I Alvin Lucier

A truly mind-blowing deep dive into one of the most important works within the canon of 20th Century experimental music, stretching across 3 LPs and 2 CDs, as well as containing a 124-page book, Alvin Lucier's "I Am Sitting in a Room. Archival Recordings 1969–2019" on Sound On Paper Editions gathers 10 previously unavailable renderings of this astounding composition, created by the composer between 1969 and 2019. Illumining an unprecedented level of depth, nuance, and insight from a work that can never be the same thing twice, this stunning box set is issued in a limited edition of 500 hand-numbered copies and won't sit around for long. As highly recommended as they come!

Anthony Burr and Charles Curtis present this collection of curated compositions from Alvin Lucier and Morton Feldman. Two Lucier pieces, August Moon and Trio For Clarinet, Cello & Tuba are presented here for the first time. Liner notes are excerpted from a lecture on Morton Feldman given by Alvin Lucier.

astille musique presents its seventeenth release »Lucier & Bach: Sitting in a Room« featuring Hanna Herfurtner (soprano, voice), Clara Blessing (oboe), Joosten Ellée (violin), Linda Mantcheva (violoncello) and Elina Albach (harpsichord, organ). The album combines Alvin Lucier’s sound art piece I am sitting in a room with arias by Johann Sebastian Bach (from BWV 61, 1, 58, 199, 57, 36, 248, 68). Recorded in co-production with Deutschlandfunk, the set also includes a 48-page bilingual booklet (EN, DE) with articles by Thilo Braun, an interview with the singer and the producer, and the complete lyrics, as well as several photo leaflets of the composers and the performers.

Alvin Curran - Canti Illuminati - 1982
Classical/Avant-Garde | EAC (FLAC+CUE+LOG) | 260 MB (WinRAR) | 2002 | Cover

Long out of print, this is an overdue reissue of American composer Alvin Curran's third record. Following his involvement in the live electronics performance group Musica Elettronica Viva, Curran embarked on a more personal pursuit utilizing his own voice and a patchwork of minimal synthesizer and field recordings. The two parts of Canti Illuminati show clear affinities to the vocal style of Pandit Pran Nath and Poppy No Good era Terry Riley, while also coming off like a denser version of Takehisa Kosugi's Catch Wave. Curran has had a lifelong affinity to the resonances of foghorns and their sonorities seem to serve as the general underlying drone and pulse of the first section. Curran's vocals, however, are what give the piece its rhythmic push. His tapestry of tape work and synthesizer delays matches the vocal intensity of his delivery; Canti Illuminati pt. 1 ends up most resembling the shimmering dronescapes of late-era Boredoms.
For the beginning section of the second half of Canti Illuminati, Curran brought in a choir; this is probably the least successful section of the disc. That may just be a matter of taste as I generally find chorus' of extended vocal technique to be somewhat corny. However, at about the 10-minute mark of the 24-minute piece the chorus fades away to an exquisitely beautiful extended passage comprised only of Curran's wordless vocals and lyrically minimal piano phrasing. Memorably haunting stuff that devolves at the final two minutes to a little bit of piano improvisation that seems to have been taken from the Great American Songbook. AWESOME!