Circuses Finances

What garlic is to life, loud is to the circus. Not always. Take a look inside the big blue and yellow tent off the 405 Freeway in the parking lot of South Coast Plaza where Canada's Cirque du Soleil is holding forth. There, majestic among the band's amplifiers and Fenders, is something older even than the circus, an acoustic, stand-up string double bass. Unplucked and bowed, daring solos come from it, all done without benefit of net or spotter.

What garlic is to life, loud is to the circus. Not always. Take a look inside the big blue and yellow tent off the 405 Freeway in the parking lot of South Coast Plaza where Canada's Cirque du Soleil is holding forth. There, majestic among the band's amplifiers and Fenders, is something older even than the circus, an acoustic, stand-up string double bass. Unplucked and bowed, daring solos come from it, all done without benefit of net or spotter.