Singers in Vancouver can't sing leisurely, because they are hungry.
I was shocked when I heard a famous canadian singer said on radio that his last year income was only $7000. He definitely doesn't lack of talent being a wonderful singer and song writer, but he do lack of living resources for sure. Because he is so passion about his music and never thinking about quitting, so he has done many kind of jobs he possible can get just for survival.
Yes, everyone knows Vancouver is kind of "outdoors" city, people would rather spend hundreds dollars to buy golf clubs than pay $ 50 ticket to join a concert that performed by local artists; however, the similar cities like Seattle never worry about lack of audience to attend all kind of music events including the famous jazz, why Vancouver wouldn't do?
I think high percentage of asian population perhaps is one of reasons why the attendance rate of concert is so low here, and sadly the singing is kind of the art that crucially depends on big crowd of audience; on the other hand , the booming " chinese idol "show indicates chinese do like music, maybe someone just need to know how to marketing their products, in order to attract more asians.
I guess there is not easy solution to solve this problem overnight, but from now on, whenever i see singer singing on street, i will PAY my respect for his/her music for sure.