1978
Image: Max Neuhaus, Sound Text Siren
In the 1980's Neuhaus took on the problem of redesigning the sounds of emergency-vehicle sirens. The project's focuses were to make sounds that were locatable in an urban environment so people would know what to do when they heard one, to allow drivers of emergency vehicles to hear one another when their sirens were on so they wouldn't run into each other, and to make sounds we could live with – which would have authority without being authoritarian.
sirens, an edition at 66 East, 18 March, 22 April 2007
Image: Photo Max Neuhaus, Callng All Cars
Photo Credit: Fred Mertz. NYT Pictures
The New York Times National, Saturday, April 1, 1989
Bibliography of papers on Localisation of Sound and Sirens:
First published in Zeitgleich [English, German] (Vienna: Triton, 1994).
(1) Published in the New York Times on December 6, 1974.
(2) In 1991 Neuhaus was awarded the first patent for a sound as a result of his siren project; see "Siren - Aural Design" [Dutch, English], Kunst + Museum Journaal (Amsterdam), vol. 4, no. 6 (1993), and "Siren" [German] and "Listen" [German], Welt auf töneren Füssen (Göttingen), Schriftenreihe Forum, Band 2 (1994).
(3) 'muzak' is the generic term for background music in the US.