Busking: Mark Kyle Style

 

Welcome back to Glasgow Street Music!

This week I had the pleasure of chatting to 23 year old Mark Kyle – an up-and-coming musician based in Glasgow.

Introducing Mark Kyle

Mark started street busking at the age of 18 during his gap year before enrolling at university to study politics and French. He began in Glasgow’s popular busking scene before travelling to cities like Oslo, Rome and Paris to share his music. On top of his degree, Mark busked to raise his finances throughout his studies to support himself and to gain more experience in performing – even during his year abroad in the south of France (which he admits went towards funding his nights out!) Since finishing university, Mark landed a position with a well-known record company to pursue his ambition of working in the music industry.

When discussing the types of genres Mark plays, he has a soft spot for folk music and rockabilly but still loves to perform indie-folk tunes. From having a listen to Mark’s busking on YouTube (filmed by captivated passers-by) it’s clear that he can effortlessly put his own twist on almost any song; ranging from Robyn’s deep ‘Dancing On My Own’ to Otis Redding’s soulful ‘Sittin’ On The Dock Of The Bay’. Mark also writes his own music and plays guitar to accompany it; he aims to have his Spotify page launched as soon as possible to make his music available to the public (keep an eye out!)

Mark Kyle busking with a view

Before the coronavirus pandemic, Mark played in a variety of settings including pubs, parties and corporate events. However, with the strict regulations in place limiting where artists can play, the only place left to publicly perform music is Glasgow’s streets. Mark has found that people listening to his street busking have potentially been more generous with their tips than pre-Covid, which could be put down to the fact they were ‘starved’ of any live music throughout lockdown. Although this is an enormous encouragement to Mark and a huge number of musicians in the same position, he hopes that even once restrictions are eased the public will not shy away from tipping street musicians for their continued efforts to maintain Glasgow’s reputation of being a culture-rich city.

Looking at the bigger picture, Mark believes that the UK music industry as a whole will need to acclimatise to the ‘new normal’, as daunting as it may be. For the industry to survive, he feels it is essential that more financial aid is distributed to the creative arts. One logical suggestion from Mark as to how this could be done is subsidising event tickets once Covid-19 cases rapidly decline so that music fans can afford to attend gigs (especially following the impacts that the current recession will have on the public’s disposable incomes). Another reasonable proposal would be for an increase in governmental funding into music courses and to develop greater support networks/platforms for young and upcoming artists to share their talent.

If you’d like to follow Mark Kyle’s musical career and keep an ear out for his own material, feel free to follow his Instagram (@mark__kyle) to show him your support! Talented and with his own established style, I’m certain he’ll go on to do amazing things.

Thanks for reading and don't forget to share!
C x