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By Michael Cooper. PHILADELPHIA — “Can I get one with whiz, no onion?” a hungry young man called into the window of Pat’s King of Steaks. The counterman deftly flipped a sizzling skein of thinly sliced steak onto a roll and then applied a lacquer of Cheez Whiz to create a classic Philly cheesesteak. Taking it all in with a digital recorder and high-end binaural microphones one day in February was the composer Tod Machover, who writes symphonies about cities around the world and brings some of their most characteristic sounds into the concert hall. 
(Photo Credit: Jessica Kourkounis for The New York Times)
Mr. Machover was nearly finished with his latest work, “Philadelphia Voices,” which the Philadelphia Orchestra and the conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin will perform at Carnegie Hall on Tuesday, but he was not quite satisfied with an earlier attempt to capture the sizzle of a cheesesteak. So he went back for a second helping |