thirdcrank wrote:The panpipes, as piped music, are piped music and it's piped music that some find unwelcome.
I should have been clearer. Pan pipes, piped or unpiped, are unacceptable.
And that brings me to Cyril Haearn's point about buskers. I prefer buskers to piped music. Even the terrible ones. But, increasingly, buskers are nothing of the sort, as they have been selected and licensed. It all feels rather corporate and bland. Landowners and burghers have decided that every cultural centre needs a certain type of live performer - and from Budapest to Bath they have chosen the same things: panpipers in ponchos, robots, floating yodas, living statues, steel drum players... it's all so depressingly predictable. Then there are the professional guitar balladeers, who come with amplification. This type is the preferred official performer of the London Underground committee. Yuk!
I'd prefer to take my chances with proper buskers, who might be a bloke warbling Streets of London to the accompaniment of a three stringed guitar, or who might be something much better.