With growing numbers of artists residing in Elgin and Aurora, local officials are encouraging busking along city streets in the hope that street musicians can bring bustle to revitalizing downtown areas.
“I have lived in New York City and have been to many world cities, all which have a lot of street art, music and buskers,” said Elgin City Council member Carol Rauschenberger, a major proponent of the movement. “I was exploring the idea of city in the suburbs (Elgin’s motto), and a city typically has lots of street life.”
With Elgin developing a reputation as being “art-edgy,” Rauschenberger said she has been encouraging businesses to offer outdoor seating and signage. With Elgin’s riverwalk as an attraction, she’s been working with others on events and other things that would bring people downtown, at no real cost to the city, including allowing street performing.
“The long-term goal is to get more retail interested in being here if they see more street traffic,” Rauschenberger said. “It is the old chicken-and-the-egg thing — as more retail would help bring more people downtown.”
At the same time, Downtown Aurora has been hosting Wednesdays at the Plaza at Millennium Plaza, where local musicians perform and food trucks set up shop in August.
Rauschenberger noted that Fort Wayne, Ind., and other cities have busker festivals.
“I would like to see a ‘Bikes, Bites and Buskers’ planned for next summer to continue to encourage street life in our beautiful downtown,” the Elgin official said.
Already, street performance has been a big part of downtown Elgin events such as the recent Art & Soul on the Fox and plans in the works for another Walkabout Theater Festival sometime this fall — not to mention the giant street party that is the Halloween time Nightmare on Chicago Street.
Elgin’s Downtown Neighborhood Association has a list of guidelines for buskers on its website. The organization also has been incorporating acts into its seasonal outdoor Thursday Harvest Market and its First Friday offerings.
Suzy Schwartz, of Marengo, a moonlighting nurse who plays acoustic guitar and ukulele, has performed at Art & Soul and at the Harvest Market for several years and at places across the Chicago area.
Typically set up under a canopy, her eclectic sets feature everything from Elvis to Green Day, sometimes with keyboard accompaniment. She plays for tips and a $75 stipend at Harvest Market.
“I like the atmosphere (in Elgin Thursdays),” Schwartz said. “It’s friendly, fun, and says summer.”
Chicagoan Coelti Ticsay trekked to Elgin for a First Friday Art Hop once in spring to perform with hula hoops, first in a gravel parking lot, then inside the Martini Room.
“I noticed an online ad that Elgin was looking for street performers, and you don’t see that very often,” Ticsay said. “That was really awesome.”
Ticsay said she has had a busking license in Chicago for four years. A Chicago license runs $100 and is good for two years. Licenses are not required for Aurora and Elgin street performers
“As a downtown merchant, I think it’s great that Elgin has street performers who just may show up and play at places, on corners or are scheduled like the DNA First Friday events where they try to organize some street performances,” Rediscover Records owner Rich Wagner said. Wagner sometimes has solo acts play in front of his shop, too.
In Aurora, in addition to Wednesdays at Millennium Plaza, Louche Puce Market along the Water Street Mall on Aug. 15 also offered music outdoors. The city also allows busking. The city also hosts First Fridays, an event that Elgin copied.
And though it’s on hiatus this summer, organizers plan to bring Alley Art Fest back in 2016 with street performers.
“For Alley Art Festival, we get musicians, hula-hoopers, roller derby girls and belly dancers to perform in the commons area. Recently at the ArtBar Bazaar, a man on stilts dressed as a scarecrow entertained patrons,” said Marissa Amoni. Amoni publishes Downtown Auroran magazine and is a marketing liaison for Aurora Downtown.
JD Klatt busks occasionally in downtown Aurora, specializing in 1920s and 1930s jazz and blues. Spots have included the sculpture garden on Downer Avenue, Culture Stock, a flea market, the farmers market, and a sidewalk art festival.
“Before my FAA job, I went to school to teach instrumental music. Now music is an avocation,” Klatt said.
A retiree, Klatt also plays guitar weekly at Rush Copley Medical Center and for his church.
He believes downtown Aurora merchants are experiencing a revival of interest in visual arts and music. Klatt’s Town Band recently performed during a Wednesdays at the Plaza. Klatt plays tuba in the group, a seven-piece he formed that re-creates World War I era arrangements of songs on woodwind and brass instruments.
Members of a punk pop band believe street performances have helped Elgin attract young people to its downtown.
“Elgin’s always had this small music scene hanging on for dear life. Now these places like Side Street Studio (Arts) and the Blue Box Cafe are opening up, and art festivals are happening, and we have artist lofts (downtown),” Beer Murray guitarist Tom Sexton said.
Sexton said these attractions are not only helping Elgin become more appealing to younger people, but also helping the city become a place with options for people in the suburbs who can’t or won’t go to Chicago for culture and entertainment.
“(That includes those) who are in bands and do art but don’t have a place to express themselves in their neighborhoods. (With downtown Elgin) they have a place to come,” Sexton said. “Playing in the streets is contributing to that energy. It’s like being part of a movement here.”
The most the band has collected in money left by passersby has been $90 on the 4th of July performing for about 90 minutes along Spring Street as crowds were downtown for Elgin’s Independence Day concert and fireworks, drummer Michael Spiekerman said.
It’s evidence that music in public spaces can have wide appeal.
“We’ve had police come up to us, so we stop playing to see what’s the matter and they tell us they came to listen to the music,” Spiekerman said.
The band also has performed around Elgin in Side Street Studios, Rediscover Records, in addition to busking the occasional weekend or holiday downtown.
“We made a couple dance under the moon to our music,” Sexton said.
