Alvin Augustus Lucier Jr. 1931 – 2021

death

An influence: experimental composer, sound artist, free and open thinker. (On Ubuweb; on Discogs). The first generation of 20th Century sonic artists are falling. Last August, it was R. Murray Schafer, before that in 2016 it was Pauline Oliveros.

Having students sit for 45 minutes to hear the entirety of “I am sitting on a room …” — last imposed that on my “Ways of Listening” students at UTS in Sydney. They absorbed it without complaint, unlike my Amurikan students who balked and whined <sigh>.

I am sitting in a room different from the one you are in now. I am recording the sound of my speaking voice and I am going to play it back into the room again and again until the resonant frequencies of the room reinforce themselves so that any semblance of my speech, with perhaps the exception of rhythm, is destroyed. What you will hear, then, are the natural resonant frequencies of the room articulated by speech. I regard this activity not so much as a demonstration of a physical fact, but more as a way to smooth out any irregularities my speech might have.”

Lucier’s 90th birthday celebration … a 24-hour global performance of … “I am sitting in a room” … May 2021

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