Eye Witness: Buskerfest

Buskers are a hard group to peg down. They fall somewhere between artist and circus performer, with a little panhandler added to the mix. Acts come in all sorts,
but you have to be pretty damn entertaining if you want your audience to dig deep for the change in their pockets. And when it’s good, it’s very very entertaining. Enter BuskerFest, a yearly celebration that brings top-shelf street theatre from around the world to Front Street. Toronto Notes took in the closing night gala performance and reported back on the wonders that it beheld.

BEST B-BOYING
Real hip hop, as they say, is street, so the breakdance-busker crossover seems an obvious one. BuskerFest featured two crews, Conkrete Stylez and Pulp who came together for the gala performance with musical accompaniment from Sick Sound Syndrome, five beatboxers who sound just like your stereo. Standing out amid the spinning limbs was Robert Muraine, aka Mr. Fantastic, of Pulp, who you might remember from a commericial for the very street Ikea. His popping marries the robot with circus contortionism. The man can bend over backwards until his head is touching the ground. And he does it to the beat.

BEST COORDINATION
Playing the saxophone is difficult enough; I still have nightmares about grade-school band recitals. Playing the saxophone while running laps in front of the crowd, as Michael “Shoehorn” Conley did, must be really difficult. Playing the saxophone while at the same time tap dancing, Conley’s finale, is pretty amazing.

BEST PERFORMER
Any slacker can escape from a straight jacket, but if you want to make it as a busker, you need something more — you need showmanship, a little razzle dazzle. Rob Williams picked out an assistant from the audience to help him into the straight jacket, then blindfolded him and told him to fall backwards, trust exercise style, in 45 seconds, by which point he would be out of the restraints and read to catch him. Williams was out of the jacket by 35. By zero, he was wearing a wig, a fake mustache and a leather S&M getup and was ready to catch the rather surprised assistant.

BEST MISTAKE
For the grand finale of the show, Alakazam, three-time winner of this years People’s Choice Award, climbed up to the top of a 12-foot pool. His partner Space Cowboy, a fellow Aussie, got on top of a really really tall unicycle. Then they got some juggling pins, lit those pins on fire and proceeded to throw them at each other. A little ho-hum perhaps. Maybe if they were using flaming swords. But then they starting dropping pins, much to the chagrin of the people underneath helping to hold Alakazam’s poll up, with ropes.