Andrew Paul

Brian Gregg in 2008

The emergence of spring has meant the return of a certain lanky, tinsel-jacketed electronic busker to serenade the downtown lunch crowd as weather permits. That would be one Breezy Brian Gregg, a six-string troubadour who has been taking advantage of the natural reverb available on the southwest corner of Edmonton’s foremost cement plaza, just across from the Milner Library, for going on three years.

And so, with the occasion of Gregg’s new solo instrumental CD entitled Street that digitizes some of the guitarist’s sunny noontime repertoire — complete with the faint whoosh of traffic added for ambience — I thought it might be a good time to get to know our local space cowboy a little better.

Lots of people think performing in public for pocket change is the domain of the wood-shedding amateur hoping to pick up a few bucks while practicing, but Gregg brings four decades of professional experience to the sidewalk. This includes bragging rights for playing in the band that opened for Led Zeppelin on their storied 1969 swing through Edmonton and helping in the late 1970s to convert the Commercial Hotel Tavern from a C-circuit country dive into a national blues landmark. His decision to start playing al fresco had more to do with the devaluation of live local music than a decline in personal fortunes.

“If you think about it, playing music is a public service,” the guitarist says, recalling a time when the city boasted a couple of dozen viable venues that offered live music six nights a week and the musician’s union saw to it that players earned scale or better. This probably sounds like a fairytale world to current local acts that play for a bar tab or accept a token sum just to get on a decent bill.

“With the gigging scene the way it is, I thought to myself I want to go out and play music, but I don’t feel like playing at club where I have to split the door with two other bands while the bar’s charging $5.50 a beer — that’s a rip-off.  I’m just going to go out and do it this way.”

Along with non-musical jobs, Gregg still gigs — often with his girlfriend Patsy Amico and sometimes with his two sons — teaches music and has long hosted the Little Flower Open Stage at the Fiddler’s Roost on 99th Street, but busking has formed part of his playing regimen since 1998. He usually works Corona Station in the cold months but he’s happy to drag his portable tube amp into the daylight when weather permits. He says he draws on a repertoire of about 60 tunes, 20 of which are collected on Street — themes that range from House of the Rising Sun and The Girl from Ipanema to Danny Boy, Pop Goes the Weasel and stuff that he just makes up on the spot.

“That’s my job, to make people happy, right? So I don’t have to play the most intricate or inspired piece of music to do my job of making people feel good.”

Last week’s downtown stabbings aside, Gregg doesn’t believe Edmonton’s reputation as a rough town is entirely warranted, he hopes that his presence in an area frequented by all walks of life does something to make the mix a bit less volatile.

“Not very often have I seen trouble, but I like how my music seems to make that whole street violence thing seem like less of a threat. I feel like being there, putting some live music into the space, that I change it a little bit, I hope I do anyway, I hope I give a little lift to people. Maybe that makes them a little less likely to express themselves with violence.”

A good lunch hour might see Gregg pull in $50 from passersby  (“I only count the loonies and toonies, I don’t count the small change.”), but Edmontonians haven’t always been reliably generous. Performing electrically has helped him reach a wider audience from his vantage point on the edge of Churchill Square, but he says he knows not to pin his livelihood on busking.

“I’ve had days where I make zero. Some days I actually lose cause I have to pay five dollars to park. I think to busk you can’t have any expectations about what you’re going to make, so that anything that happens is a bonus, right?”

A query about Gregg’s mayoral candidacy in 1998 elicits the frank admission that his political aspirations were a manifestation of bipolar disorder, the same condition that had sidetracked his musical career for five years in his youth. Gregg wound up arrested and briefly institutionalized, an episode that he says had an upside.

“In the end it was a good thing because I came out understanding what bipolar was, and they showed me how to look after myself, gave me medication that didn’t bother me, but the whole thing was really hard on my family. Now I’ve been fine for 12 years. I love the city, but there’s no way in my normal mind I’d want to be the mayor. I want to play the guitar. I couldn’t do that if I was mayor.”

Gregg will celebrate the release of Street on Friday, May 14 by occupying his regular spot on the southwest corner of Sir Winston Churchill Square from noon to 4 p.m., then repairing to Rossdale Community Hall (10135 96th Ave.) for an evening performance with special guests. The $15 cover charge includes a copy of the CD.