British violinist Thomas Gould went busking at Westminster Tube station on Wednesday, in a recreation of the famous Joshua Bell subway experiment that was arranged by the Washington Post in 2007. Gould, the concertmaster of the Aurora Orchestra and the associate concertmaster of the Britten Sinfonia, recreated the stunt for London's Evening Standard.
According to the Standard, out of around 2,000 people using Westminster station during the lunchtime rush hour, only 35 stopped to listen to Gould playing on a 1782 Guadagnini. By the time he finished performing a selection of music by Bach, Massenet, Paganini and Chopin, he had made £15.06.
When Bell took his Stradivari into a Washington, DC subway station and played Bach's Chaconne and pieces by Schubert, Massenet and Ponce, just seven out of 1,097 people paused to listen. Twenty-seven people gave money, and Bell walked away with $32.17.
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