*New podcast: <
http://rwm.macba.cat/en/sonia/alvin-lucier/capsula>*
* to coincide with Alvin Lucier 85th birthday, on May 14th, we feature a
podcast with an exclusive interview with him
<
http://rwm.macba.cat/en/sonia/alvin-lucier/capsula>*
Link:
http://rwm.macba.cat/en/sonia/alvin-lucier/capsula
A key figure in post-Cage experimental music, Lucier is one of a kind, a
composer who, as James Tenney says, makes his fellow musicians find
themselves “having to revise our basic (and often unconscious) assumptions
– our self-evident axioms about music.” Driven by a curiosity to understand
“how things work” (an innocent and unprejudiced curiosity that Tenney
compares to that of a child), Lucier always seems ready to disappear within
sound. It is as if his fascination with the sound phenomenon leads him to
avoid interfering in its manifestation. His work is thus by no means based
on self-expression or on compositional interventions. Instead, he allows
sounds to “be themselves” without pushing or directing them in any way.
To coincide with his 85th birthday, SON[I]A features a conversation with
Lucier (that took place in Boston in 2014) in which he talks about the need
to listen carefully, the composers that have accompanied and influenced him
over the years, and the role of space and technology in his work, among
many other things. Near the end, he also explains some interesting facts
about “I am Sitting in a Room”, one if his best known and most enigmatic
works.* Many happy returns, Mr Lucier!*
*Background music: "Music on a Long Thin Wire 1", 1977*
*Timeline*
*00:00* Not just listening
*00:46* Revealing implicit sounds
*02:53* Let it happen: on "Music for Piano and Magnetic Strings"
*07:18* Transparency of sounds
*08:35* The question of space
*10:48* Music that happens in a loudspeaker
*13:16* Letting the players play
*14:59* "I'm Sittting in a Room"... live: something wonderful about real
time
*17:30* "All I wanted to do is to tell people what I was doing"
*Enjoy!*