until the end.
>
> "It was the most astonishing thing I've ever seen in Washington," Furukawa
> s=
> ays. "Joshua Bell was standing there playing at rush hour, and people were
> n=
> ot stopping, and not even looking, and some were flipping quarters at him!
> Q=
> uarters! I wouldn't do that to anybody. I was thinking, Omigosh, what kind
> o=
> f a city do I live in that this could happen?"
>
> When it was over, Furukawa introduced herself to Bell, and tossed in a
> twent=
> y. Not counting that -- it was tainted by recognition -- the final haul
> for=20=
> his 43 minutes of playing was $32.17. Yes, some people gave pennies.
>
> "Actually," Bell said with a laugh, "that's not so bad, considering.
> That's=20=
> 40 bucks an hour. I could make an okay living doing this, and I wouldn't
> hav=
> e to pay an agent."
>
> These days, at L'Enfant Plaza, lotto ticket sales remain brisk. Musicians
> st=
> ill show up from time to time, and they still tick off Edna Souza. Joshua
> Be=
> ll's latest album, "The Voice of the Violin," has received the usual
> critica=
> l acclaim. ("Delicate urgency." "Masterful intimacy." "Unfailingly
> exquisite=
> .." "A musical summit." ". . . will make your heart thump and weep at the
> sam=
> e time.")
>
> Bell headed off on a concert tour of European capitals. But he is back in
> th=
> e States this week. He has to be. On Tuesday, he will be accepting the
> Avery=
>  Fisher prize, recognizing the Flop of L'Enfant Plaza as the best
> classical=20=
> musician in America.
>
> Emily Shroder, Rachel Manteuffel, John W. Poole and Magazine Editor Tom
> Shro=
> der contributed to this report. Gene Weingarten, a Magazine staff writer,
> ca=
> n be reached at weingarten at washpost.com. He will be fielding questions and
> c=
> omments about this article Monday at 1 p.m.
> ..
>
>
>
>
>
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