Emerging from a year of profound isolation, Make Music New York 2021 became a triumphant, city-wide reunion that underscored the healing power of public art and shared human connection. Neighbors stepped out onto sidewalks, Open Streets, and community plazas across all five boroughs, transforming the urban landscape into a vibrant, open-air laboratory of creative resilience and pure joy.

 
2021 Program Highlights Included: Multiple Mass Appeal concerts, which gathered hundreds of musicians of all backgrounds in public parks and plazas for synchronized, single-instrument jam sessions ranging from guitars to brass choirs • Expanded Open Street Activations, which closed off neighborhood thoroughfares to vehicular traffic, turning everyday pavement into community dance floors and acoustic concert stages • Flowerpot Music, where percussionists utilized everyday terracotta flowerpots to perform structured, minimalist outdoor compositions that blended rhythmic sound with neighborhood greenery • Street Studios, which brought emerging producers and mobile, outdoor gear stations to busy sidewalks to collaborate on-the-spot with passing pedestrians and record tracks in real-time. • We also presented the first-ever Make Music Autumn lineup on the weekend of Sept. 18-19 • in partnership with Metropolis Ensemble, Biophony at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden featured 25 performances of newly commissioned neoclassical works • Tilted Axes: Music for Mobile Electric Guitars took over Astor Place Plaza • and the Unplugged Brooklyn Americana Festival from Brooklyn Bridge Park