Last week, John Canzano, a sports columnist for the Oregonian posted about an article he read in the Washington Post. I read Canzano’s blog because it is found on an Oregonian webpage devoted to all things Trailblazers (as in struggling NBA basketball team). This post, however, had nothing to do with basketball. The Post piece was about famed musician Joshua Bell who, for an hour, dressed up as a regular guy and played a $3.5 million violin at the L’Enfant Metro station in Washington, D.C. during rush hour. It was a test put on by the Post to see what would happen. Would people stop and listen to arguably some of the finest music ever written performed by one of the finest musicians in the world or would they pass by as if he wasn’t there?

Canzano entitled his post, “Just settling an old epistemological debate” and proceeded to ask, “Would a guy who makes $60,000 an hour and sells out the most popular performance venues in the country, playing an instrument valued at $3.5 million even draw a crowd? Is beauty really measurable?”

You’ll have to read the article, “Pearls Before Breakfast” by Gene Weingarten to find out what happened. It is very interesting.

A few days later, Amy Lauger, at Common Grounds Online blogged about the same article. She sees in Bell, the virtuoso who left the ornate symphony halls for the humble surroundings of lowly L’Enfant Plaza an allusion to the incarnate Christ who left the glory of heaven and became ignoble man. Her article is entitled, “Just a Street Musician?” It, also, is worth a read.

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