Busker –
nounplural noun: buskers– a person who performs music or other entertainment in the street or another public place for monetary donations.“on any given corner you will be entertained by buskers”
“On any given corner you will be entertained by buskers” is one of the goals for Aiken City Limits Music Festival! Sign up to come share your talents on the streets of #downtownAiken on Friday, October 18 and Saturday, October 19 during the Aiken City Limits Music Festival weekend. Buskers on our streets make it really feel like an”all things musical” weekend – throughout our downtown.
Many people may recall the “Make Music Day” event on Park Avenue this past summer. The businesses along Park Avenue were bustling with people enjoying walking around with music filling the air all evening. This year, we are working to create that atmosphere on Friday night and Saturday, all day. This is a wonderful opportunity to share you talents AND help our downtown merchants benefit from a music filled weekend.
Busking is not currently legal in Aiken. However, there is an effort, led by Mayor Osbon and Haley Knight, Aiken Downtown Development director, to introduce an ordinance that will make street performers legal all the time – with a few rules.
In the meantime, Aiken City Limits Music Festival organizers are paying for a group event business license for our Field of Dreams Entrepreneur Village participants, that don’t hold a city business license, and for Street Performers – so you can legally put out your tip jar.
To sign up, email AikenBlend@gmail.com, with the times that you would like to participate, and we will work on placing you at locations all around the downtown. The Aiken Trolley will also be operating from 2:00pm until 10:30pm. We place buskers on the Trolley, also! The Trolley is one of the most fun activities during Aiken City Limits Music Festival every year and previous performers have had a ton of fun entertaining young and old – just for fun! You can read all the weekend activities at AikenCityLimits.Com if you want to coordinate around a particular event.
The more, the merrier! We welcome seasoned professionals and hobby performers of all ages. Who knows? Maybe you will be discovered like the young saxophone performer that was recruited while performing on the Atlanta Beltline and blew us away, literally, when he appeared with his new band during an Aiken Music Fest show this past summer. It was a cool story to hear. (Daniel was actually #connected to the CSRA because he took lessons from Wycliffe Gordon, a world class saxophonist from Augusta. He wasn’t too proud to hustle!)
There will be lots of folks on our streets next weekend experiencing our town in between sets at the 3 stages – The Alley, New Moon Cafe, and Highfields Event Center. Let’s help them have lots of fun!
Just email us at AikenBlend@gmail.com – soon! Thank you to all of our regular buskers. We are looking forward to hearing some new buskers, too!
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