By Marielle Reyes

From trumpets, electric guitar performances, drums and belting voices, busking has been prevalent in Glasgow, especially on a sunny day in the city centre. Talent is painted all over the streets of Glasgow and it’s no doubt our street performers display that. It's undeniable that people do make Glasgow the lively, interesting and captivating city it is.

Many people view street performances and busking as a timeless tradition that liven up city centre streets, but since performers share these areas with the locals, businesses, street vendors, onlookers and other performers, it is critical that respect is given from both ends and conflict is avoided.

Glasgow has placed a code of conduct for street performers to adhere to when performing in the city centre. A few of these rules consist of performing at a reasonable volume, avoid places of worship like churches, cash machines as well and aim to be at least 50 metres away from other fellow buskers to allow everyone to gather an audience of their own.

19-year-old aspiring musician and student of West College Scotland, Ross Mochan shares insight into his experience as a professional busker in Glasgow, and how he turned his passion into extra exposure and income.

His inspiration for beginning his busking career revolved around watching his friends who began just a year before him. Admiring how fun it seemed, he thought “it would be a really good way to make money but also get practice and gain more experience in music”. Going out into the city and meeting new people, whilst playing his favourite songs on the guitar is one of Ross’s favourite things about busking. It also allows him to connect to other street performers who share the same experiences, which in his words allows him to “become better overall as a performer.”

As Glasgow is known to be filled with lively people, a cherished memory he shares with his best friend who went busking with him, would be the day several people were enjoying their song performance of “Corduroy dreams” by Rex Orange County. “We were down in Buchanan Street and we managed to get quite a big crowd around us, there were a few parents with their kids and they were dancing around.” It became a core memory for the both of them as they realised you could gain quite a big following from playing music people appreciate.

With his main priorities being song writing and performing, Ross’s next steps with his career is to proceed in his studies through university. Ross ultimately aims to become a professional performer within the next 5 to 10 years.

When beginning a busking career, his advice revolves around not letting the nerves get to you whilst performing and to simply “go for it, you meet a lot of people that you otherwise wouldn’t meet and you come across new stories, people and something new to learn every day.”

Carolyn Sleith is another well-known individual in the busking scene within Glasgow, mostly referred to by the street performing community as their “busker mum.” Carolyn has been running the @buskersofglasgow Instagram page since 2018 and has had such an astonishing social media growth since. She began posting videos of buskers to allow the performers to receive the exposure they need, and for their talent to be seen all over the world on several different social media platforms.

“The whole story started in 2018, I was walking around the block during summer after work and I was crossing Buchanan Street and heard somebody singing. It was O’shean Murray playing George Ezra’s song Budapest and he absolutely changed my mood.”

Growth is primarily one of the main goals each busker wants to accomplish as a musician. Carolyn says that it is imperative for an aspiring musician to have a social media presence for there to be a way to contact the talent in her viral videos. “When people see you in the street how are they supposed to contact you again?” she expressed. Many people have contacted her before about several buskers and whether they would be able to perform and if a lack of a social media presence has been a hindrance to new career opportunities.

As an instrumentalist, busking allows musicians to gain more practice, create more contacts and gather more exposure. In Carolyn’s words “a busking audience is a passive audience, if you’ve been able to stop people and pay attention to you, then you know you’ve really touched somebody.”

Building up the courage to busk may take some time but it’s worth the experience. Carolyn added: “get out there and regardless if you know just three songs and expand your repertoire and before you know it, you’ll become a famous musician.”

With overcoming the fear of a crowd and nerves, busking could be seen as paid practice and a stepping stone to an aspiring musician’s career. The Glasgow busking scene flourishes with many talented people, and with a simple stroll around the city centre there is no doubt that someone would catch your attention.