Posts Tagged ‘Let It Be’
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Little Girls and Bikers
0September 28, 2016 by admin
It’s a beautiful day in New York. There are no longer big crowds in the park. Fewer than 10 people were at the Imagine Mosaic, where the guitarist sang “Let It Be.”
From a distance, it appeared there were no nuts on the chestnut tree at all, but up close I spotted a few browning golf-ball sized nuts in the upper branches, and the ground was littered with shells. I found a whole nut, shiny brown, and crushed it under my foot. The meat was white and moist, good eating for squirrels.
Sitting alone on a bench near the stairs down to the fountain, a man sat expressionless, unmoving like a statue. His head was wrapped in white gauze. Wearing a suit, sunglasses, no tie, his shirt out of his pants, legs crossed, he was a living work of art, although I was at a loss as to how to interpret him.
The accordion player was in the arcade. No other buskers were around. I set up, tuned and started my set with only a handful of people to hear me. A 5-year-old girl looked me over suspiciously. “Would you like to dance the hula?”
“She’s shy,” said her dad. I tried to lure her with a lei, made funny faces, sang funny lyrics, all of which drove her farther away.
“Not going to happen,” I said to dad. He agreed, then dropped 55 cents into my case.
Another dad and daughter, 2-3 years old, stopped to chat. I doubled the lei into a crown and put it on the little girl’s head. The only sign of a hula was the occasional bend of the knee, or wave of the arm. Dad gave me buck and said, “Sorry, she won’t dance, but you sound great.”
Three women rode into the plaza on bicycles and dismounted. One of them couldn’t take her eyes off me. “Have you got time for a hula today?” She turned her back and consulted with her friends, finally coming my way with a big smile and $3.
Later, another set of bikers, stopped to listen. These were young men from Ireland. “From the west,” one of them told me. “Near Galway.” I told him that Mrs. Ukulele’s family hailed from Tipperary.
My ukulele was falling farther and farther out of tune. I tightened the low-G string, strummed a few more chords, then twang, the string broke. I finished the song on 3 strings, then found a replacement string in my case. My old string maker, Hilo, had gone out of business; my strings now are from Aquila. I took off the broken string and replaced it as quickly as I could. New strings, once stretched, need some seasoning; right out of the package they go flat, so I had to tighten it up after – sometimes during – every song until I finished with “Little Grass Shack.”
When I sat down at the end of my set to pack up my stuff, a couple from Poland asked, “How much for the purple dancing girl?”
Ordinarily, my dancing girls, like my leis, are not for sale. But today I made an exception. “Five dollars.”
They conferred as I continued packing. The man finally pulled out a $50-dollar bill. There was only $5.55 in my case, plus $2 in starter money. I made change from my wallet, nearly doubling my daily take without playing a note.
Category Uncategorized | Tags: Let It Be, Little Grass Shack
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Better than Average
0July 19, 2015 by admin
Thursday dawned to reveal clear blue skies, low humidity, cool breezes; it was a beautiful day for a hula. Other people thought so too. The park was mobbed. I rushed past the red and pink begonias, past the cone flowers and cosmos. Behind the mass of color were fire red fuschia, in front deep purple heliotrope. On the sides, lantana in yellow, red and orange.
A new guy sang out “Let It Be” at the Imagine Mosaic; at the end of the bench an older man sold cold water, “a dollar less than the hot dog man.” The pods on the catalpa are almost 2 feet long.
I set up on center stage, i.e. the east end of the fountain, and opened with “Making Love Ukulele Style,” followed by “Sunday,” “Fit as a Fiddle,” and “I Saw Stars,” then returning to the Hawaiian theme with “Ukulele Lady.” I noted attention, amusement, acceptance building up around me. I convinced a young man taking a picture to hula. A couple of teens talked each other into a dance. I didn’t mind the walk-aways; they gave others the idea.
My first contribution came from a man just walking by. Then a German-speaking 6-year-old stopped, transfixed. “Wollen Sie der Hula tanzen?” Tanz she did, swaying from side to side while she flapped her hands uncertainly.
Another little girl planted her feet near me and laid her dollar in my case. “Would you like to hula?” “Oh, yes.” A man in a matching tie-dyed shirt was standing by the lake. “Is that your Dad over there? Make sure its ok with him.” It was.
A blonde mom parked her stroller a few feet in front of me. A toddler stood tethered to one side while his 4-year-old sister stared at me, absorbed, on the other. I ran through a few songs, got the kids bopping a bit. Mom dug around in a bag on the stroller. It was either money for me, or a cellphone. The odds were 10-1 against me. It was sunblock. Through another few songs, mom goopped up the kids, then away went the sunblock, out came the wallet with $2 for me.
A dozen or so teenage girls from Argentina were up next, followed by another group from Spain. When both sets of dancers walked away, a 20-something man stepped up with a couple bucks. The cold water man from Strawberry Fields set up shop in the shade in front of me, calling out “agua frio, agua frio.” A single here, a single there floated into my case. It was shaping up to be a wonderful day on all counts. Now 3 women each gave me a dollar. “How much for the lei?” one asked. “Can’t sell them,” I said. “These are my means of production.”
At the end of the set, I counted $16 in my case, a better than average sum on a better than average day.
Category Uncategorized | Tags: Fit as a Fiddle, I Saw Stars, Let It Be, Making Love Ukulele Style, Sunday, Ukulele Lady
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Another Hot One
0July 9, 2015 by admin
Today, a tee shirt vendor has replaced the Sabrett hot dog man at the entrance to the park at W. 72nd St. Hot dogs had always been more expensive at this location, $3 compared to $2.50 inside the park. When I asked the hot dog man about it, he told me his monthly rent was $10,000 – that’s a lot of hot dogs. This year hot dogs are $3 everywhere.
It’s hotter than yesterday. A Japanese Katsura tree at the entrance to Strawberry Fields looks stressed, its heart-shaped leaves browning in the sun. The guitarist sings “Let It Be.” At Bethesda Fountain, an accordion has replaced John Boyd’s family singers. He had to have gotten up pretty early in the morning to do that.
Once again, I sought the shade. The doo-wop singers had already set up by the boathouse. I launched into “Making Love Ukulele Style,” and immediately got a dollar from a 60-something, like me.
It was a day for families and pleasant conversation. First a family with 4 girls, from 6 to 16. They got a line-dance hula going. The oldest guided her young sisters, while mom sat behind, on the rock, and dad took some photos. He was an optometrist from Sherman Oaks, CA. He too had a pension, he told me, and couldn’t wait to retire like me and have nothing to do all day but seek his bliss.
“Are these all yours? That must be quite a pension.”
He laughed. “Four daughters, how expensive can that be?”
A man from Norway stopped to tell me his son had just started to learn to play the ukulele. I handed the instrument to the pre-teen boy. “Let’s see what you can do.” He was indeed a beginner, laboring over D-G-A7-D. I helped him along, giving him tips his father translated.
The doo-wop dancers got chased away by the park rangers. According to the optometrist, who gathered his information on a trip to the bathrooms with a couple of daughters, the group had been blocking the path. More probably, the restaurant had complained; Meta and her inoffensive harp, after all, had also been rousted from that spot.
An Italian family replaced the California family, this one with 3 young children. While 2 daughters did the hula, a toddler boy kept picking up my watch from out of my case and slipping it on his wrist. Dad took it off, put it back, and the kid swiped it again. At the end of the “The Hukilau Song” I took a quick inventory; everything was there, including $6.15 in donations.
Category Uncategorized | Tags: Let It Be, Making Love Ukulele Style, The Hukilau Song
