Over the holidays, I had the privilege of riding the Long Island Rail with all of its whistles and bells. It was the night before Christmas when all through the train, I struggled to stay awake to the gentle jazz of the wheels on the tracks. The doors even signaled their openings and closings with a simple musical interval. Perhaps it was the comfiness of the LIRR, or that I had drunk a little too much soy nog, but I began to think those thoughts which tend to stir this time of year, of orphans and angels and other things like that. The CIA-grade conspiracy theorist in me wishes to see the world in a negative light, and indeed this blog should be taking advantage of the cottage industry booming around musical conspiracies, (such as the notion of Rockefeller Equal Temperament and the Lost Concert A that cures cancer), but thinking of Mrs. Train, her doors and her chimes, the jazzy way she slinks along the tracks, carrying humanity’s children home; I do believe Father Christmas, Mother Nature, and possibly my Drunk Uncle Joey are in some kind of collusion, rigging the very doors to sound in a way that even babies find pleasing. After all, we built this city…we built this city on major thirds.
Here’s the door chime now; drag over the noteheads below.
The M6 train closes its doors with a 2-tone chime—the friendly DING-DONG of a doorbell, a Major Third interval which can be traced back to “Westminster Quarters”. The new M7 has a horrible beep like a truck’s back-up beep, just to be sure that everything still worsens over time.
Anyhoo, here’s my favorite door chime. God bless ya.
