In collaboration with the Max Neuhaus Estate, we are delighted to share that all audio-visual materials in the Max Neuhaus papers are digitized and available online through the Columbia Libraries’ Digital Library Collections.

The recordings document Max’s career as a pioneer of sound: his work as a percussionist and performer; his sound installations; and his experiments such as developing a new emergency siren. Also included are interviews and conversations with Neuhaus and scholars or other artists about his work.

Early recordings include a performance by Neuhaus of a work by the composer John Cage: 27 minutes 10.554 seconds. After receiving his BM and MM from the Manhattan School of Music, Neuhaus performed as a soloist throughout the United States and Europe. He quit performing in 1968.

The archive also has recordings from Neuhaus’s “Public Supply” (1966) sound work, a live composition that harnessed the power of a network invented by Neuhaus. The network connected a radio station and telephone network, allowing for listeners in to call in and join an aural space, with Neuhaus at the controls. He wrote of the work, “The result was a live collage where I acted as a moderator balancing the levels of the introverted with those of the extroverted.”* This culminated in “Radio Net” (1977), a two hour program on NPR that removed Neuhaus as a moderator of the space and connected callers to the sound space from across 190 stations.

Beginning in the late 1970s, Neuhaus became interested in redesigning the sound of emergency sirens: to be more practical for the drivers of emergency vehicles, less painful to the ear of bystanders, but still alert drivers and pedestrians. By the late 1980s he has found financial support for this work and conducted extensive testing in the California desert, then in an urban environment.

 
Of particular interest to New Yorkers will be the short film Times Square, produced by Firefly Pictures, which documents the Max Neuhaus sound installation of the same name. The installation is site specific, using computer created sounds that resonate up to pedestrians, changing as they move about their business. Originally created in the 1970s, it was reinstalled by Max in 2002 and is maintained today by the Dia Art Foundation. The grate is at the pedestrian island between 45th and 46th streets.

To learn more about the Max Neuhaus papers, or schedule an appointment for research, please visit the collection finding aid.

To learn more about Max Neuhaus and enjoy even more of his art and inventions, please visit the Max Neuhuas Estate online.

*Neuhaus, Max. “Networks,” Max Neuhaus-Estate, June 2004, accessed December 24, 2025, https://www.max-neuhaus.estate/en/sound-works/vectors/networks.