the joshua bell violinist in the subway experiment

• Psychology , Psychology Experiments

Violinist at the Metro Experiment: The Perception of Beauty

Introduction

On Friday, January 12, 2007, Joshua Bell, a world-renowned classical violinist, began to play in a Washington D.C. metro station. Bell was wearing jeans, a long sleeve tee-shirt, and a baseball cap. Thousands of people rushed by in the midst of their morning commutes, unaware of the prodigal musician standing just feet away from them. 

Explanation

This was part of a study of human behavior by the Washington Post, and was meant to reveal the attention, or lack thereof, people pay to beauty. What makes something beautiful? Is something always beautiful, or is beauty situational? 

Violinist at the Metro Experiment

The Violinist at the Metro Experiment, conducted by the Washington Post, examined the role of perception and human behavior when assessing beauty and helping others. 

Joshua Bell arrived at the Washington D.C. metro station, L’Enfant Plaza, at 7:51 AM on a Friday, right in the middle of rush hour, in the center of federal Washington. He began to play a series of incredibly complex pieces on one of the most valuable violins in the world. As he played, people seemed not to notice, very few even looked in his direction, less threw some change in his open violin case, and fewer still actually paused to listen to his music. 

This result is certainly not what most people would expect from an experiment such as this. A world-renowned violinist playing a multi-million dollar violin in a busy metro station filled with educated people certainly should attract more appreciation, or at least attention. So why did people disregard Joshua Bell?

There are two primary explanations for the reaction of the public towards Bell and his violin playing. The first concerns how beauty is perceived in any given situation. The second involves helping behavior in humans, or more specifically, how we assess situations in which we assume help is being asked for by another. 

Perceiving beauty is not as straightforward as one may expect. Situational factors play an enormous role in the final verdict regarding the beauty of the subject at hand. 

Beauty is all about perception. If something which is widely agreed to have beauty is placed in an unassuming setting that does not highlight its worth, it will take a lot more for people to recognize it as beautiful. Joshua Bell was dressed casually, in a commonplace setting, at an inconvenient time, so people simply did not notice the beauty that was occurring as they rushed off to work that morning. 

Another factor likely at play in the reaction (or lack thereof) to Joshua Bell’s performance was the way humans exhibit helping behavior, and the cost-benefit analysis that humans use, consciously or subconsciously, when deciding whether or not to help. When some people were walking through that metro station that day, they immediately saw Bell as someone looking for help, in the form of cash thrown into his open violin case. 

People seeking help are often perceived as a nuisance by others. They intentionally ignored Bell by maintaining walking pace and not making eye contact, so that they could avoid empathizing with, or assisting him. The reciprocity principle was also likely involved in this ignorance of Bell by the public. If they had paused and enjoyed his music, they would have felt indebted to him for that. In return, they would have felt obligated to help him, which in this instance would mean leaving some change in his case. 

At the end of his forty-three minute performance, Bell had made $52 and some change. During those forty-three minutes, 1,097 people passed by, seven people stopped to listen, and only one person recognized him (and gave him $20). Had people noticed his incredible skill, who he was, or the quality of his instrument, more people likely would have gathered to appreciate his performance. However, helping behavior and the perception of beauty worked against the commuters acknowledging and appreciating Joshua Bell’s performance. 

Applying It

Being aware of how you assess the world around you is a great way to begin appreciating it. When you are in a familiar setting, and are focusing only on the task at hand, important moments can easily pass you by. Just by looking up and actively seeking the beauty in your environment, you will expose yourself to so many new experiences. When you pass someone on the street asking for help, don’t automatically shut yourself off and ignore them. Taking the time to enjoy the small things that occur in your daily life, and to acknowledge your fellow human beings, is sure to result in new opportunities. Who knows? You may be the one to stop and listen to a world-class violinist in a metro station. 

Think Further

• What are some other psychological factors that could have influenced the reaction of the public towards Joshua Bell?
• Can you think of a time when you missed something special simply because it wasn’t being presented to you as important?
• What role does helping behavior play in the way you interact with others?

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• Herrera, Nicholas, Ph.D. “Helping Behavior and Subway Musicians.” Psychology Today , Jan 2010, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/personality-and-social-interaction/201001/helping-behavior-and-subway-musicians .
• Norris, Michele. “A Concert Violinist on the Metro?” NPR , April 2007, https://www.npr.org/2007/04/11/9521098/a-concert-violinist-on-the-metro .
• Weingarten, Gene. “Pearls Before Breakfast: Can one of the nation’s great musicians cut through the fog of a D.C. rush hour? Let’s find out.” The Washington Post , April 2007, https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/magazine/pearls-before-breakfast-can-one-of-the-nations-great-musicians-cut-through-the-fog-of-a-dc-rush-hour-lets-find-out/2014/09/23/8a6d46da-4331-11e4-b47c-f5889e061e5f_story.html .

This gave students an opportunity to watch a video to identify key factors in our judicial system, then even followed up with a brief research to demonstrate how this case, which is seemingly non-impactful on the contemporary student, connect to them in a meaningful way

This is a great product. I have used it over and over again. It is well laid out and suits the needs of my students. I really appreciate all the time put into making this product and thank you for sharing.

Appreciate this resource; adding it to my collection for use in AP US Government.

I thoroughly enjoyed this lesson plan and so do my students. It is always nice when I don't have to write my own lesson plan

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clock This article was published more than  10 years ago

Gene Weingarten: Setting the record straight on the Joshua Bell experiment

I thought I had written  my final words on Joshua Bell and the Metro , but it turns out there’s one final thing to say. And it’s kind of fascinating, and it tells a story about the power, and peril, of the Web.

In my last live chat , I mentioned that most people who have heard of the Joshua Bell Metro experiment picked it up not directly from my Washington Post story , but from an anonymous, supposed summary that went globally viral a few months after the story was published. It was a simply written little piece, with a helpful moral at the end, for the people in the cheap seats. (I’m not linking to it here because I want no more eyeballs on it, but I will be cutting and pasting it below, for purposes of refutation.)

As I said in the chat, this piece — most people’s only direct knowledge of the stunt and its aftermath — was filled with errors significant and trivial, but relentless in their carelessness. I just re-read it, and it is almost incomprehensible how this could have happened, unless the writer read the original piece, forgot about it, and then, months later, tried to summarize it from memory, as though it were not available in original, checkable form just a few clicks away. But why bother, it’s just for the Internet, right? Who cares?

Hardly a month goes by that I don’t get an e-mail from some priest or minister or rabbi or imam gratefully and graciously informing me that they have just delivered a sermon based on the events in my story; often, they include a copy of the sermon, and more often than not it is based on the erroneous summary. In fact, they think that WAS my story. In the beginning I gently told them of the error, but that caused only shame and distress, so I don’t anymore. I just thank them.

(I do sometimes tell them that while I have no problem with their interpretation of the story as an affirmation of the presence of God all around us in bounteous yet unappreciated beauty, I personally did not exactly intend that message inasmuch as I am a heathen.)

Anyway, after last week’s chat, several readers asked me to explain how wrong the Internet version was, which I will do below, by annotating it. But other readers wanted to know how I am aware that most people who know about this stunt read it from this thing and not the original, and that’s pretty easy. If you Google “Joshua Bell” and “metro,” you get 169,000 hits . But if you add to the search “six Bach pieces” — a phrase that exists only in the flawed summary and not in my story, since Josh did not play “six Bach pieces” at all — you get 161,000 hits .

(Google searches are imperfect, and vary oddly and dramatically with the order and syntax of the searched-for words and phrases. In some versions, the “six Bach pieces” search gets 698,000 hits, and without it, 730,000, but you get the idea. Whatever the real proportion, it’s preposterous.)

So what does this all mean? A bunch of things, I think, none of which comes as a particular shock.

1. The insidious, intelligence-challenging “TL;DR” phenomenon: The Web values concision and simplicity over subtlety and context and, uh, complex truth.

2. Remain suspicious of anonymity. Where careers are not threatened by error, standards of truth are mightily relaxed. I discovered this independently some years ago when Wikipedia and numerous other sources informed me that Howard K. Smith, the 1960s TV anchor, had witnessed the hanging of the Nuremberg convicts and written a famous account of it . It sounded wrong to me, so I did some research and discovered it was not Howard Kingsbury Smith, the TV newsman, but Kingsbury Smith, a wire service guy with an oddly similar name. Two different men, no question. I wrote this in a chat as a giant exposé  several years ago, and yet there are still 50,000 references to Howard K. Smith’s fine reporting about the hangings, including several that take pains to note the stunningly careless invented factoid that Kingsbury Smith changed his byline to Howard K. Smith when he went into television.

3. Some people just don’t give a crap. See below.

A Most Interesting Story A man sat 1 at 2 a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold 3 January morning. He played six Bach pieces 4 for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousands of people 5 went through the station, most of them on their way to work. Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds 6 and then hurried up to meet his schedule.  A minute later 7 , the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk. A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. 8   Clearly he was late for work. 9 The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. 10 His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. 11   Finally the mother pushed hard 12 and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on. In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people 13   stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace.  He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. 14  No one applauded, nor was there any recognition. 15 No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars. Two 16 days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100. This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of an social experiment … One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be: If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?

1. Joshua Bell never sat.  He stood the whole time.

2. He was not “at” the station.  He was in an arcade outside the station, which becomes important below.

3. It was cold, but that was irrelevant to his performance; this erroneously suggests he was playing outside in the cold, which has become part of the legend entirely due to this account.

4. Wrong. Two Bach pieces, one Massenet, one Schubert, one Ponce, and a sixth that escapes me at the moment, and I didn’t mention by name in the story. Mendelssohn, I think.

5. Not “thousands” or anywhere near. Exactly 1,097.

6. This first guy never stopped, even for a second. That was the point of including him. The story says he barely altered his gait, but did turn to notice a musician. He was the first to do so.

7. A half-minute, actually, but who’s counting?

8. Nope, this guy, John David Mortensen, stayed a full three minutes against the wall.

9. Nope. He got to work on time. That is why he left when he did.

10. Well, no, not hardly. Several people paid way more attention than the child, who watched for about three seconds; one man, John Picarello, stayed nine minutes.

11. Evan didn’t stop.  He wanted to, but his ma kept moving him along.

12. Evan was never “pushed hard,” or mistreated in any way. His mother simply kept him briskly moving, the way hurried mothers do.

13. Seven people, not six, but who’s counting?

14. As the story says, one woman definitely noticed it. Right at the end. She recognized Bell, watched the last two minutes of his performance, then went up to him to say hello.

15. See above. There was definitely recognition.

16. Three days, not two, but who’s counting?

I realize some of the above are small, but all of them are just phenomenally lazy. Avoidable by four minutes of work.

Did Violinist Joshua Bell Play Incognito in a Subway?

Do we perceive beauty do we stop to appreciate it do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context, david mikkelson, published dec. 29, 2008.

About this rating

Many a marketing survey has been conducted to gauge how presentation affects consumer perceptions of quality, and quite a few such surveys have found that people will frequently designate one of two identical items as being distinctly better than the other simply because it is packaged or presented more attractively. Might this same concept apply to fields outside of consumer products, such as the arts? Would, for example, people distinguish between a world-class instrumental virtuoso and an ordinary street musician if the only difference between them were the setting?

Consider, for example, the following narrative:

A Most Interesting Story A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousands of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work. Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule. A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk. A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work. The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on. In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition. No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars. Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100. This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of an social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people. The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context? One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be: If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?

Washington Post writer Gene Weingarten tackled some of these questions in 2007 when he enlisted renowned violinist Joshua Bell, a winner of the Avery Fisher Prize for outstanding achievement in classical music who regularly undertakes over 200 international engagements a year, to spend part of a morning playing incognito at the entrance to a Washington Metro station during a morning rush hour. Weingarten set up the event "as an experiment in context, perception and priorities — as well as an unblinking assessment of public taste: In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty transcend?"

So, on 12 January 2007, about a thousand morning commuters passing through the L'Enfant Plaza Station of the subway line in Washington, D.C. were, without publicity, treated to a free mini-concert performed by violin virtuoso Joshua Bell, who played for approximately 45 minutes, performing six classical pieces (two of which were by Bach) during that span on his handcrafted 1713 Stradivarius violin (for which Bell reportedly paid $3.5 million). As Weingarten described the crux of the experiment:

Each passerby had a quick choice to make, one familiar to commuters in any urban area where the occasional street performer is part of the cityscape: Do you stop and listen? Do you hurry past with a blend of guilt and irritation, aware of your cupidity but annoyed by the unbidden demand on your time and your wallet? Do you throw in a buck, just to be polite? Does your decision change if he's really bad? What if he's really good? Do you have time for beauty? Shouldn't you? What's the moral mathematics of the moment?

Three days earlier, Bell had played to a full house at Boston's Symphony Hall, where fairly good seats went for $100. But on this day he collected just $32.17 for his efforts, contributed by a mere 27 of 1,097 passing travelers. Only seven people stopped to listen, and just one of them recognized the performer.

The Washington Post won a Pulitzer Prize in the feature writing category for Gene Weingarten's April 2007 story about this experiment, based in part on the article's originality. Weingarten was therefore quite surprised at finding out in mid-2008 that his concept wasn't quite so unique: the very same experiment had been tried (with strikingly similar results) by another journalist 77 years earlier:

In a stunt ginned up by a newspaper named the Post — the Chicago Evening Post — violin virtuoso Jacques Gordon, a onetime child prodigy, performed for spare change on his priceless Stradivarius, incognito, for three-quarters of an hour outside a subway station. Most people hurried past, unheeding. The violinist made a few measly bucks and change. It was a story about artistic context, priorities and the soul-numbing gallop of modernity. I obtained a copy of the original [May 1930] article from the long-defunct Evening Post. The main story, bylined Milton Fairman, was on Page One, under the headline "Famous Fiddler in Disguise Gets $5.61 in Curb Concerts." The story began: "A tattered beggar in an ancient frock coat, its color rusted by the years, gave a curbstone concert yesterday noon on windswept Michigan Avenue. Hundreds passed him by without a glance, and the golden notes that rose from his fiddle were swept by the breeze into unlistening ears ..." We learn from this story that two of the handful of songs played by Jacques Gordon were Massenet's "Meditation" from "Thais" and Schubert's "Ave Maria." Two of the handful of songs played by Joshua Bell were Massenet's "Meditation" from "Thais" and Schubert's "Ave Maria." Of the hundreds of people who walked by Gordon, only one recognized him for who he was. Of the hundreds of people who walked by Bell, only one recognized him for who he was. I telephoned Bell — he, too, had not heard about this other street corner stunt. But, though Jacques Gordon died two decades before Bell was born, Bell knew of him. The two men had shared something intimate. From 1991 through 2001, Bell played the same Strad that Gordon had once owned, the same one Gordon had played on the Chicago streets that day in 1930. For 11 years, Bell's fingers held the same ancient wood.

Weingarten, Gene.   "Pearls Before Breakfast."     The Washington Post.   8 April 2007   (p. W10).

Weingarten, Gene.   "Fiddling Around with History."     The Washington Post.   29 June 2008.

By David Mikkelson

David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994.

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Grammy-winning violinist Joshua Bell delights masses at DC subway concert

Back in 2007, pedestrians hurried by without realizing that the busker playing at the entrance to a Washington D.C. Metro stop was none other than the Grammy-winning Joshua Bell. Gene Weingarten wrote about the Washington Post social experiment (“In a banal setting at an inconvenient time, would beauty transcend?”) and later won a Pulitzer Prize for his story.

Today, Bell set up at the entrance of Union Station. Seven years later, he held a very different kind of performance; this time, he was anything but ignored.

“Music — you need the give and take from the audience, the feeling of attention. It’s not about me its about the music itself,” Bell told senior correspondent Jeffrey Brown after the concert. “Today, I was a little bit surprised at how many people came. I was a little worried that when I agreed to do it that there might be only a handful of people and it might be embarrassing, so this far exceeded my expectations. I was so happy.”

Situated in the main hall, Bell, one of the most acclaimed classical musicians in the world, played Bach and Mendelssohn for a 30-minute performance to promote music education. He was accompanied by nine students from the National YoungArts Foundation. These young musicians are featured alongside the violin virtuoso in his HBO documentary special “Joshua Bell: A YoungArts MasterClass,” which will premiere on Oct 14.

“Where we need to work on is getting is making sure [music] is a part of everyone’s educational diet in the school. Music and art is part of what it means to be a human being and to be make it just an extra curricular thing is sad because most kids will not get any musical experience if they don’t have it in their school.”

With more than 30 years as a celebrated violinist, Bell has recorded more than 40 albums. Today, in conjunction with the train station concert, the violinist’s newest album was released.

Stay tuned for Joshua Bell’s full concert and more video excerpts. Jeffrey Brown’s interview with Bell will air on tonight’s PBS NewsHour.

Anne Azzi Davenport is the Senior Producer of CANVAS at PBS News Hour.

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Joshua Bell, Busker Redux

Joshua Bell, a world-renowned violinist, tries busking in Washington’s metro.

“Jist whaddaya think you’re doing”? snapped the cop, scowling at me and the violin case full of coins. The crowd booed and hissed. My heart stopped, my face began to creep red, and my hands shook as I lowered the violin. “P-p-p-playing,” my voice whispered, instant tears choking my throat. “Don’t you know you’re breaking a law? I could have you arrested for panhandling. Now move on—you only get one warning.” The policeman walked away. Angry and embarassed, I kicked the case closed to cover the money and raised my violin to continue playing…”– Mary R. Moore, Street Musician, 1974

What’s it like to be a street musician—a busker, as they’re known in the business?

Just ask Joshua Bell, the world-renowned violinist who plays a $4 million Stradivarius. Back in January 2007, as an experiment initiated by a Washington Post columnist, Bell dressed down in a baseball cap and jeans and made his way through rush hour crowds to the L’Enfant Plaza Metro station in Washington D.C. where he played for 45 minutes. More than a thousand people passed by with barely a glance. A few stopped to toss cash into his violin case, and only one person recognized him. Just a few days earlier, Bell had performed to a sell-out crowd in Boston Symphony Hall. In the D.C. subway, he made $32.17.

Weingarten’s story, “ Pearls Before Breakfast ” went viral and earned him a Pulitzer. (Watch the  Washington Post’s  time lapse video of Bell in the subway   here . )

Most buskers in subways, shopping malls, and public parks would be pleased enough to take home $32.17 for 45 minutes of solo Bach. But Bell is returning to the D.C. subway today at 12:30 PM in Union Station. Yes, the date, time, and place have been carefully announced, and he’ll be avoiding the rush hour crush, for maximum space and attention. The aim is to promote an upcoming album and HBO special.

This time he won’t be collecting tips in his violin case. But you’d better believe there’ll be an attentive crowd.

Read more of Mary R. Moore’s essay about her life as a busking violinist on JSTOR.

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11. The anonymous busker

In an experiment conducted by 'The Washington Post', Bell performed as an incognito busker at a metro station in Washington D.C. on 12 January 2007. Of the more than 1000 people who passed by, only seven stopped to listen, and only one recognised him. He collected just $32.17 from 27 people (excluding $20 from the woman who recognised him).

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