Musician James Murphy, formerly of LCD Soundsystem, has partnered with beer company Heineken in an attempt to bring his long-gestating Subway Symphony project to New York City.
Murphy has for 20 years been at work on an idea to replace the beeping noise of New York's subway turnstiles with pleasant, harmonized notes that would differ by station, giving each its own sonic identity -- and making rush hour "possibly the most beautiful time to be in the subway," he says.
Dutch brewer Heineken has now announced it's supporting the idea as part of its "Open Your City" campaign, which aims to improve cities.
Those interested in seeing the concept implemented are encouraged to tweet "I support #SubwaySymphony," and a video series at SubwaySymphony.com has been launched to document the effort, with future episodes set to make the case for the project and to provide a preview of the musical tones via a working turnstile prototype.
It's not for lack of trying that the idea has yet to take off, however. Thus far, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) has refused Murphy's proposal.
An MTA representative told Gothamist it simply could not be done, explaining, "The tones are an ADA element for the visually impaired, and we won't mess with them -- much less take turnstiles out of service and risk disabling them for an art project" -- albeit a "very cool project," he added.
As the video series rolls out, viewers may get a sense of how Murphy and Heineken plan to tackle those issues and turn the project into a reality.
"The turnstile has to make a sound -- it might as well be beautiful," says Murphy in a video announcing the new campaign.
