A world sized thank you!
World Record 2009
Musicians on all seven continents and one sea took to the streets (or ice floes and flight decks) to raise money for Musequality during out first World Busk in June.
At 12 noon on Sunday 14 June. 483 people in 29 cities in 14 countries on all seven continents helped establish a record for the largest co-ordinated busk in the world. BBC World News broadcast clips of buskers throughout the day while the crew of HMS Illustrious, in the middle of a foggy Baltic Sea took a break from their NATO exercise to boost our numbers. Near the South Pole, the Antarctic Minkes were chipping ice off their guitars as the temperature dropped to minus 15 C.
Nine harpists took to the streets in Adamstown, PA, William Cooper bagpiped in Picadilly Circus and even the Chief of Police in the Falkland Islands was seen strumming a guitar . Light Relief started the world record busk in Tauranga, New Zealand, followed closely by Ist Café Tonia in Kobe, Japan. 21 hours later, the Palo Alto Chamber Orchestra, Musequality’s guitar hero, Michael Partington (who busked all seven days!) and violinist, David McCaroll were among the last buskers that day.
There were several mass busks – 50 crewmembers on HMS Illustrious, 30 Friends of Goa at the Ruislip Lido, 42 at Stanley, Falkland Islands and 141 speed-buskers in just ten minutes at the Bedford Park Festival in west London. All participants were required to have an independent witness and to fill in a witness form and return it to us. More
World Busk Outcome
We estimate that around 811 buskers in 75 locations in 17 countries on 7 continents and one sea performed in the first Musequality World Busk raising a whopping £14,719, a fantastic result. And we’re going to do it all again.7-13 June are the dates. Please register now for 2010.
First row: Barbershop Chorus Light Relief, New Zealand. Falkland Islands’ police chief
witnesses Vocalise with Shirley Adams Leach MBE. Angela Amato’s Sirenide for Musequality, Italy.
Second row:Tutti Flutti, Chiswick. Heidi Goldsmith, South Kensington. Taro Hakase with
London Tango Quintet, St Pancras International. Senior officers as Peruvian pipers,
HMS Illustrious. Primary school violinists, Woking.
Third row: London: Craig Ogden, London Tango Quintet. Royal College of Music Junior
string quartet. Sam Meredith and Nick Booth. Jocie Juritz awaits speed busk. Rob Juritz.
Wind Chamber Orchestra, St Pancras International.
Fourth row: Mark Fennell, Isle of Wight. Royal College of Music Junior wind quartet.
Kensington Symphony Orchestra beside the Thames. Goan picnickers join the busk, Middlesex
Fifth row: Nine year old Sarah Gordon, London. Kier the Street Musician, Weymouth.
Barbershop Capital Chorus, London. Guitarist Simon Green, London. Acephale the magician,
Seattle. The Wandering Skewers, Padstow
About Musequality
The world busk aims to raise money for Musequality, whose mission is:
- to support the development of music projects for underprivileged children in the developing world that will foster self-confidence and growth in their social, intellectual and spiritual capacities.
- to provide the necessary financial assistance to these projects and Musequality’s beneficiaries through exchange programmes and training.
- to facilitate partnerships between established music ensembles and Musequality’s beneficiaries through exchange programmes and training.
We are currently supporting projects in Africa, Indis, Kenya and Thailand. The world busk will help us continue to support these projects – and set up more.
www.musequality.org
See the busks on YouTube
We’re thrilled so many of our buskers had their busks videoed. They are now on our YouTube page, in the main section or in favourites. They are all lovely but we particularly recommend you watch two remarkable busks:
- the coolest buskers on the planet, the Antarctic Minkes
- the ship’s company of HMS Illustrious who held a hymnathon for the world record on the Sunday as well as a whole day of busking the previous Wednesday.
A week of busking
Though most buskers turned out for our record-setting busk, many busked on other days or, in the case of Michael Partington, Seattle, (right) 
and Amery Hill School, Alton, everyday.
The Royal College of Music Junior Department drew crowds in South Kensington
tube station as did Capital Chorus, a Barbershop quintet; Festive Flutes flattered the City of London; Taro Hakase stole the show in St Pancras International one day ;
two days later Alan Rusbridger, editor of UK newspaper The Guardian, dusted off his clarinet to play there in a wind chamber group.
Fiddles predominated with old time favourites and French folk songs in Victoria, Canada; a string quartet in Paris, France; classical and jazz violin in Dorchester, England. Solo guitarists, singer songwriters, Chiswick Baroque, Tutti Flutti, a bassoonist, a saxophonist and others joined in. Thank you, all.
Media coverage
If you generated, or saw/heard, media coverage about the busk please tell us where and when and send us cuttings. Meanwhile here are two we are particularly pleased about:
The Times, UK, 10th June
There’s no business like snow business – and it’s all in a good cause. More
BBC World News, 5th to 8th June
Clips of a few busk rehearsals were broadcast around the world.
What you've told us
“We had a ball! The sun was shining, the wind dropped down, although there were still frozen fingers on instruments, and we played from 11.45am until 12.35pm in front of a very appreciative audience. We raised £223! Still to add any sponsor money to that of course but we were really pleased."
“We had a Ball!! Can't wait to find out about the overall results. Ready to Prep for Next Year!"
“We had a good time busking. Haven't done anything like that for a long time. Everything went well. Even the weather was on our side."
"Well that was fun!!! The response was wonderful ... All in all it was the kids who loved it the most ... they just stayed the whole time and listened ... you gotta love them!"
"We're all already making plans for how to do it bigger and better next year"
