NY Composer Gets Green Light to Turn Eiffel Tower into Musical Instrument

Dogged efforts by the composer Joseph Bertolozzi to turn the Eiffel Tower into one big musical instrument are paying off, writes Daniel J. Wakin in The New York Times blog ArtsBeat.

Bertolozzi, who has created a piece of music by harvesting percussive sounds from the Franklin D. Roosevelt Mid-Hudson Bridge near Poughkeepsie, NY, said he recently received approval from the Eiffel Tower Operating Company (the Société d’Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel) to record samples from the tower. The samples would then be assembled into a piece of music, with the ultimate goal of performing it live on the tower itself.

Bertolozzi traveled to Paris in the fall to present his project, and he received a letter of approval last month. The tower operating company said it was open to the idea of a live concert but was making no promises.

Now, Bertolozzi said, all he has to do is raise the money. He said his aim was to have performances in 2014, the tower’s 125th anniversary.