4 entries for Tuesday, December 14, 2021

Alvin Lucier: The Duke of York

From Bird and Person Dyning (1972–1973). I skipped the Latin recitation in the beginning, but feel free to hear from the start—either way, try to stick with it for the whole experience. Simple processes and simple inputs over time transform your perception; instead of proposing ‘what’ to listen, the composer guides us 'how’ to listen. The use of stereo is for guiding your attention (if you allow it). As it develops, it feels like being inside of someone else’s trip: notice how provocations create a chain of effects in sound, how it still feels 'organic’ despite being heavily electronic; observe the unfolding of a process, someone playing with their own perception and yours, often leading to surprise without shock.

Let's talk about the thing we missed in Crenshaw's speech....

[Education destroys fear.]

Alvin Lucier: I Am Sitting In A Room (1981)

Speaking seamlessly morphs into ‘room’, sounding ethereal like a vortex has opened, alive and shimmering. Simple production technique on a simple text to create something profound. It takes a magician to create something out of nothing, or maybe just perception… We can always listen more.

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.