Brass Band at Times Square Subway, Heard Through a Payphone

I wander through the New York City subway system, listening for music. When I hear music, and if I can find a working payphone nearby, I put 50¢ into that payphone and call it in. Depending on the phone I either let the handset dangle, or else I prop it up atop the phone, as in this image.

Subway payphones frequently do not work at all. When they do they provide the sound quality that has gone missing in the cell phone era: the raspy, gray, monochrome sound of the landline. The distinctly low-fidelity quality of musical performances funneled through a public pay telephone is something akin to the difference between color photography and its black and white forebear. Black and white photography, especially when used in modern times, separates the subject of the photograph from its reality, turning it into a set piece, or a story disambiguated from its setting. Music, crippled of its acoustical environment and atmosphere, also tells a mysteriously different story than may be intended by its performers.

Click below to listen to The Payphone Project’s Soundcloud Stream.

Other Subway and Street Sounds as Heard Through New York City Payphones

• Times Square Subway Buskers
• Grand Central Terminal, Subway Musicians
• 14th Street/Union Square, Subway Musicians
• Subway Buskers: Underground Music via Public Pay Telephone
• Subway Percussionist, Heard Through a Payphone
• Subway Saxophonist, Heard Through a Payphone
• More Subway and Street Sounds As Heard Through Payphones