These are the sounds of a pre-pandemic New York: A parade in the streets, the roar of fans at a ballgame, the bustle of the subway. And here are those scenes today, echoes of city life that are unsettling and yet also reassuring, reminding us of the New York we hope will return.
These are the sounds of a pre-pandemic New York: A parade in the streets, the roar of fans at a ballgame, the bustle of the subway. And here are those scenes today, echoes of city life that are unsettling and yet also reassuring, reminding us of the New York we hope will return.
The Sounds of New York City Have Changed. Listen for Yourself.
ByDan BarryandPhotographs By Todd HeislerAug. 20, 2020
TheNew York Cityof OurImagination
These are the sounds of a pre-pandemic New York: A parade in the streets, the roar of fans at a ballgame, the bustle of the subway. And here are those scenes today, echoes of city life that are unsettling and yet also reassuring, reminding us of the New York we hope will return.
These are the sounds of a pre-pandemic New York: A parade in the streets, the bustle of the subway. And here are those scenes today, unsettling yet reassuring echoes of city life, reminding us of the New York we hope will return.
By Dan Barry and Todd HeislerAugust 20, 2020
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The music of the metropolis has been altered.Listen.
We once measured our days to New York City’s rhythms, keeping time to its idiosyncratic beat. But now the faint strains of Alicia Keys professing her empire state of mind come from some indefinable distance; wisps of “Rhapsody in Blue” float past in the evening breeze.
We are living in the echo — in the almost but not quite — of what had been our city life. It can be unsettling, melancholic.
We ache forwhat was.
Gradually, though, hesitantly, we are emerging from our pandemic cocoon, resolved to pick up where we left off — which is here, in this chaotic urban scrum so maddening, so magnificent.
Where else can you pause just about anywhere — leaning against a street sign, sitting on a stoop — and have a front-row view to the tragicomedy of life forever unfolding on a pavement stage?
This is a rhetorical question, my friend. There is only one place.Here.New York.
But as we and our city slowly reacquaint, let us hope that we have learned from these months of having our words filtered through the gauze of masks.
Now, perhaps, we will listen more closely. Work harder to understand one another. Revel in the bouncing-basketball beat of the city’s heart.
That heartbeat grows less distant, as certain realities of city life begin to return. This would include realities we never dreamed could ever — ever! — stir feelings of nostalgia. For example:
Had we ever considered the subtle reassurance behind afull-throatedmorningrush hour?
How its harried mornings suggest the hum of a sound economy; the pursuit of knowledge; the commitment to provide and be self-sustaining.
The rush reflects the cyclical process of communal replenishment, as workers and students scurry to offices and construction sites and classrooms — only to stagger home together a half-day later, thoroughly spent.
Lately, though, our muted rush hours are cacophonous in the wholesale disruption of earning and learning. The effect of this quiet is the opposite of calming.
We find ourselves missing what we once loathed. Those car-horn bleats of annoyance. Those corner clusters of impatience, waiting for a green light. Those barks of “Excuse me!” that sound like the opposite of an apology.
We even miss, dare we say it, the subway. Those rickety escalators descending slowly, slowly, toward some hellish train platform near middle-earth, as Talking Heads lyrics loop through our minds: “My God, what have I done?”
Someday, we will again be pressed against one another like cattle in a rail car, eyes averted, listening to teenagers share the inside jokes of adolescence, worrying that we will never again see daylight.
Someday.
For now, perhaps, we can take one of the many available seats on the 7 train, or the B, or the E, and behind our masks, give in to the sweep and sway, the rocking, buh-buh-BUH, buh-buh-BUH, buh-buh-BUH.
Give in as we reflect on the infrastructural wonder that is the subway system, which carries life to the city as arteries carry blood to the heart. It provides passage to those places — the open fields and quiet sanctuaries — that sustain the soul.
To the city’s parks. Where dogs share how-do-you-do sniffs while their owners engage in forced chitchat; where the unfettered air can flutter a bridal veil or grant flight to a kite.
Where the forgotten pleasure of bare feet on grassis remembered,again.
There are other kinds of parks as well. Among the many givens we now miss is the comforting knowledge that on nearly any summer’s day, you could lose yourself in a baseball park. If the Yankees were away from the Bronx, the Mets were likely home in Queens.
Even when empty and silent — whether because of the off-season or a pandemic — these parks seem to retain the ruckus of thousands surrendering to a simple game’s pleasures.
The somber analyses, the cheers of children, the roaring release uncorked whenbatmeetsball.
There are also those parks of the intellect and soul, the libraries and museums from which we are, for now, precluded from freely wandering.
We are left to stand outside these institutions and recreate with our imagination the experience within.
The inquisitive tapping on terminals. The practiced but beguiling patter of docents. The churchlike hush in the presence of art, antiquities and literature…
Reminders that even in the bleakest of times, humankind has produced works for the ages.
The physics of the city prevail: For every morning rush hour, there is an equal and opposite evening rush hour. The pandemic-altered beat carries into the night, as we continue to adjust to the not-quite-right.
People drink and dine on the sidewalks and in the streets, turning corners of the city into proof that human beings crave one another’s company.
Finally, home. Above ground this time, with a taxi’s back window framing the city panorama. The bridges of yesteryear and the skyscrapers of yesterday, the human silhouettes in preferred or resigned solitude.
All of it, cast in thenaturalunnaturallight of Gotham.
More unnatural, though, is this cab darting east to west across 42nd Street — without once slowing for traffic. No further proof is needed of a New York City out of rhythm.
The music of the city has been altered, forever — for you, for me, for the taxi driver, for everyone.
But maybeits new beatis finally one thatwe canalldance to.
Photographed by Todd Heisler. Written by Dan Barry.

Edited and designed by Jeffrey Furticella, Rebecca Lieberman and Meghan Louttit.

The New York Public Library andMother New Yorkprovided the audio, from their collaborative album,Missing Sounds of New York.

Audio for the Clinton Hill photo provided byChad Vill, featuring a recorded mix by Adil Rahman.
Produced by Jeffrey Furticella, Rebecca Lieberman and Meghan Louttit.