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For NYC musicians, all the subway's a stage

BY LAUREN JOHNSTON | STAFF WRITER

3:13 PM EDT, May 18, 2005

Two months ago, Meredith Axelrod, 20, packed her bags, grabbed her guitar and left San Francisco to head for New York in a pilgrimage many a musician had made before her. She was out to make it big in the big city.

But first, she needed a stage.

So on Monday, the ragtime guitarist found herself in the cavernous, marble halls of Grand Central Terminal waiting among African drummers and jazz trios to audition for a gig that would put her and partner Craig Ventresco, 37, on one of the most visible stages in the city: a subway platform.

Axelrod and the 70 or so acts who showed up that day were all hoping to be chosen for the MTA's Music Under New York program (MUNY), which has been sending performers underground since 1987.

MUNY manager Lydia Bradshaw said the program was hatched to ease the chaos of commuting for harried straphangers and boost mass transit use, but many musical careers have been fueled by the platform playing.

Longtime MUNY musicians like Sean Grissom, known around town as the Cajun cellist, and Elijah Staley, a blues singer and guitarist who goes by Carolina Slim, figured out long ago you don't need an agent to score gigs in the Big Apple.

A MetroCard will do just fine.

Both have been playing on the program since it began. Legally, anyone can perform in the subways but there are perks to MUNY membership.

Artists get set time slots to perform in specific stations, they tend to coexist a bit more peacefully with transit cops than their freelance counterparts and they're allowed to sell CDs in Grand Central and Penn Station.

Both Grissom, 44, and Staley, 78, report serendipitous tunnel meetings with platform passersby have opened countless doors over the years.

"I couldn't have a press agent give me more exposure than I get in the subway," Grissom said. "I've done four film soundtracks because I happened to be in the subway on the right day. Every business card handed out could be a gig."

Staley said he enjoys the raw intimacy of playing in the tunnels versus more structured stage performances, but mostly he joined the program to be seen. "In the subway you'll see every kind of person in the business," he said.

The gravelly voiced singer was invited to do a spot on "Saturday Night Live" and shot a Sprite commercial in the early 90s through fortuitous sub-sidewalk run-ins.

He also starred in the music video for Madonna's 1994 hit "Secret."

Calls to James Graseck, a regular subway performer, found the classical violinist traveling to Carlisle, Pa., for a gig set up by a man who approached him during a platform performance.

"Playing there actually begets work for me," he said.

This is not to say the underground music scene is a vast wonderland where the gigs are as plentiful as free tabloids and the platforms are paved in platinum record deals. It's just that there's always the chance you'll get lucky.

The other reason performers move underground, of course, is love of the music and the freedom that comes with playing in an unstructured space.

"Playing music like that is good for you. If you're a musician and a gifted musician you're supposed to play anywhere. You're supposed to play it for people," Staley said.

There is also the sheer electricity of connecting with a swift-moving, non-captive audience that is often surging all around you. Fleeting eye contact with scurrying travelers amounts to bursts of applause and to bring a bustling New Yorker to stop in his or her tracks is the equivalent of a standing ovation.