Busking in Belgrade

I personally found busking in Belgrade little bit hard. I don’t know why. First time I tried almost at night. And there were only a few people on the street. A couple of people dropped like 120 denars.

I retuned guitar to something similar to the Turkish baglama. In order to play one Russian traditional song. Cause I knew only melody and lyrics. It was quite interesting. And I like the fact that with this tuning and a traditional song structure you can play long. It is repetitive.

Verses are short but many. The same phrase is used around each verse. And you sing it almost exactly as the melody. And between verses you can just improvise with the scale as long as you want. Which is pretty straight forward. Although I do only basic moves. I’m pretty sure some Arabic instrument player would do it so much better. As they keep all those melodies and scales in mind. It doesn’t sound abrupt after all as with all those newer songs of 2-3 verses. Cause you can keep it going. And it is not boring for some reason. Maybe it is a sophisticated repetitive singing melody. A kind of a trance effect in singing. May be a compound effect of your voice and strings. I guess everything.

The sound is pretty rich, I made first 2 and 4 5 strings equal pitch. So it gives some harmonics. Although I found overall sound a little bit sad. I don’t know why. Maybe should try tuning it some other way. 

The next day I tried to busk little bit in the park. the Main Street was packed with musicians. Not many people in the park. May be more than last night. And no one dropped any money. I was hungry and not so happy to sing full power. So I just made a trip through the street. Still many musicians. Just went back to the hostel.